There are many terms and acronyms that are used frequently at school, in written documents that are sent home, and in conferences and meetings. Following are some frequently used terms and acronyms that will be used often and may be helpful to know and understand.

• Academic Language or Academic English: Refers to the oral, written, auditory, and visual language proficiency required to learn in schools. It is the language used in classroom lessons, books, tests, and assignments, and it’s the language in which students are expected to learn and achieve fluency. This specific vocabulary allows students to acquire knowledge and academic skills while also successfully navigating school policies, assignments, expectations, and cultural norms.

 

• Advisory: An advisory is a regularly scheduled period of time, usually during the school day, for teachers to meet with small groups of students for the purpose of advising them on academic, social, and future-planning issues. The broad purpose of an “advisory period” or “advisory program” is to ensure that at least one adult in the school is getting to know each student well, making sure their learning needs are met, and encouraging them to make good academic choices and plan for their future. Advisories are designed to foster stronger teacher-student relationships and a stronger sense of community and belonging in students.

 

• Agenda Book: Every student receives an agenda book at school. They should use this book daily to record homework assignments and due dates. This book is also used as a pass to go to the restroom or other places in the building. Parents should look at the agenda book daily to monitor student homework and if your child is completing the homework assigned.

 

• Assessment: A wide variety of methods that educators use to evaluate, measure, and document the academic readiness, learning progress, and skill acquisition of students from preschool through college and adulthood. This may refer to a formal test or an informal way of asking questions or completing assignments to show if students have mastered a skill.

 

• Cohort: Typically a term applied to students who are educated at the same period of time—a grade level or class of students. In our case, students will be in cohorts of students that will be in core courses together. Our cohorts include students of different native languages, English proficiency levels, and gender.

 

• Core Class: Includes the academic courses–Language Arts, Science, Math, and Social Studies

 

• Curriculum: The lessons and academic content taught in a school or in a specific course or program.

 

• Elective Class: Includes courses that students are able to choose based on what they are interested in–examples of such classes include music classes, art, technology, family and consumer science, world languages, etc.

 

• English Learner (EL):  Students who are learning to communicate fluently in English, who often come from non-English-speaking homes and backgrounds, and who typically require specialized or modified instruction in both the English language and in their academic courses.

 

• Lexile Measure: A valuable piece of information about either an individual’s reading ability or the difficulty of a text, like a book or magazine article. The Lexile measure is shown as a number with an “L” after it — 880L is 880 Lexile. A student gets his or her Lexile Measure from a reading test (SRI) or program. For example, if a student receives an 880L on her end-of-grade reading test, she is an 880 Lexile reader. Higher Lexile measures represent a higher level of reading ability. Lexile measures help a reader find books and articles at an appropriate level of difficulty (visit Find a Book), and determine how well that reader will likely comprehend a text. You also can use Lexile measures to monitor a reader’s growth in reading ability over time. We often use this measure to help guide instruction for students as well as to place students in appropriate reading programs that will improve growth in reading.

 

• Limited-English Proficient (LEP) : Often used interchangeably with ELL and in state reporting. Refers to a student who is 3 through 21, enrolled in an elementary or secondary school, whose native language is a language other than English, who comes from an environment where a language other than English is dominant, and whose difficulties speaking, reading, writing, or understanding the English language may be such that it denies the the student the ability to meet the State’s proficient level of achievement on the State assessments, the ability to achieve successfully in the classrooms where the language of instruction is English, or the opportunity to participate fully in society. Students are assessed and given an English Language Proficiency Level that allows schools to provide appropriate modifications to instruction or testing to allow the student to successfully learn English as well as access the academic content.

 

• Project-Based Learning: Refers to an instructional approach that utilizes projects as a central strategy for educating students. Students will typically be assigned a project or series of projects that require them to use different skills, such as researching, writing, interviewing, collaborating, or public speaking, and to produce various products, such as research papers, presentations, videos, art installations, or theatrical performances, for example. These projects may take several weeks or months, or it may even unfold over the course of a semester or year. Project-based-learning experiences are often designed to address real-world problems and issues.

 

• QRI Score: Another measure used to indicate a student’s individual reading level in English. This is a valuable measure to help place a student in appropriate reading groups to help teach and improve reading levels as well as to help the student choose appropriate books and texts that are at or slightly above their level to challenge them and help them gain skills in reading.

 

• Rigor: Instruction, schoolwork, learning experiences, and educational expectations that are academically, intellectually, and personally challenging.
  

 

• Standards-Based Grading: Instruction, assessment, grading, and academic reporting that are based on students demonstrating understanding or mastery of the knowledge and skills they are expected to learn as they progress through their education.

 

• Standards of Learning (SOL) Test: A public school standardized testing program in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It sets forth learning and achievement expectations for core subjects for grades K-12 in Virginia’s Public Schools. These tests are given around May or June of each school year. The subject of the tests taken depend on the grade level of your child. 6th and 7th graders take Reading and Math SOL tests, while 8th graders take Reading, Writing, Math, Civics, and Science SOL tests. Students must pass a specific number of SOL tests in high school in order to gain the verified credits needed to graduate with a high school diploma.

 

• Team: At F.C. Hammond, our goal is to have students on teams, which include a Language Arts, Math, Science, and History teacher that are able to meet and plan together. This allows team members to build a relationship with the student and coordinate about the best ways to meet the needs of each student on the team.

 

• WIDA Test : We use this term most often to refer to the large-scale English language proficiency assessment that is given to Kindergarten through 12th graders who have been identified as English language learners (ELLs). It is given annually to monitor students’ progress in acquiring academic English. Scores are reported for listening, speaking, writing, and reading, and in several composites scores.