Discovery Education provides many supports for all types of learners—including English Language Learners—through the use of instructional strategies and the features of multimodal text and resources.
English Language Learner Center
Exclusive to our Experience partners, the English Language Learner Center provides professional development, instructional resources and tools, multimodal digital content, and immersive learning experiences to help English Language Learners (ELL) as they unlock the language of academic success. English Language Learners, sometimes referred to as English Learners or multilingual learners, are students who are in the process of acquiring English while their primary language is not English. The fastest growing population in U.S. schools, English Language Learners face the complex challenge of learning rigorous academic subject matter while simultaneously mastering a new language. | EXPLORE THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNER CENTER.
Language Support
Searching for Resources
Discovery Education offers a wide variety of resources including videos, images, audiobooks, poetry, podcasts, songs, interactive activities, and reading passages. The high quality multimodal digital content, differentiation tools, and language support will bolster teaching and learning in reading, writing, speaking, and listening. In addition to filtering all resources by grade band, reading level, teachers can also search by different languages in selecting appropriate resources to help develop background knowledge which will increase student motivation. | LEARN MORE ABOUT SEARCHING FOR RESOURCES.
Closed Caption and Transcripts
Discovery Education feature videos with closed caption and transcripts that provide additional language support for ELLs. Closed caption and video transcript features provide an additional modality of print text when paired with a video’s visuals and audio. Closed captions are a powerful tool for English Language Learners to help non-native speakers fully understand key concepts, especially when dealing with technical subjects. Closed captions support students with word knowledge, information retention, content recall, nuanced language, and syntax. The settings for closed captions can be adjusted to modify text color, background color, and font size. Transcripts provide similar support as Closed Captioning, but are searchable for specific vocabulary. | LEARN MORE ABOUT CLOSED CAPTIONS AND TRANSCRIPTS.
Text Support
Because language learner’s verbal skills develop more quickly than reading and writing skills, students may understand what is read aloud, even if they cannot read it themselves. All Discovery Education text resources include a read-aloud feature so that students can hear and understand the content. Settings can be adjusted to modify reading speed, highlight settings, font changes, and text mode settings. Additionally, additional tools such as a page mask and tracking ruler support students as they read. | LEARN MORE ABOUT TEXT FEATURES.
Audio Resources
The digital nature of content such as songs, and podcasts, provides additional opportunities for students to hear English and can be interacted with multiple times to support English language acquisition. Many of Discovery Education’s audio resources include printed lyrics or speech transcripts to make the resource accessible to all students regardless of reading or language ability. | LEARN MORE ABOUT AUDIO RESOURCES.
Native Language Support
Education features resources in several languages. In addition, students using the Chrome web browser can add the Google Translate extension to translate websites. This extension provides access to over 100 language options. On our Discovery Education website, this will change the language of headings, titles, descriptions, and buttons throughout our website. It will also translate encyclopedia articles and for our Techbook users, the Core Interactive Text and glossary terms. | LEARN MORE ABOUT THE GOOGLE TRANSLATE EXTENSION.
Other resources such as videos, reading passages, and channels have Spanish Versions of the resource. This allows teachers to assign the same resource but in two different languages to support students by learning in their native language. | LEARN MORE ABOUT LANGUAGE VERSIONS.
Differentiating Content and Assignments
With Discovery Education, all resources are assignable. Teachers can assign content to individuals, groups, or the entire class which allows the class to work on comparable assignments with varied content and tasks. Teachers can find similar resources in content, but vary in language or grade level, and assign the resource to groups of students to ensure students are learning the same content - but in a format that best meets their needs. | LEARN MORE ABOUT ASSIGNING CONTENT.
Discovery Education Studio provides students with a platform to demonstrate their understanding of a concept by integrating Discovery Education content as well as their own self-created content, like videos, images, oral text, and more. Educators can record directions and upload it as a file to Studio so that language-learning students can more easily interact with the same content as their peers. Resources can be curated on a board to guide learning and boards can be differentiated to meet the needs of the student. Just like other resources, Studio Boards can be assigned to a whole class, group of students, or a single student. | LEARN MORE ABOUT STUDIO.
Culture
Discovery Education offers a variety of globally-minded content featuring many countries and cultures, including videos, images, and sounds relating to students’ home countries, allowing the students to see themselves. Additional culturally-relevant channels support students such as the Culture Channel, Cultural Regions Channel, Culture and Experiences of Places and Regions, and BESE Channel. | LEARN MORE ABOUT CHANNELS.
Education’s Interactive Atlas allows students to interact with video content about their home country related to culture, government, history, and the natural world. | EXPLORE THE INTERACTIVE ATLAS (Canadian Subscribers).
Education’s Virtual Field Trips Channel provides students real-world, immersive learning experiences to expand their understanding of the world around them by taking students to the world's most iconic locations without ever leaving their classroom. | EXPLORE OUR VIRTUAL FIELD TRIPS (Canadian Subscribers).
Home, School, and Community Experiences
Discovery Education’s Student Center extends the learning environment during- and after-school through teacher-curated content and assignments, and through student-initiated exploration. To support students in using Discovery Education for learning, Discovery Education offers how-to guides in student-friendly language on topics such as researching, studying, and communicating ideas with Discovery Education. Included with each guide is also a Studio Board which can be assigned to students to learn the ins and outs of Discovery Education. | LEARN MORE ABOUT THE STUDENT EXPERIENCE.
Multiple Modalities
High-quality, multimodal content provides multiple representations of ideas and aids students in developing content knowledge. Discovery Education’s expansive image library is useful for providing background information for students and allows them to engage with content in either English or their native language. | LEARN MORE ABOUT IMAGE RESOURCES.
Discovery Education's collection of vetted resources not only engage students in their learning but can also scaffold the content for English Language Learners. | LEARN MORE ABOUT INSTRUCTIONAL MEDIA SUPPORTS.
Meaningful Use and Interaction
Instructional Strategies provide instructional ideas that encourage students to learn language and culture through meaningful use and interaction. The Instructional Strategies give concrete strategies for engaging with multimodal text. Students are able to practice key skills such as summarizing, compare and contrast, citing evidence, questioning, and so much more when these strategies are combined with digital resources. Additional strategies also support vocabulary development by providing a scaffold for developing academic language. | EXPLORE THE SPOTLIGHT ON STRATEGIES (Canadian Subscribers) AND OUR TOP 10 LIST FOR LANGUAGE LEARNERS.