
Principal Laura La Sala

PS 89Q
The Jose Peralta School of DREAMers

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English as a New Language
❝You can never understand one language until you understand at least two.❞
‒Geoffrey Willans

With approximately 47.5% English Language Learners (ELLs), P.S.89Q advocates for our ENL (English as a New Language) students and families. We embrace the culture and diversity of our students by selecting books, resources, and topics of interest our students can relate to. Our ENL Department consists of 18 trained teachers who provide ELLs with language support, hands-on, and differentiated, small-group instruction with a speaking pace appropriate to their comprehension level. This instruction helps ELLs achieve academic success and be competitive amongst their native-English speaking peers.

Speaking more than one language is incredibly advantageous for all students. It is beneficial when applying to college, future careers, and maintaining a connection to their cultural identity and family. Language learning takes time and is a process.

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We do not insist upon only speaking English, and in fact encourage parents to speak with their children in their home language.Research has shown that the more proficient a student is in speaking their native language, the better they will perform learning a second language. As ENL teachers, we are empathetic and supportive of the second language learning process. We assess student progress by looking at improvements across reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills, as well as our Teacher’s College Curriculum data.
ENL at P.S.89Q follows the push-in model, and one sheltered ENL beginner class. ENL teachers work collaboratively with your student’s classroom teacher to deliver the most effective language support. Your child’s ENL teacher meets with your student throughout the week providing ENL instruction in their classroom. We also offer an afterschool program called Mondo for beginner and newcomer ENL students.