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YOU ARE A STUDENT
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246978
Transforming the ESL Sequence:
A Report from the First Year
Why the Change?
External Pressures
Budget Cuts
Financial Aid Cuts and Restrictions
District-Wide ESL Faculty Retreat
March 2011
The New Peralta ESL Curriculum
Combined Reading and Writing
Change from 6 levels to 4:
old
new
(6)
5
advanced
4
high intermediate
3
intermediate
2
1
high beginning
Change from 4 to 3 Skill Areas
High
Beginning
Intermediate
High
Intermediate
Advanced
Grammar
(4 Units)
284A/B
215A/B
216A/B
217A/B
Listening &
Speaking
(4 Units)
283A/B
232A/B
233A/B
50A/B
Reading &
Writing
(6 Units)
285A/B
222A/B
223A/B
52A/B
The Strands
• 6 skill strands in addition to language
objectives run through all main courses at all
levels
Critical Thinking
Information Literacy: Computer
Skills/Research
Intercultural Communication
and U.S. Culture
Sentence Level Accuracy
Comprehension (Reading/Listening)
and Production (Writing/Speaking)
4-8 level A/B system for flexible
acceleration
Visualization #1 of the A/B plan:
Accordion
Visualization #1 of the A/B plan:
Accordion
HIGH
BEG A
STUDENT
ADVANCING
FAST
INT
A
HIGH
BEG B
ADV
A
HIGH
INT A
INT
B
HIGH
INT B
ADV
B
Visualization #1 of the A/B plan:
Accordion
HIGH
BEG A
INT
A
HIGH
BEG B
STUDENT
ADVANCING
SLOWER
ADV
A
HIGH
INT A
INT
B
HIGH
INT B
ADV
B
Visualization #1 of the A/B plan:
Accordion
HIGH
BEG A
INT
A
HIGH
BEG B
STUDENT
ADJUSTING
TO PROGRESS
ADV
A
HIGH
INT A
INT
B
HIGH
INT B
ADV
B
Visualization #2 of the A/B plan:
Stairs
ADV B
STUDENT
ADVANCING
FASTER
ADV A
HIGH INT B
HIGH INT A
INT B
INT A
HIGH BEG B
HIGH BEG A
Visualization #2 of the A/B plan:
Stairs
ADV B
ADV A
HIGH INT B
STUDENT
ADVANCING
SLOWER
HIGH INT A
INT B
INT A
HIGH BEG B
HIGH BEG A
Visualization #2 of the A/B plan:
Stairs
ADV B
STUDENT
ADJUSTING
TO PROGRESS
ADV A
HIGH INT B
HIGH INT A
INT B
INT A
HIGH BEG B
HIGH BEG A
Other features of A/B system:
• All students initially test into an A level
• B levels are only for those who have passed A
and are not ready for the next A level
• Students taking A and B of a level are in class
together and are only identified on the roster
• Attempt to alternate, not repeat instructors/
materials if possible
Example: 3 students toward the end of
High Intermediate A
Got it! Ready
to move
ahead!
I worked hard and
even got a C+, but
I can’t really
perform all of the
SLOs.
Wow! That was
too hard! I got
a D or an F.
Advanced A
High
Intermediate B
High Intermediate A
June/August 2011: mapped out levels
and strands
August 2011-February 2012:
• wrote 24 new course outlines, entered in
Curricunet, and passed them through all
relevant committees
Fall 2012
Report from the 1st Year: Data
• The new curriculum was implemented at all
Peralta Colleges in Fall 2012
• All ESL students started out in an A course at one
of four levels:
•
•
•
•
High-Beginning
Intermediate
High-Intermediate
Advanced
• All students participated in a common
assessment used to determine placement for
Spring 2013
Questions
• How many students accelerated at each level?
• How many students progressed to the B
course?
• When students accelerated, how did they do?
Laney College Fall 2012 R/W Students R/W Courses Taken Spring 2013
None
B course of
same level
A Course of
next level
A course 2
levels
High38%
Beginning
285A students
(229 total)
25%
1%
Intermediate
36%
222A students
(200 total)
22.5%
0%
HighIntermediate
223A
(215 total)
38.6%
22.8%
0%
Advanced
52A
(171 total)
57.3%
17.5%
25.1%
0%
How did the students who accelerated
in Spring 2013 do?
Laney College
High-Beg. Students who accelerated to Intermediate
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
81
62
76.54%
(Success rate in Intermediate Fall 2012= 83.16%)
Intermediate Students who accelerated to High-Intermediate
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
78
63
80.77%
(Success rate in High-Intermediate Fall 2012 = 79.07%)
How did the students who accelerated
in Spring 2013 do?
Laney College
High-Int. Students who accelerated to Advanced
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
71
63
88.73%
(Success rate in Advanced Fall 2012= 77.84%)
Berkeley City College
High-Int. Students who accelerated to Advanced
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
21
15
71.43%
(Success rate in Advanced Fall 2012 = 83.6%)
How did the students who accelerated
in Spring 2013 do?
Laney College
Advanced Students who accelerated to English 1A
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
29
26
89.66%
(Success rate in English 1A Fall 2012= 62.16%)
Berkeley City College
Advanced Students who accelerated to English 1A
Total Graded
Success
Success Rate
12
11
91.67%
(Success rate in English 1A Fall 2012 = 64.05%)
So, how many students accelerated?
• At all levels, more students accelerated than
did not
• More students accelerated at the first three
levels than did at the highest level
• A significant number of students did not
continue in the sequence in Spring 2013
(averaging around 37% for the first three
levels and increasing to 57% one level below
transfer)
When students accelerated, how did
they do?
• The success rates for students who accelerated into the
the A course of the next level in Spring 2013 for the
three levels below English 1A (transfer) are pretty
consistent with the success rates for those courses in
Fall 2012 at both colleges
• The success rates of the students who accelerated from
Advanced A to English 1A were exactly 28 percentage
points higher at both colleges than the respective
success rates in English 1A for Fall 2012
BCC Portfolio Assessment Results
• All Reading & Comp classes
• Pieces scored together:
– Short (3-5pp) research paper using “Academically
Acceptable Sources,” including databases
– 2 hour in-class essay: summary/response to a
short, college-level essay or excerpt
• “Dead Week” Scoring sessions with extensive
norming
First Portfolio Assessment Results
The Old ESL Program Writing Focus by Level
Writing 3:
• paragraphs
• short essays
Writing 4:
• essays in different rhetorical modes
Writing 5:
• summary/response
• quoting/paraphrasing
Writing 6:
• persuasive essays
• research paper
% of students scoring Acceptable-Excellent on the English/ESL
Common Portfolio Assessment Spring 11 vs. Spring 13
top level of ESL (1-below transfer)
spring 11 vs. spring 13
What were the outcomes of
integrating reading & writing?
• 88% faculty said integrating r/w increased
intellectual rigor to a moderate degree or
more
• 61% positive 17% neutral and 12% negative
experience overall new curriculum
Student perception:
Do you feel that reading and writing are integrated (= connected) in the
Reading/Writing class you are taking now?
70.0%
60.0%
No. We mostly study reading, not
writing.
50.0%
40.0%
30.0%
20.0%
10.0%
0.0%
No. We mostly study writing, not
reading.
We study both reading and writing
but they are not connected.
Reading and writing are somewhat
connected.
Yes, reading and writing are very
connected.
Instructor perception
88% faculty said integrating r/w increased
intellectual rigor to a moderate degree or more
“Allows for more interesting and meaningful
assignments that engage students better and
more opportunities for recycling target skills.”
• Language learning is a spiral, not a
pyramid
• Contextualization and acceleration
go hand-in-hand
How Did Faculty Respond
to the District-Wide Redesign?
• Most satisfied; some: just too much work
• most: students benefit greatly from being
allowed to progress at their own speed;
some: students learn less well when they are
being “pushed” to accelerate
Positive Outcomes: Professional
Development/Collaboration
• PD in-house
• PD well attended
• 70% of faculty say quality of PD has increased a
moderate amount or more
• Collaboration among faculty has increased: 79%
say “a great deal or a lot”
“I learn from my colleagues and students benefit from
multiple teachers’ experience in collaborative
assignments”
Being held to standards and collaborating “has made
me a better teacher”
Positive Outcomes in the classroom
• Faculty say they are more excited about and
stimulated by teaching now
• Integrating skills is a more realistic college
experience
Challenges: time and $
• Extensive collaboration is difficult for part-time
faculty-they are not compensated
• A feeling among some faculty that non-academic
and lower level students are being left behind
• Faculty stressed from trying to improve on
multiple fronts
• Impression that we are cramming more into a
shorter period of time.
• Frustration with lack of automatic alignment
between textbooks and course outlines
Challenges for evaluation
• A disconnect between faculty impressions of
students and what students report about their
experiences
• Confounding factors: budget cuts, other
acceleration initiatives, Adult School closing
• Confusion/miscommunication about terms,
goals
Remaining Questions
• Are we serving both academic and non-academic
students? Is there a true distinction?
• Student goals can change: who knows what
students will decide to do given the chance?
• How do we better support faculty as they make
changes in pedagogy and honor those who feel
they have always been doing a “good job”?