Hi John and Ros,

I find the discussions most interesting.  Thank you!

I teach adult ESOL.  Previously, I worked as a special education teacher and as a reading teacher (children).  Several of our learners are non-readers or struggling readers.  I'm currently teaching a beginning level ESOL group and an ESOL/literacy class.  We formed the Lit class based on needs of the students: high level speakers, non- or low-reading level, no or very low -level in writing.  What diagnostic tests would you suggest for this population in order to find strenghts and instructional needs?  Wouldn't tests normed on a population of native speakers be somewhat inaccurate for ESOL learners?  Depending on the native language, I can see that in certain cases some tests might work fairly well.  But what of others with different alphabets and different ways? Chinese learners do not sound out words.  Russians do not actually spell words, etc.

Thanks again.

Nicole B. Graves
Teacher/ESOL Program Coordinator
The Center for New Americans
Amherst, Greenfield, Northampton, MA
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