Making Content Accessible to Promote Second Language Acquisition: The ESL Intensive Program at Hostos Community College (CUNY).

An English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) Intensive Program was established at Hostos Community College, New York, to help accelerate students’ acquisition of ESL by combining three semesters of the college’s regular ESL program into two semesters. Each level of this program provides 15 hours of classroom instruction per week, a 6-hour reading and conversation course, a 6-hour writing’course, and a 3-hour language workshop. Each course seeks to develop all language skills in an integrated fashion using a content-based communicative approach. Students also take computer applications, theater production, arts and civilization or humanities, and math courses. ESL class size is limited to 20 students. Students are expected to keep a weekly journal in response to “New York Times” articles, participate in field trips, view films related to their ESL classes, read and respond to essays, do collaborative group and individual research projects, and submit a portfolio at the end of each semester. Overall, this program facilitates language acquisition through reading, writing, and discussion in response to provocative questions, collaborative learning tasks, the building of academic terminology, the development of critical thinking, and students’ sense of empowerment. (SM) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. Making Content Accessible to Promote Second Language Acquisition: The ESL Intensive Program at Hostos Community College (CUNY) by Diana M. Diaz, Nellie T. Justicia and Lewis Levine An Overview of the ESL Intensive Program at Hostos Community College PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) 1 0 This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy.