This article reports on the preliminary findings of a two-staged empirical study aimed at gaining insights into the variables salient in the early language and literacy development of young English language learners (ELL). Increasingly, young ELL, whether foreign-born or Canadian-born, arrive at school with little developed English-language…

This article integrates findings from earlier research (Roessingh & Kover, 2003; Roessingh, Kover, & Watt, 2005) linking distinct patterns of achievement for diverse age-on-arrival (AOA) cohorts of ESL learners on the grade 12 Alberta English language arts (ELA) examination to their vocabulary and reading comprehension scores on a standardized…

Over the past few years, the author has often been invited to speak to various audiences on topics related to the development of English-language proficiency. The audience response and the kinds of questions asked led her to share the framework that she has adopted, some visual representations that illustrate the key concepts embedded in the…

This study tracks the development of cognitive academic language proficiency of 47 academically competent high school ESL learners of differing age on arrival (AOA) who received instructed ESL support and one comparison group of six young arrivals who received little if any ESL support during their educational experiences. Although intake and…

The language-through-content movement of the past decade has promoted the use of authentic texts for language-learning purposes. Content-based instruction, however, has had the effect of emphasizing content as the driver of curriculum rather than language-learning objectives in the language-through-content equation. Longitudinal studies of ESL…

With the revamping of the Canada Immigration Act in 1985, the demographic profile of new arrivals to Canada took a marked shift to place a priority on better educated, business-class immigrants. Most of these immigrants are from the Pacific Rim, and they have high expectations for the academic achievement of their children in the Canadian school.…

Discusses the fallacies that pervade the English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) profession: that students arriving in primary school do not require ESL support in order to mainstream successfully. Describes a program designed to help younger-arriving ESL learners once they reach high school, with powerful implications for practice in all K-12…

Examines issues related to time, timing, and timetabling to discuss how the timetable can be constructed to support the development of English language proficiency in a 3-year plan leading to university entrance for academically competent English-as-a-Second-Language learners, using a semester system. (Author/VWL)

Describes an experimental program that includes adjunct support designed to promote access to postsecondary education for more English-as-a-Second-Language students. (Author/VWL)