Children adopted from abroad at older ages have unique speech and language-learning issues. At adoption, the impact of longer stays in orphanages with their associated lack of enrichment, nutrition, and healthcare is more pronounced. After adoption, the children begin school in a new language soon after arriving home. These children quickly lose…

Although the United States has had a language requirement for citizenship (through the naturalization process) since the first decade of the 20th century, very little research and discussion has taken place in academic circles about this requirement, which has been enforced for the past two decades through a test and testing practice to which…

This article reports on two related studies carried out to link the State examination of Dutch as a second language to the Common European Framework of Reference for languages (CEFR). In the first study, key persons from institutions for higher education were asked to determine the minimally required language level of beginning students. In the…

In researching the potential of cognitive diagnostic assessment, researchers concur that the quality of diagnostic inferences is subject to the extent to which the construct representations based on cognitive skills are theoretically compelling, empirically sound, and relevant to test use. In this paper, I argue that the construction of a Q matrix…

Since the publication in England of the National Languages Strategy, there has been much debate concerning the aims of primary modern foreign language (PMFL) teaching. This article presents research into the beliefs of tutors and pre-service teachers in training on Postgraduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) courses with a PMFL specialism in…

This article presents a model of assessment development integrating student characteristics with the conceptualization, design, and implementation of standardized achievement tests. The model extends the assessment triangle proposed by the National Research Council (Pellegrino, Chudowsky, & Glaser, 2001) to consider the needs of students with…

Children from bilingual backgrounds are sometimes overidentified with language impairment (LI) because educators do not have appropriate developmental expectations. At other times bilingual children are underidentified because educators wait to identify difficulties while children learn the second language. In this review we discuss data on…

The impact of information and communication technologies (ICTs) is changing the nature of literary narratives for children and the contexts in which they experience and respond to such narratives outside of school contexts. However, in the main, teachers do not feel confident or comfortable in the world of digital multimedia. Children's literature…

CD-ROM affordances are explored in this article through participation in classroom interaction. CD-ROMs for shared reading of animated stories and language work were introduced to all Malaysian primary schools in 2003 for the Year 1 English Literacy Hour. We present classroom interaction extracts that show how the same CD-ROMs offer different…

The "Framework for High-Quality English Language Proficiency Standards and Assessments" (Framework) was conceived as a critical tool in states' efforts to ensure that their English learner (EL) students achieve English language proficiency (ELP) and, also, achieve at high levels academically. Building on the best knowledge from relevant research…

Because English language learners (ELL) are among the fastest growing student populations in the country, improving the quality of programs serving them is essential to the state of Texas as well as to the country as a whole. Despite decades of experience in attempting to address the language proficiency and academic needs of English language…

One of the central challenges of ESL teaching is striking the right balance between form and meaning. In pronunciation pedagogy, this challenge is compounded because repetitive practice, which has been shown to enhance phonological acquisition and promote fluency, is widely viewed as being incompatible with communicative principles. This article…

A crucial question for automatically analyzing learner language is to determine which grammatical information is relevant and useful for learner feedback. Based on knowledge about how learner language varies in its grammatical properties, we propose a framework for reusing analyses found in corpus annotation and illustrate its applicability to…

This paper provides a critical review of the literature between 1980 and 2005 on the evaluation of resources for computer-assisted language learning (CALL) with a particular emphasis on elementary education. An analysis of that literature indicates that there are a range of approaches to evaluation that have been somewhat monolithic and possibly…

The Center for Adult English Language Acquisition (CAELA) Network, under contract with the Office of Vocational and Adult Education (OVAE), has created a framework that can be used to plan, implement, and evaluate professional development for practitioners working with adult English language learners at the state, regional, and program levels. The…