Middle school is different. How can we better support our multilingual learners during those middle years?
Whether it begins in grade five, six, or seven, middle school is designed to help students transition from the structured environment of elementary school to the increased independence of high school. Students navigate identity, more choices, and academic pressures. We must guide them through newfound freedoms along their journey and help them build a strong academic foundation. Empowering multilingual learners (MLs) during these formative years ensures their long-term achievement.
Understanding and Navigating the Content Gap
Multilingual learners are culturally, linguistically, and economically diverse. Unfortunately, they usually have inferior access to content courses compared to non-MLs because of prior academic achievement, institutional constraints, and EL classification. We know that English proficiency and academic ability are not the same, so we give MLs individualized tools for differentiated instruction. Middle school students respond well to learning at their own pace through rigorous, structured, and repetitive activities. Middle school teachers help them do this by providing learning tools that monitor student progress and involve language and content equally.
What does this mean for middle school educators?
- Provide Instructional Scaffolding: Supply extra materials to add support and enhance learning in the mastery of tasks.
- Unpack the Standards: Use standards to help MLs identify the skills and tasks to help them understand content concepts.
- Prioritize Phonics and Oral Proficiency: Help MLs achieve reading fluency and comprehension through explicit phonics instruction.
- Provide Equal Access: Provide MLs with accessible and comprehensible academic content.
- Connect data to instruction: Use data to identify literacy gaps.
Unlocking Success with Boost
Boost is a supplemental literacy solution that significantly enhances foundational reading and writing skills while also accelerating language acquisition and oral language development. It uses adaptive software to provide individual instruction in the following areas:
- Foundational Skills: Boost provides systematic, explicit instruction and practice of phonological awareness skills based on the Science of Reading; gamified assessments provide detailed data for each foundational skill.
- Reading: Readings are broken into smaller strands and progression levels. This allows for mini-lessons, actionable teaching points, and supported reading practice and instruction.
- Speaking: Boost provides interpersonal oral activities supported by video lessons, classroom activities, and partner speaking games.
- Writing: Boost provides writing modules that support differentiated instruction. Students receive guided and independent practice via video mini-lessons, graphic organizers, checklists, and writing prompts that integrate the reading curriculum. Students receive mastery-based assessments across three genres.
How does Boost Support Achievement in Content Areas?
Teachers using Boost can access a broad library of instructional resources through their dashboards. Mini-lessons are embedded in books, organized by text complexity level, topic, grade level, and objective. Readings draw from informational and fictional texts across various content area topics, including:
References:
Elder, Damian Jina’, “Content Area Teacher Practices for Middle School English Language Learners” (2018). Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies. 5185. https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/dissertations/5185
Umansky, I. M. (2016). Leveled and Exclusionary Tracking: English Learners’ Access to Academic Content in Middle School. American Educational Research Journal, 53(6), 1792-1833. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831216675404 (Original work published 2016)
Vista Higher Learning. (n.d.). Learn about Boost. Avanza Boost. Retrieved [March 23, 2025], from https://learn.vistahigherlearning.com/avanza-boost/learn-about-boost.html
By Katalyn Vidal Loveless, Ed.M.
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