Merissa Leonard Intro to ESL Education

September 10th, 2015

T&L 333
Demographics
The school I chose to focus on is Benson Hill Elementary. This school is located in the
Renton School District. This is where I attended elementary school and I do remember them
having an ELL program/class. According to the schools webpage the term they associate with
their non-English speaking students is ELL, English Language Learners, which the students who
need to develop English proficiency are placed in the program. Although they are placed in this
program only after the Home Language Survey form is filled out and the Washington English
Language Proficiency Assessment is completed. This website states that 16% of students in the
Renton School District are enrolled in the ELL program, and that 26% of students at Benson Hill
are enrolled in their ELL program. Also, it states, at least 85 home languages or dialects are
spoken by Renton School district students. Of the student population at Benson Hill Elementary
about 76.9% of students are labeled as different ethnic origin and those include, Asian, Latino,
Native American, Pacific Islander, and more. This means that over half of the schools
population is not white, which makes it surprising that only 26% of the schools population is
enrolled in the ELL program.
The term that Benson Hill Elementary uses is sufficient term and it does not neglect
anyone nor is it an offensive term. This term is widely used throughout our state although I
believe that the teachers at the school may also use other terms such as ESL or many of the other
terms that we learned this week in class. This term implies that the students may not understand
or speak English although they may have some understanding of the language. This term is less
specific to what could be taught in an ELL classroom. I feel this term has mostly positive
connotations rather than negative connotations. Overall, I think Benson Hill Elementary does a
great job with word choice in identifying their program names specifically their ELL program
especially because they such a high rate of ELL enrollment rates.