1. In the article "National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy: A Conversation With FOB... What Works for Adult ESL Students," it states that ESL students are better able to learn and understand English when the teacher or instructor of ESL is bilingual, in which case, the instructor can speak the students' native language or languages in order to clarify the students' understanding to further construct meaning.  This statement is also made in the article "Real World Research: Combining Qualitative and Quantitative Research for Adult ESL."  However, if a teacher or instructor is not bilingual, and they want to improve ESL students' written proficiency levels, should the instructor who is fluent only in English be encouraged to permit his or her ESL students to first write an essay or paragraph, depending upon the written assignment, within the student's own native language and then work closely with the student to translate that writing into English?  Is
 this a recommended form of instruction?  For one thing, allowing ESL students to write within their native languages helps the instructor familiarize themselves with languages that may be foreign to them.  This can also help the student translate and interpret their own native language and correspond their thoughts and ideas within a contextualized English language.  This can permit ESL students to demonstrate writing that displays clearer contextualized meanings.  It also allows ESL students to demonstrate a complexity of thoughts and ideas as well as express critical, analytical thinking skills within written English, especially those ESL students who struggle with written English in terms of writing incoherent sentences or clauses, or students who write mere phrases or simple sentences with incorrect word choice and improper use of grammar.  The article, "Real World Research," states "English learners who, for example, have good higher order reading strategies in their
 own language cannot call on those strategies to help them understand English texts until their understanding of English vocabulary and syntax are good enough to understand basic sentences and expressions."  Can this same principle be applied to ESL students' written English? 
   
  2. The article "Real World Research: Combining Qualitative and Quantitative Research for Adult ESL" briefly refers to the codings of a running record.  A running record that is incorporated in the teaching of standard American English and literacy within elementary schools in this country is used in a way that teachers can determine a student's reading abilities and potentialities through close observation of a student's reading processes.  Before a running record can be implemented, the teacher or instructor first must decipher the probable reading level of a particular student.  For instance, the teacher must select a book that the student will easily be able to read along with selecting two other books that may be more challenging to this same student.  Students must read 50 words within each of the three books.  To correspond the running record in accordance with the student's reading, the teacher must listen closely and observe, paying strict attention to the
 student's substitution or replacement of words, repetition of words, omission of words, pronunciation and/or mispronunciation of words, and number of self-corrections the student makes during their reading.  Once the student is finished reading 50 words within all three selected books, the teacher must add up all of the student's errors.  The book in which the student made no less than five errors is selected for appropriate reading in terms of a substantiated reading level since it presents more of a challenge.  However, a book in which a student makes more than five errors is considered too difficult for the student to read or comprehend.  I brought this up because in a standard English or literacy class in grades K-12, a student can be placed within a specific reading level or group and is given reading material in accordance with that particular reading or grade level, as it pertains to a balanced literacy model in adherence with the curricular standards of a running
 record.  Students are given reading material that is slightly more challenging in order to assist these students in mastering the English language.  Once students have mastered the English language and have acquired appropriate English reading skills, they will be able to read books that are several reading or grade levels above their current reading performance level.  Can a running record such as the one I have previousy described be applied within an adult literacy program for ESL students?  Instead of using grocery store fliers, electricity bills, and immigration documents, can literature be incorporated in an adult literacy program for ESL students?
   
  3. In the research study discussed in the article "Instruction, Language, and Literacy: What Works Study for Adult ESL Literacy Students, the BEST Oral Interview was incorporated in measuring listening comprehension, communication, and fluency.  In the footnote of that same research study, it states that the BEST Oral Interview also includes measures of pronunciation and a reading and writing score which were not used in the study.  I would actually like to know more about those measures of pronunciation, reading, and writing, and how they are assessed in determining a student's perfomance level.  Recently, I completed a training session for both print-based and the computer-adaptive BEST PLUS software program which measures the same items that were measured in the research study 1)listening comprehension, 2) language complexity or fluency, and 3) communication.  When I completed the training session in BEST PLUS there was no mention of scoring for pronunciation, reading,
 or writing.  Also, I wanted to know if these measurements had been included in your research study, would it have any effect on the students' performance levels quantitatively? Also would it have any statistical significance whatsoever in this particular research study if these variables had been taken into consideration when the BEST Oral Interview was administered?         

 
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