1. Barriers of ELL Students when Learning Literacy
ELL learners are facing many barriers when learning literacy in English.
According to Deapua and Marshal (2010), ELL struggle because they lack a strong
academic background in their own language. This is specifically true of English.
These students often lack a proficiency in English as well.
Also, other cultures often have a strong supportstructure in their schools.
These cultures are more nurturing to students whereas schools in the United States
tend to be more individualistic. Forexample, cultures suchas those in Mexico and
Central America often promote a familiar relationship with educators and students.
Similarly, in the Hmong culture teachers are considered “second parents.”In
contrast, US systems encourage a gradual separation of students and encourage
them to become more independent.
Another barrier, according to Musanti and Pence (2010) suggest ELLs have
to learning literacy is the fact that ELLs cover up what they do not know. They do
not want to appear dumb; therefore they act as if they understand concepts.
Research supports the fact that if you cover up not knowing a concept, it makes it
more difficult to learn it.
A third barrier that ELL students have in learning literacy is the fact that
there is a difference in the social language structure and the academic language

2. structure (DeCapua & Marshal, 2010). Because these language structures are
unique to their place in society, it is confusing to the ELL who is just learning the
language. It takes between five and seven years for an ELL to acquire academic
language at grade level. Also, becausethe social language structure is easier for the
ELL students to grasp, many teachers misinterpret these students’ knowing this
language and assume they should be able to do well in school.
To overcome these barriers, some schoolsystems have implemented
Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL). Although many schools see this
as a solution to an ever increasing problem, it actually has many barriers as well.
Some of these barriers include the fact that many ELL students may come to this
country with little or no technology skills. Also, this program proves to be very
costly. Funding is an on-going problem to keep this program in the schools. Lastly,
the ELL may not accepttechnology, even if he or she is able to learn it. (Shao-
Chieh Lu, 2006).
Along with many other barriers, ELLs have a challenge when learning
English. There is research to supportthat ELLs’ difficulty in acquiring academic
language is legitiment. Culture is instrumental in shaping one’s views of the world
and how he or she organizes and processes information (DeCapua & Marshal
2010). Thus, schools should understand these barriers and work around them.

3. Teacher attitudes can also be a barrier ELLs have when learning literacy.
Research is mixed about how teachers feel about ELLs. Most research, however,
points to a more negative feeling towards these students, especially if you ask
teachers about having ELLS in their classrooms.
According to research conducted by Karabenick and Clemens (2004), only
43% of teachers said they would like to have ELLs in their classroom. Also, 45%
of teachers believe that if an ELL student is not able to express himself, it is
because he or she does not understanding. Likewise, 63% of teachers believed that
ELLs take more of their time in the classroomthan non-ELL students. Most of the
teachers also favored emersion to other methods of instruction for ELL students.
Overall, teachers in this study were positive when questioned about ELL students,
though they were more comfortable with ELLs at their schoolthan in their
classrooms.
According to Youngs and Youngs (2001), mainstream teachers’ attitudes
toward ESL students are likely to affect what ESL students learn. Teachers’
attitudes and expectations of students often lead to students behaving or learning as
expected. Teachers influence their students, even if they are unaware that they are
communicating these expectations.

4. Attitudes not only in the classroom, but also in society have become
increasingly negative in the pastfew years (Walker, Shafer, and Liams, 2011).
Evidence to supportthe fact attitudes are increasingly negative include the fact that
referendums have been passed banning bilingual education and have negated ELL
instruction to a single year of structured immersion in California, Arizona, and
Massachusetts.
Additionally, in a study by the authors, the overall attitudes of teachers
towards ELLs appear to be neutral to strongly negative. Only 18% felt that ELLs
perform well and school. Also, 16% of those surveyed felt that ELL students came
from places where education was inferior. Equally important, 70% of mainstream
teachers were not actively interested in having ELLs in their room. In the same
way, 25% of the mainstream teachers felt it was the responsibility of the ELL
learner to adapt to the American culture to learn.