Developing a Language Profile for ELL Students: Engaging Families Through Interviews

1. Developing a Language Profile of the ELL Student: An interview format designed for school staff to use with culturally and linguistically diverse families to obtain information about the student’s use of his/her first language

2. Interview Outcomes: • School staff will obtain detailed information about the student’s use of the first language from the family members’ perspectives • Families will become involved in the school system and understand that the school will learn how to best teach that student, based on their skills in the L1

3. Types of Interviews • Informal: Conversational style interview in which the interviewer can be highly responsive to the needs of the interviewee • Guide: Uses an interview guide that provides topics or subject areas to explore • Standardized: The same questions are asked of each informant, more objective because there is decreased flexibility in the order and type of questions

4. Interview Format Decision • School staff (e.g., ESL instructor, speech-language pathologist, classroom teacher),interpreter, multicultural liaison meet to discuss appropriate type of interview format for family • Cultural and linguistic issues will be considered (e.g., a culture that does not like direct questions may prefer an informal, conversational format) • Prior staff relationships with family should be considered (e.g., it may be beneficial for the ESL instructor to be present if he or she has developed a positive relationship with the family)

5. Interview • Interviews need to be performed with the family members held in authority for that cultural group (e.g., elders in some African cultures; men in Vietnamese culture) or others as appropriate • Schedule the interview at a time convenient for the family member(s) that will be interviewed • Preconference with the school staff and interpreter/liaisons to discuss the format of the interview and question types

6. Cultural Issues • Providing private v. public information to school staff (establishing a relationship before interview may be necessary) • Styles of communication (e.g., direct v. indirect questioning) • Views of education and teacher authority • Gender of interviewer

7. Linguistic Issues • Interpreters, liaisons, and school staff need to have a common understanding of first and second language acquisition • Interviewers need to establish typical development and atypical development of native language (key characteristics of language) for language probes if performing a standardized or guided interview • Language probes should contain items within each communicative domain of language (reading, writing, listening, speaking) as well as form, content and use of the language

8. Sample Questions for the 3 Formats:

9. Sample questions, continued:

10. Sample questions, continued:

11. Post-Conference • Interviews with family members should be accompanied by interviews with students • School staff and liaisons discuss interviews and decide if further discussions with family members are necessary to obtain more information about native language proficiency