4 Ways to Support Long-Term
English Learners

By Sarah Said

In this article, Sarah Said offers four simple strategies for helping students who have remained in an ESL program for more than five years.

1. Use Oracy for Reading Comprehension and Writing – Students’ oral abilities can be utilized to improve comprehension and literacy by having them work in teams to talk about the subject content for reading and writing. She suggests starting with “Turn and Talk” to build confidence to participate in class discussions. Three other ways that the author lists to use oracy are Fishbowl described as “Socratic seminars about texts”, Inside Outside Circles in which students question each other for reading comprehension, and Back to Back, Front to Front which offers students time to think about their answers.
2. Create Activities Requiring Students to Mindfully Listen – Said bases these listening activities on “empathy interviews” starting with the game, “What’s Wrong with Grownups?” A follow-up activity requires students to listen to each other without interrupting and only asking questions to clarify meaning.
3. Utilize Small Group Reading Structures – Working in groups of three or four, students read out loud to each other, usually alternating paragraphs.
4. Deconstruct and Reconstruct Sentences for Meaning – Rather than simplifying a text, choose a sentence that exemplifies the main idea, and then dissect it for comprehension. Afterwards, it can be reproduced in students’ own words and used for writing.

In 2019-2020, the graduation rate for MLs was 15% below the national average. According to the author, “With many of those learners being long-term ELLs, rethinking how we teach our students is critical to filling in the gaps.”

You can watch the videos and read the explanations of these strategies here.

Announcing the 2025 Spring Conference Keynote Speakers!

Left to Right:
Tuesday: Alisha de Lorenzo
Wednesday: Dr. Patriann Smith
Thursday: Missy Testerman