English Language Learners

English Language Learners (ELL) bring a diverse set of skills and background to a classroom.  The language spoken at home is something other than english, and the home language may or may not be related to english. ELLs may be Canadian born or newcomers to the country. An ELL's first significant exposure to English may be when they arrive in a Canadian classroom.  Many of these students have travelled from or through various parts of the world, and frequently have family or friends on other parts of the globe that create special and unique connections that they contribute to the classroom community.

ELLs may be overlooked by teachers because they frequently sound confident and fluid. They often speak with a Canadian accent. Their oral language english skills frequently exceed their academic english skills, which may take up to five years to catch up. However, these students need help with more advanced grammatical structure and english vocabulary. They also need a wide variety of texts and materials that reflect their realities. As well, it is important that ELLs are given the opportunity to participate meaningfully within the classroom community by being given the opportunities to share their personal experiences. 


A community bulletin board that ELLs and other students contribute to creates dialogue and discussion, and provides real life reading experiences. Multicultural dinners that students create menus and invitations for extend into writing and provide a bridge between home and school. Labels, bulletin board headings and titles can be added to the school community in the language ELLs enjoy at home as well as in english. 

A couple of resources well worth exploring to support ELL Learners:

Storyline Online is a wonderful website where several stories are read aloud by actors. ELLs who would benefit from more english read alouds will enjoy the quality of texts and the skilled presenters. In addition to seeing the presenters, the text and illustration are also displayed  and the audio and video streaming quality is excellent. Several of the presenters are men, so there is a wonderful opportunity for boys to see reading male role models as well and the presenters come from different ethnic backgrounds. 

Activities for ESL has a wealth of bilingual quizzes in many languages. For example, the Arabic English link offers vocabulary in many topics including days of the week, colours, parts of the body, etc. A great resource for students, teachers and even their parents.