"ESL Library (now Ellii) was founded in 2002 as a resource site for English teachers. The materials are designed to enhance, complement, or supplement curriculum. New materials are added every month. The lessons include relevant, thought-provoking materials that focus on real-world issues, historical events, and natural dialogues geared toward teens and adults. There are also kid-friendly lessons for young learners and middle schoolers as well as lessons for literacy classrooms."
Does your school follow the WIDA Standards Framework? If yes, you may be wondering if Ellii (formerly ESL Library) is a good fit for your school.
WIDA uses a special correlation process called PRIME, which stands for Protocol for Review of Instructional Materials for ELLs. The main purpose of PRIME is to help educators in the K–12 space understand the relevance of materials that are available for their language programs.
In early 2021, a WIDA PRIME V2 correlator spent a week reviewing Ellii's (formerly ESL Library's) offerings. They looked at our correlation to WIDA's Standard Framework as well as connections to the ELD Standards.
You can view the full WIDA Correlation for ESL Library on WIDA's PRIME inventory page (with referenced examples taken from a variety of materials and sections on our site).* Here is an abridged summary:
- Materials are asset-based.
- Materials feature academic language.
- Materials address language features appropriately and consistently at the discourse dimension for all proficiency levels.
- Materials address language features appropriately and consistently at the sentence dimension for all proficiency levels.
- Materials address language features appropriately and consistently at the word/phrase dimension for all proficiency levels.
- Differentiation of language is addressed throughout the materials and is developmentally and linguistically appropriate for the proficiency levels.
- The four language domains are targeted and integrated throughout the materials.
- Social and instructional language are included in the materials.
- Materials encourage language learners to engage in higher-thinking skills at all levels.
- Materials cover a range of language functions that are incorporated into a communicative goal.
As you review the official WIDA Correlation, please note that Ellii (formerly ESL Library) is not currently licensing WIDA terminology, which means we cannot explicitly reference WIDA standards and descriptors in our materials. In addition, Ellii, which services teachers all over the world, does not yet assign specific grade bands to materials. We do hope to add WIDA proficiency levels to our Equivalency Scale later this year.
2021 Updates
We're always striving to make improvements! A new Young Learner filter has been added to the site since WIDA's correlation. Other recent developments include teacher discretion labels, digital speaking tasks, and collections. Ellii's (formerly ESL Library's) new collections make it easier for teachers to sort and filter relevant content by theme, function, and academic subject as well as by age-appropriateness and proficiency level. Finally, our new Ellii Folders, curated by the publishing team, support the progression of language development and have been popular with our K–12 teachers.
A special thank you to the folks at WIDA for your careful consideration of our materials and site!
*If the link does not open a PDF, please visit WIDA's PRIME inventory and type ESL Library as a search term.
Related
- Academic Subjects Collection
- WIDA Conference 2018: Highlights & Takeaways
- CASAS Quick Search (New CASAS Collections coming soon!)
