The Barrier of Lexile Score 1000 is What?

In the United States, the number of high school dropouts remain high rate, and many of them are of immigrant origin.

There are various reasons for this, but many students drop out of school, due to low family income and low academic performance.

For ESL students who immigrated to the United States, does the difficulty in English sentence reading cause many dropouts?

I can't help but think that low income and low academic performance make bad cycles over the generations.

In Japan, it's not the same situation, but low English academic performance is a huge problem.

Lexile Score is the number of English sentence difficulties

Lexile Score, which is an index that indicates the difficulty of English sentences, is developed by The Lexile^® Framework for Reading and operated by MetaMetrics.

You can use it to select the appropriate book that matches your English reading comprehension level, and you can also measure your English reading comprehension skill.

I summarized in the table below, but it is also possible to roughly convert Lexile Score to CEFR, TOEFL, IELTS, etc.

Note: There is some overlap because it is stated by the median Lexile Score (Median Lexile Range). 

Note: Created from Read Theory and The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.

Let's try to measure Lexile Score

You can measure your Lexile Score using this English Reading Comprehension APP called Read Theory.

I show you an ESL someone's=P result last year, and his average score is 965L.

We can see the wall around Lexile Score 1000, which is almost close to the line of grade 8.

He has been trying many times to get over Grade 8, but he is at B2 level, and is always pushed back. (T^T)

Lexile Score of about 1000 is C1 Level according to the table 1, which means it equals TOEFL iBT 100 and IELTS 7.0.

It is the barrier between CEFR B2 and C1, and since Grades 6-8 are for American Jr-high school and Grades 9-12 are for high school.

So, it can also be said to be the barrier to the difficulty level of American high school English.

To receive a university education in USA or UK, that level of English proficiency is needed after all.

Barrier of Lexile Score 1000 ≒ Difference between Jr-hi and hi school Native English

As an analysis of the results based on my sufficient conditions (empirical measurements) above, the following [English Experimental Room Hypothesis] can be established. 

[A] The Barrier of Lexile Score 1000 is the English ability barrier that exists between Jr-high and high school English in USA.

Although I made the hypothesis, it is not something that can be easily verified.

So, what should I do next?

It won't be adequate to conclude that our solution is to learn American high school English; in other words, as ESL learners, we don't have the time to learn ALL items.

Is Reading Comprehension still being taught even if in American high school?

In ELA, English grammar and reading comprehension are still taught in Grades 2 to 12.

・Why does it need to learn English reading comprehension lessons for the long term, even if natives?

・What is the difference and the difficulty between CEFR B2 and C1?

・What should we learn to reach C1 Level or higher, and what are the important points?

Many questions arise.

After this chapter, I will answer the above questions based on the results of my investigation and analysis of ELA's CCSS (Common Core State Standard).

The poor learning time of the Sentence Structures is the matter?

For ESL to overcome this barrier [A], I believe that the important points (of American high school English) should be captured are as follows.

[1] Study Sentence Structure thoroughly (Complex and compound sentences are difficult to understand)      

Learning about compound sentences, complex sentences, and compound-complex sentences. Learning to avoid bad sentences such as Dangling Modifier, Run-on, Fragment, and etc.

[2] Learning Conjunctions (Closely related to Sentence Structure)      

Learning Coordinating Conjunction, Subordinating Conjunctions, Conjunctive Adverbs, Relative Pronouns, and etc. Learning the correct usage of Parallel Structure.

[3] Learning the appropriate arrangement of phrases and clauses (these are also elements of compound and complex sentences)      

Learning writing techniques such as Subject Ellipsis, Inversion, and etc.

These [1]-[3] can all be considered as Know-how for writing compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences.

And they are also one of the most difficult parts to understand when learning English.

English sentences that are written as compound or complex sentences, and that have been transformed and modified using rhetorical techniques such as Ellipsis or Inversion or others, are very difficult for ESL.

So, appropriate and sufficient study is required.

It can be summarized as above.

Summary

In addition to those listed above, other items are said to be difficult for ESL.

[4] The meaning of Perfect Tense 

[5-1] Conditionals（Subjunctive Mood 1）

[5-2] Recommendations（Subjunctive Mood 2）

[6] Verb + to Infinitive OR Verb + Gerund Selection

[7] Modal Verbs Selection

Although I already explained (4) in the previous article, other items were excluded because they also can be easily understood by Visualization using illustrations.

My conclusion and hypothesis suggestion are below.

For ESL to overcome the barrier [A], learners should at least learn the important parts [1]-[3] of American high school English after being proficient with American Jr-high school English.

I am optimistic that by learning these, we ESL will automatically understand the famous standard techniques necessary for speed reading, such as Skimming, Scanning, Phrase Reading (Slash Reading), Context Clues, and Sight Words.