Who are experienced multilinguals and what challenges do they face?
Experienced multilinguals - learners who have been in language development programmes for five or more years - face unique challenges that traditional English language development classes often do not address. While newcomers and beginner-level language learners receive the attention and support they need, experienced multilinguals frequently find themselves in classes designed for those lower-level learners and often they don’t receive any explicit language instruction. These learners can understand instructions and communicate their ideas in class discussions, but they often struggle to use a variety of sentence types or write coherent essays. Experienced multilinguals need to develop beyond social language and acquire academic literacy, which is possible with systematic and explicit instruction.
What is Integrated Literacy for Experienced Multilinguals?
Our new book, Integrated Literacy for Experienced Multilinguals, is a guide for English Language Development (ELD) teachers seeking an approach to cultivate sophisticated academic language that their experienced multilinguals require in schools and in their careers.
The book presents ELD teachers with a framework for planning language development units, from assessment to individual lessons. Additionally, it describes essential routines and engagement models for teaching lessons that intentionally integrate the four language domains. The final four chapters of the book present four example units designed using the framework to illustrate how instruction is planned at the vocabulary, sentence, and organisational level.
Why should we explicitly teach complex sentence structures?
One aspect of the Integrated Literacy Framework is sentence-level instruction. Explicit instruction in writing increasingly sophisticated sentences is one of the most efficient ways to develop academic literacy, as it provides intentional opportunities for deliberate practice within the context of the unit (Hochman & Wexler, 2024). While many well-intentioned English Language Development teachers regularly provide learners with sentence frames to expand their sentence-level writing, sentence starters do not explicitly teach students when and how to use the sentence structure independently.
After years of dependence on sentence starters, many experienced multilinguals still struggle to use complex sentence structures without this support. Since sentence starters and frames do not always develop learners’ ability to use complex academic sentence structures, we propose an alternative: Structured Quick Writes; a systematic, sequential, and logical approach to teaching academic sentence structures (Huynh & Skelton, 2026).
What is a Structured Quick Write?
A Structured Quick Write scaffolds learners’ ability to write complex sentences. A typical comprehension question about the unit’s content does not specify how students should respond. However, a Structured Quick Write requires learners to communicate in a particular sentence structure. To teach experienced multilinguals to write academically, a Structured Quick Write breaks down the parts of a specific sentence structure and uses guiding questions to scaffold learners’ ability to combine the answers into that structure.
For example, suppose we want to teach learners how to write a complex sentence that shows how the characters in The Hunger Games use power. In Chapter 1 of The Hunger Games, learners read about Katniss Everdeen hunting in a restricted area to provide food for her family. The following Structured Quick Write encourages learners to process the content while simultaneously writing a complex sentence that begins with the word ‘Although’.
Prompt: Explain how Katniss defies the laws by hunting in a restricted area. Start your sentence with Although.
- Guiding question 1: What are residents not allowed to do?
- Guiding question 2: What does Katness do that defies the laws?
- Combine answers 1 and 2, starting the sentence with Although. A hypothetical response might be: Answer to Guiding question 1: Residents are not allowed to hunt for food in a restricted area. Answer to Guiding question 2: Katniss hunts in the restricted area. Combine Parts: Although residents of District 12 are not allowed to hunt in restricted areas, Katniss defies the laws and hunts there to provide food for her starving family.
Writing a sentence structured in this way not only encourages learners to think critically about the novel, but it also simultaneously develops academic writing. When learners produce a response using a specific sentence structure, they begin to use language for a specific purpose to express their thinking. As a result of engaging with thoughtfully planned Structured Quick Writes taught over the course of a unit, academic sentence-level instruction is demystified.
We hope that by using the Integrated Literacy Framework for Experienced Multilinguals, teachers feel empowered to create the optimal conditions their experienced multilinguals need to expand their academic register and unlock their potential.
About the Guest Bloggers
Tan Huynh:
Website
Tan is a career educator working at international schools where he teaches multilingual students and co-teaches various secondary classes. He is the co-author of the newly released book Integrated Literacy for Experienced Multilinguals, Long-Term Success for Experienced Multilinguals, a best-selling book published by Corwin, and DIY PD: A Guide to Self-Directed Learning for Educators of Multilinguals by Seidlitz Education. He is also a consultant who offers support for multilinguals.
Beth Skelton:
Website
Beth has over 30 years of experience as a language educator and holds a master’s degree in multicultural teacher education. She has worked with early childhood, elementary, middle, high school, and adult language learners in rural, urban, suburban, and international school settings. She is the co-author of the newly released book Integrated Literacy for Experienced Multilinguals, Long-Term Success for Experienced Multilinguals, a best-selling book published by Corwin, and Putting it Together, materials for teaching adult English learners using a story-based curriculum. Beth currently provides professional development, coaching, and consulting to schools worldwide, with a focus on equitable education for multilingual learners.
References:
Hochman, J. C., & Wexler, N. (2024). The Writing Revolution 2.0. John Wiley & Sons.
Huynh, T., & Skelton, B. (2026). Integrated Literacy for Experienced Multilinguals. Corwin Press
