What is the equivalent of the professional work to identify a
“guaranteed, viable curriculum” for ESL teachers? As budgets
shrink and pounds per square inch increase on all educators, ESL
teachers are often used exclusively to deliver or support
content instruction to English learners. While differentiating
content instruction and assessment for levels of English
development is an essential piece in effective schooling for
English learners, planning for the core of English language
development (ELD) is often overlooked. In the effort to
participate in the same professional work as content teachers,
ESL teachers are often pressed into missappropriating the ELP or
ELD Standards of their state to serve as the anchors for their
curriculum work, without respect to the basic purpose of the
standards and performance indicators. Instead of reaching deeply
into their understanding of the ELD continuum and the
definitions of each performance level and of academic language
in order to develop end-of-year learning target