Best Instructional Practices for ELL Students and how can Bilingual Teachers Leverage Them

In many classrooms, English language learners (ELLs) understand far more than they are able to immediately express in academic English.

A student may solve a complex math problem correctly but hesitate when asked to justify the reasoning aloud. Another may fully grasp a science concept during peer discussion yet struggle to communicate that same understanding in formal written language.

For years, many instructional systems responded by reducing task complexity, simplifying curriculum, or separating language support from academic learning.

But research and classroom experience increasingly point in another direction.

The strongest instructional practices for ELL students maintain rigorous grade-level expectations while giving students meaningful access to participate, discuss, write, and think deeply.

Across major research frameworks—including IES, WIDA, and the National Academies—the same themes appear consistently:

• integrate language and content instruction
• create structured opportunities for academic talk
• scaffold instruction intentionally
• leverage students’ home languages strategically
• use student data to provide targeted support

Effective instruction for multilingual learners (MLLs) requires coordinated practices across content areas, grade levels, and school systems.

And bilingual teachers are central to that work.

They are designers of cross-linguistic transfer, builders of biliteracy, and instructional leaders who help students connect language, identity, and academic content.

This guide explores the instructional practices with the strongest evidence base for MLLs and explains how bilingual teachers can leverage those practices to improve participation, rigor, and long-term learning outcomes.

Why Instructional Practices Matter for Multilingual Learners

Language development does not happen separately from academic learning.

Students develop language through meaningful participation in academic tasks such as explaining reasoning, analyzing texts, defending ideas, collaborating with peers, and writing about content.

This means effective instruction should:

• maintain rigorous academic expectations
• make the language demands of tasks visible
• provide purposeful supports
• create opportunities for rehearsal and participation
• connect language development to authentic academic tasks

Many instructional challenges for English learners are tied less to conceptual understanding and more to language access.

A student may understand a subject related concept but still need support learning how to justify, compare, explain, or defend an argument using academic language.

Strong instructional practices help bridge that gap.

Best Instructional Practices for ELL Students

Practice #1: Scaffold Instruction Intentionally

What It Is

Scaffolding provides temporary supports that help students access grade-level content while developing language proficiency.

Effective scaffolds reduce unnecessary barriers while preserving the rigor of the task itself. Students continue engaging in the same intellectual work as their peers, but with supports that help them process information, participate more fully, and communicate understanding.

Classroom Examples

• Visuals and graphic organizers
• Sentence frames/discussion stems
• Chunked directions
• Modeled responses
• Annotated texts
• Guided examples and think-alouds
• Word banks

Why It Works

Scaffolding reduces cognitive overload and helps students focus on the key concepts and language demands of a lesson.

Instead of spending all their energy decoding unfamiliar language or complex instructions, students can devote more attention to higher-order thinking and participation.

Strong scaffolding also improves confidence, as students are more willing to contribute ideas when instructional supports help them organize language and thinking.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers are especially positioned to anticipate language barriers before instruction begins.

They can:

• preview difficult concepts strategically
• connect vocabulary across languages
• use bilingual modeling
• support transfer between home language and English

For example, in a bilingual science lesson, the teacher might identify and translate anchor terms such as evaporation / evaporación and condensation / condensación. Students can create bilingual concept maps using cognates, rehearse explanations in both their home language and English with a partner, and then participate publicly in class.

This approach strengthens both comprehension and participation.

As an educator, you may ask yourself or your team:

• Are our scaffolds helping students think more deeply or simply complete tasks faster?
• Do students eventually become less dependent on supports over time?
• Are we preserving rigor while adjusting access?

During your next planning session, identify one high-language-demand task in an upcoming lesson. Then ask: What language might make this difficult even if students understand the concept?

From there, add one or two targeted supports rather than redesigning the entire lesson.

Practice #2: Integrate Language and Content Instruction

What It Is

Integrated instruction embeds language development inside academic subjects such as science, math, literacy, and social studies.

Students learn the language needed for academic participation while engaging in meaningful content learning.

The 2014 IES/WWC guide on Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners identifies integrated oral and written language instruction within content-area teaching as a practice with some of the best, strongest results.

Classroom Examples

• Content objectives paired with language objectives
• Explicit instruction on language functions like compare, justify, and explain
• Academic vocabulary embedded into lessons
• Structured writing tied to content learning

Why It Works

Students develop language more effectively when instruction connects directly to meaningful academic tasks.

Integrated instruction also helps schools avoid one of the most common instructional mistakes, which is separating language development from core learning.

When students use language to explain scientific reasoning, analyze historical sources, or justify mathematical thinking, language learning becomes purposeful and contextualized.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers often support students in processing concepts in their stronger language before transitioning into English academic production.

For example, in a social studies lesson where the content goal is to understand causes of migration and the language goal is to use cause-and-effect connectors such as because, therefore, or as a result, both goals shape how students participate.

Take a moment to assess your latest lesson plans and ask:

• Are language objectives visible in content-area classrooms?
• Do students know what type of language they are expected to use during the lesson?
• Are content teachers seeing themselves as language teachers too?

Then, identify one language function students will need for success. This could be explaining reasoning, comparing ideas, citing evidence, or summarizing findings.

From there, explicitly model what that language sounds like.

Practice #3: Use Structured Academic Talk

What It Is

Structured academic talk and peer-assisted learning both create purposeful opportunities for students to discuss ideas using supports, accountability, teamwork, and clearly defined expectations.

Effective academic talk routines are carefully designed to support language rehearsal, participation, and content processing.

Classroom Examples

• Think-pair-share strategies
• Collaborative reasoning
• Partner retells
• Reciprocal teaching
• Discussion roles

Why It Works

Oral rehearsal strengthens both language acquisition and academic writing development. Because of this, students often need opportunities to verbally process ideas before independently writing or presenting academically.

Structured academic talk also increases equitable participation by ensuring that MLLs are not left observing silently while more fluent peers dominate discussions.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers can create strategic participation structures by:

• pairing students intentionally
• allowing initial rehearsal in home language
• modeling academic discourse patterns
• supporting equitable participation

In upper-grade bilingual classrooms, students could first process ideas with same-language partners before transitioning into mixed-language English discussion groups.

To identify opportunity areas in your classroom, ask:

• Who is consistently participating during discussions?
• Which students are rehearsing language before public sharing?
• Are participation structures helping MLLs contribute more consistently?

After that, you may begin with one repeatable discussion routine.

Think-pair-share remains effective because students have time to process, rehearse, and clarify ideas before sharing publicly.

Use sentence stems strategically and rotate discussion roles to support equitable participation.

Practice #4: Leverage Students’ Home Languages Strategically

What It Is

Strategic home-language use supports comprehension, transfer, and biliteracy development.

According to the National Academies’ research in 2017, home-language development in dual-language programs helps achieve stronger overall academic learning and can improve English literacy outcomes.

Classroom Examples

• Translanguaging routines
• Cognate study
• Bilingual glossaries
• Home-language brainstorming
• Multilingual note-taking

Why It Works

Students build understanding more effectively when they can connect new concepts to existing linguistic knowledge.

Strategic home-language use also reduces cognitive overload and strengthens conceptual clarity.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers model the cross-linguistic transfer students need to develop biliteracy.

This includes:

• identifying cognates
• clarifying conceptual misunderstandings
• helping students transfer ideas across languages
• planning opportunities for home-language rehearsal before English production

At your next staff meeting, it would be very helpful to bring certain questions to the table:

• How are we validating and using students’ linguistic strengths?
• Are home languages visible and purposeful within instruction?
• Do students have opportunities to connect ideas across languages?

When a system is designed with MLLs in mind, even monolingual teachers do not need to speak every language to help students.

They can still encourage multilingual brainstorming, use bilingual glossaries, identify cognates, and allow students to discuss concepts in their stronger language before sharing publicly.

Practice #5: Build Writing Through Scaffolded Routines

What It Is

Scaffolded writing gradually moves students from oral language and collaborative writing toward independent academic writing.

This process combines knowledge building, language analysis, joint construction, and gradual release.

Classroom Examples

• Mentor text analysis
• Joint construction
• Structured paragraph frames
• Peer feedback routines
• Writing conferences

Why It Works

Academic writing becomes more manageable when language structures are made visible.

Strong writing instruction develops ideas first and gradually increases language precision over time.

Writing routines that combine reading, oral rehearsal, modeling, and guided feedback help ELLs organize ideas more confidently and communicate more effectively.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers can build confidence and reduce cognitive overload by allowing students to plan in their home language, separating content feedback from grammar correction, and using bilingual mentor texts strategically.

When evaluating MLLs’ writing development, ask:

• Are students receiving enough oral rehearsal before writing independently?
• Do writing supports make academic language structures visible?
• Is feedback focused first on ideas and organization before language accuracy?

Then, choose one recurring writing structure students can practice consistently.

For example:

• claim/evidence/reasoning
• compare/contrast
• problem/solution

From there, you can model the structure repeatedly before expecting full independence.

Practice #6: Use Formative Assessment and Small-Group Support

What It Is

Formative assessment gathers recurring evidence of both content understanding and language development. This allows teachers to adjust instruction, regroup students strategically, and provide targeted support.

Classroom Examples

• Exit slips
• Oral language checks
• Student portfolios
• Flexible grouping
• Writing samples

School leaders can pair this with other practices such as shadowing or classroom walkthroughs.

Why It Works

Strong formative assessment helps teachers distinguish between language barriers, conceptual misunderstandings, and combinations of both.

This distinction is essential because instructional responses differ dramatically depending on the root issue.

How Bilingual Teachers Can Leverage It

Bilingual teachers often recognize patterns traditional assessments miss.

For example:

• a student may demonstrate strong conceptual understanding orally but struggle with written English output
• another student may need content reteaching rather than language support

When understanding your assessment processes school or district-wide, it’s important to ask:

• Are we collecting multiple forms of evidence for student learning?
• Can we distinguish between language production challenges and conceptual misunderstandings?
• How often are we adjusting supports based on student evidence?

Before implementing complex processes, ask teachers to choose one lightweight formative routine such as an oral explanation, a brief written reflection, or another content task.

Then, use previously chosen data points to identify whether students need:

• concept reteaching
• language rehearsal
• or extension opportunities

Common Mistakes Schools Make When Supporting ELL Students

Simplifying Curriculum Instead of Scaffolding Access

Reducing rigor may increase short-term completion rates, but over time it often limits students’ academic growth and participation in grade-level learning.

When ELLs are consistently given easier texts, shorter assignments, or lower-level thinking tasks, they have fewer opportunities to develop the academic language and critical thinking skills expected across content areas.

Schools can begin reversing this pattern by helping teachers distinguish between simplifying language and simplifying thinking.

One practical step is reviewing assignments during collaborative planning meetings and asking: “Are we changing the cognitive demand of the task, or simply making access clearer?”

Teachers can also co-plan scaffolds such as visuals, sentence frames, annotated texts, or structured discussion routines while keeping the original learning goal intact.

Separating Language Support from Academic Learning

When language development happens only in isolated intervention settings, students often struggle to transfer language skills into authentic academic tasks.

Students build stronger academic language when they regularly use it during science discussions, mathematical reasoning, historical analysis, and collaborative problem-solving.

School leaders can address this issue by supporting integrated planning and dedicated collaboration time between ESL specialists, bilingual educators, and content teachers.

For example, leaders can encourage all teachers to incorporate language objectives, structured academic talk, and explicit modeling of academic language into daily lessons.

Over-Relying on Translation

Translation alone does not build academic language proficiency. Translation and home-language support are most powerful when paired with structured opportunities for students to produce academic language.

While translation tools and bilingual materials can support comprehension, students also need opportunities to process, discuss, rehearse, and independently produce academic language.

Schools can strengthen instruction by balancing translation supports with intentional language-production opportunities.

Teachers might provide bilingual glossaries or translated directions while still expecting students to participate in structured discussions, oral rehearsal routines, collaborative writing, or academic reflection activities.

How Schools Can Support Better Instruction Systemwide

Implementation improves when schools build systems that reinforce learning, collaboration, coaching, and reflection over time.

Schools and districts can do so through:

• Professional learning cycles: combining professional development, instructional coaching, observation, reflection, and, of course, systematic progress monitoring

• Shared responsibility: Multilingual learner success cannot belong exclusively to ESL or bilingual specialists, as all teachers contribute to language development. This includes content teachers, administrators, counselors, and family-facing staff.

• Co-planning structures: bilingual, ESL, and content teachers need dedicated collaboration time to analyze language demands, plan scaffolds, review student work, and adjust instruction collaboratively

• Observation and feedback systems: walkthroughs and coaching conversations should focus on academic talk, language objectives, scaffold effectiveness, equitable participation, and student language production

These systems help schools move from isolated classroom success toward more coherent instructional implementation.

Strong ELL Instruction Expands Access to Learning

In fewer words, the strongest instructional practices for ELL students:

• integrate language and content
• create structured participation opportunities
• scaffold instruction strategically
• leverage home languages thoughtfully
• support academic language development across subjects

And bilingual teachers remain central to that work, because they help students connect ideas across languages, participate more confidently, and develop the academic language needed for long-term success.

For schools and districts, the challenge is whether instructional systems are designed to give students full access to demonstrate what they know, contribute meaningfully, and continue developing language through authentic learning experiences.

If you’d like to know more about how your school or district can implement these and other instructional practices for ELLs, reach out to Ensemble Learning and let’s explore opportunities together.