English Learners

English Learners (ELs) are students who are still developing reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills in English. The EL population, which is one of the fastest-growing student populations in the United States, is made up of students with varying degrees of exposure to English and levels of competence in their first language. Regardless of their language literacy background, ELs must acquire fundamental reading, academic language, and conversation skills in English in order to be successful. Both Lexia's curriculum and assessment solutions specifically target each of these skills, helping EL students develop fundamental reading skills with the rest of their classmates while providing educators with real-time student performance data that pinpoints a student’s exact skill gaps to strengthen interventions.
 

  • Aligns with best practices in English Learner instruction
     

  • Scaffolded support in Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Haitian-Creole, Vietnamese, and Arabic.

  • Helps students work independently and successfully at all levels of language proficiency
     

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EL Educators See Success with Lexia

"Lexia gave our English Learners an opportunity to experience success in a way that they may not have found outside of this program."

—  Jeff Mosely, Executive Director of Academic Programs, Marietta City Schools

 

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Who Lexia Helps

Who Lexia Helps

Newcomer EL students with beginner-level language and reading skills:

  • Learn key comprehension strategies for listening and reading

  • Develop phonological awareness and phonics skills that are integrated with oral language development

  • Leverage picture-based activities to build concrete and abstract academic vocabulary 

Students with proficient language skills but weak reading skills:

  • Develop sophisticated vocabulary and strong academic language

  • Read challenging narrative and expository texts to develop advanced comprehension strategies

  • Learn figurative language and word concepts such as idioms, similes, and metaphors


 

How Lexia Helps

Supports phonological awareness and phonics at the earliest skill levels

Systematic, intensive work in the areas of phonological awareness and phonics teaches students the sound structure of English and allows them to build on this knowledge in the acquisition of phonic word attack strategies for reading.

 
Enhances vocabulary knowledge

Activities designed to enhance vocabulary knowledge focus on on words with multiple meanings, analogies and shades of meaning, idiomatic expressions, as well as Latin and Greek affix and root meanings. 
 

Develops key comprehension strategies

Activities include the development of skills such as imaging and sequencing in both oral and written language and move to higher order thinking skills such as determining the main idea, drawing inferences, predicting outcomes, and summarizing.  


Builds fluency

Fluency instruction is built systematically through activities that focus on word identification, vocabulary knowledge, and sentence structure. Paragraph-level fluency activities are designed to increase speed of processing while maintaining a focus on meaning.


Improves speaking and listening skills

Speaking and listening activities combine teacher-led instruction and dialogue and structured peer discussions. Small group activities enhance the use of oral language through asking and answering questions related to important vocabulary and content.

WIDA PRIME V2 Correlation

WIDA PRIME V2 Correlation

Lexia® Core5® Reading has been recognized by WIDA as satisfying all 44 criteria under the WIDA PRIME V2 Correlation for English Language Development Standards. This designation provides further credibility for Lexia’s research-proven instructional program, which is currently used by more than 3.8 million students, and has been shown to help EL students close the academic gap.

This correlation highlights the important ways in which Core5 helps language learners develop English literacy skills. Specific examples in the correlation note that Core5:

  • Builds academic language at the discourse, sentence, and word/phrase level

  • Connects language development standards to state academic content standards

  • Challenges all learners at all levels of language proficiency

  • Provides scaffolding supports for students to advance

Download the full Correlation

WIDA PRIME 2 correlation Lexia Learning

See How Lexia Can Help Your English Learners
  • Case Studies
Woburn Public School District, MA
“Following our district’s new strategic plan, Lexia is a tool that is creating equity amongst our schools while providing students with opportunities and support we have not...
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Sterling Intermediate School, WA
Students at Sterling Intermediate are experiencing impressive growth as a result of using Core5. Because parents have access to the program at home, in a school where incoming...
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Research and Best Practices
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What is an emerging bilingual and why does this new label matter?

Schools and districts commonly use the terms “EL” or “ELL” when describing English (language) learners in the United States. While this terminology is widely accepted and understood, it fails to highlight one of the most important aspects of students learning English in schools: They are becoming bilingual. In fact, some...

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Policy Check-In: How is ESSA Shaping Up?
Policy Check-In: How is ESSA Shaping Up?

It has been four years since the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) was signed into law on December 10, 2015, some eight years after the federal education policy law was due for updating. By putting pen to paper, then-President Barack Obama authorized the long-awaited revamp of ESSA’s predecessor, the No...

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The Importance of Emphasizing Oral Language with English Learners
The Importance of Emphasizing Oral Language with English Learners

No one knows the intricacies of the English language better than a student who is learning it for the first time. English Learners, or ELs, need support in mastering all aspects of the language. While educators may be inclined to focus on academic language or written expression, ELs also need...

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5 Major Challenges Facing School Districts and How to Overcome Them

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