Find ways to improve academic self-efficacy among ELLs to support faster academic growth and gap closing¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

The article's forward-looking recommendation is that interventions targeting ELLs' academic self-efficacy—their confidence in attaining educational goals—may accelerate math and reading growth and help close achievement gaps with non-ELLs. It grounds this in its finding that 5th-grade self-efficacy is associated with achievement growth and that ELLs' low self-efficacy indirectly reduces growth. The authors state that "finding ways to improve academic self-efficacy among ELLs could also lead to greater academic growth for those students, including closing achievement gaps with non-ELLs."

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Requires valid measures of academic self-efficacy that can be administered longitudinally; the article used a four-item Likert-scale survey with demonstrated longitudinal partial strong measurement invariance.

Constraints¶

• The supporting analyses are not causal: the article states the models are likelihood-equivalent rescalings and that findings are commensurate with theory rather than causal proof.
• Evidence comes from one large urban California district serving a high proportion of low-income ELL students; the article says findings should be replicated in other settings and with other students, including younger elementary grades.

Target Learners¶

• English language learners in middle school grades 5-8

Target Learning Goals¶

• Academic self-efficacy
• Math and reading achievement growth
• Closing achievement gaps between ELLs and non-ELLs

Related Strategies¶

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Soland, J. (2019). English Language Learners, Self-efficacy, and the Achievement Gap: Understanding the Relationship between Academic and Social-emotional Growth (The Collaborative for Student Growth at NWEA Working Paper). https://www.nwea.org/research/publication/english-language-learners-self-efficacy-and-the-achievement-gap-understanding-the-relationship-between-academic-and-social-emotional-growth/