Class placement of elementary school emerging bilingual students

Bilingual Research Journal, Spring 1998 by Tellez, Kip

This study corroborates the findings of Lam and Gordon (1992), who found that few states had clear guidelines for testing EB students and the majority of those states that did test EB students made no modifications to the test or testing procedure. Duran ( 1989) also points out the need for better testing of language minority students.

Nationwide, legislation contained in Goals 2000 and the Title I Reauthorization Act mandates that the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) include more EB students in its program. Perhaps the new NAEP procedures will provide a clearer picture of the common EB student's academic growth. In Texas, the development of a Spanish TAAS could demonstrate that bilingual education does indeed promote high literacy skills in Spanish, skills that can be brought to bear in the acquisition of English literacy. But the TAAS tests, in spite of being the only required measure of student achievement in the state of Texas, has undergone little policy or psychometric scrutiny. The development of the Spanish TAAS continues this unfortunate tradition. Texas Education Agency officials have admitted that the Spanish tests were merely translated from the English versions and not built directly from the Spanish instructional objectives (Starz, 1998). Nor were the English and Spanish properly equated. Therefore, equal performances on the English and Spanish tests will reveal lower scores on the Spanish test, thus underestimating the academic achievement of bilingual students. The only conclusion we can draw from the assessment predicament in Texas is that Gandara and Merino ( 1993) are correct: the current achievement data by EB students are "mythological."

The impact of class sequence, however, deserves to be properly assessed. Educators and policymakers need to know the effects of improper class sequences, and a strong dependent variable is necessary. Tests that measure linguistic or academic achievement in a single language, by default, underestimate cognitive achievement in EB students. Recent advances in combined language aptitude and achievement testing are showing promise. One of these developments is the Bilingual Verbal Abilities Test (Munoz, Shrank, Cummins & Alvarado, 1998). Briefly described, this test first presents verbal ability items in English and then offers missed items in the student's other language. Early reports suggest that this assessment process provides better estimates of academic achievement because students can take advantage of their linguistic flexibility (Shrank, Fletcher & Alvarado, in press).

Finally, the equivocal interpretations of the data should not detract those who are responsible for the policy decisions regarding EB children from the research on the cognitive and social advantages of bilingualism. Studies such as Hakuta and Diaz ( 1985) and Bialystok ( 1991 ) strongly support the view that bilingualism, in general, and biliteracy, in particular, result in positive consequences for metalinguistic development. Policymakers and educators must stay the course during the certain and heated political debate over English-only proposals and their impact Qn language-learning classes. Consistent, sequential ESL and bilingual class placements offer children an educationally sound and humane introduction to the English language. Both ESL and bilingual education, when properly implemented, result in a national resource: a multilingual citizenry capable of forging new alliances in an increasingly interdependent world.