The Consequences of English Learner as a Category in Teaching, Learning, and Research

Abstract

AbstractThe evolution of a pervasive negative view of immigrants and its role in classroom achievement in the United States is described in this paper; beginning in the crowded urban secondary classrooms of the 1800s, to IQ testing in the 1920s that identified many as morons, imbeciles, or idiots, and to an English‐only view that permeates public and political views of teaching and learning. It is argued that categories such as ELL are ill‐advised because they obscure diversity and inform neither instruction nor research because they are unidimensional and misrepresent important underlying diversity. It is argued that evidence‐based strategies should inform teaching and learning, but that evaluating research is the purview of teachers themselves, including conducting classroom‐based action research to test recommended strategies. Concludes with general guidelines to evaluate research.