Who We Are

The English Language Education program has existed in its current form since 2006. That year, we served 196 students in the nine schools, with a staff of eight licensed ESL teachers. Today, we have more than 500 students, in addition to an instructional staff of 22, along with department support staff.  

Understanding that English learners are all unique, arriving with varying levels of prior education, socio-economic status, and experiential background, we have endeavored to build a structure that meets the needs of all of our students. We accomplished this by providing educators with the tools that enable students to reach high levels of academic achievement in our academically competitive environment.  

Over the past decade, the Lexington Public Schools have benefited from various initiatives that have contributed to the current environment. First, the district has committed itself to building the capacity of its educators through its professional development structure. This enabled educators to continuously improve their instructional practice by learning strategies, technologies and resources that improve student learning.  

The district has built a culture of professional learning communities (PLC), providing time in each educator’s schedule to participate. This is a required component of each educator’s professional growth plan, and has lead to improvements in instructional practice and curriculum.

There is a strong emphasis on academic vocabulary (discrete words, structures, and discourse) that enables students to learn content, even as they learn the language. This is based on the notion that students must learn the “language” of each discipline in order to raise their level of comprehension.

Lastly, the district has committed to improving academic achievement of its students through the training of teachers to implement Reader's and Writer's Workshop, developed by the Teacher’s College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University. This training, provided to all K-5 teachers (including English as a Second Language teachers), ensures the use of common language, strategies, and rubrics across the curriculum. The district is also training teachers in the effective use of project-based learning, a initiative that motivates students to learn by "Solving highly complex problems requires that students have both fundamental skills (reading, writing, and math) and 21st century skills (teamwork, problem solving, research gathering, time management, information synthesizing, utilizing high tech tools)."

Each of these steps supports a structure in which English learners consistently rank at the top of the state in both progress toward, and the attainment of English proficiency.

With the steadfast support of the district, we believe we have developed a highly effective English language education program, which has been commended by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Our emerging bilingual students are exposed to rigorous, researched-based instruction, using a wide variety of content materials, enabling students to learn the academic language structures that are so vital to success in the classroom by focusing on academic language and writing (as outlined in the WIDA standards and in the Common Core).    

To this end, we give screening assessments, participate on data teams, on student support teams, consult with teachers, act as liaison for new families, assist with the identification of students who may require special education, arrange for translators…all in addition to teaching children to speak English!

Our teachers are dedicated professionals who are expert in the language acquisition and acculturation processes, and who continuously expand their knowledge and hone their practice by participating in countless courses, workshops, and conferences. Even as they attain impressive results in the classroom and gratitude from the parents of our students, they continually strive for improvement.  They are at the heart of what makes this department so well regarded.