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Texas Adult Education Standards and Benchmarks
for ABE ASE and ESL Learners

Section 3: ESL Content Standards

How to Read the Standards and Benchmarks

Speak So Others Can Understand Standard and Benchmarks for ESL
Listen Actively Standard and Benchmarks for ESL
Read With Understanding Standard and Benchmarks for ESL
Write to Convey Ideas Standard and Benchmarks for ESL
Examples of Proficient Performance

How to Read the Standards and Benchmarks

S

tandards define what is important for learners to know and be able to do within a specific content area. Their purpose is to provide a general but clear outline of content and skill so that programs can develop and align curriculum, instruction, and assessment.  Texas adopted four of the Equipped for the Future (EFF) content standards for the English as a Second Language Standards:

 

• Speak so Others can Understand
• Listen Actively

• Read with Understanding for ESL learners

• Convey Ideas in Writing for ESL learners

Within the standards are the benchmarks.  The benchmarks are specific enough to guide instruction and learning but broad enough to allow for multiple approaches to curriculum and instruction. They define a progression of levels that are increasingly difficult and observable.  The Texas Adult Education Benchmarks were written by Texas Adult Educators during 2005-2007.  As you move across the benchmarks, you will notice the benchmarks become more challenging and are to be completed with increasing independence.  

The benchmarks are separated into different strands – each standard has a different number of strands.  Each strand represents a set of benchmarks that increase in difficulty as the learner progresses through the levels in the strand.  The order of the strands is not an indicator of greater or lesser importance, and not all students will fit into exactly the same level throughout all the strands.  The benchmarks are written for instructors, not learners.  Examples found within each benchmark help to clarify the meaning.  Text in Bold indicates words that can be found in the Glossary.

The ESL learner benchmarks for Read with Understanding and the Convey Ideas in Writing are not the same as the ABE/ASE and ESL learner benchmarks for Read with Understanding and the Convey Ideas in Writing. 

The description of the benchmarks’ levels follows the Educational Functioning Level Descriptors that have been designed by the National Reporting System for Adult Education (NRS).  The Texas Adult Education Benchmark levels are written as exit levels, not entry levels.  In other words, the levels represent what learners should be able to do upon exiting the level and moving to the next level. 

The examples of proficient performance, which can be found at the end of this section, are real-life activities and purposeful applications of the benchmarks that learners are able to perform at each level.  They are written for the learners, so the learners can recognize their progression through the levels.

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