When a family considers a move to Qingdao, or a shift from a local bilingual setting into a full English-medium curriculum, the question we hear most often from parents is quietly the same: Will my child be able to keep up?
It is a fair question, and one we take seriously. Our English Language Learning (ELL) program is built on a single principle: arriving with limited English is a starting point, not a ceiling. At Qingdao No. 1 International School of Shandong Province, located on our Laoshan District campus, we have welcomed multilingual learners for more than 25 years, and families seeking an ELL program in an international school setting will find a provision shaped by that experience. What follows is an honest look at how our non-native English speaker school support works, what parents should look for in any ELL provision, and how language support connects to the wider life of our school.
Why English Language Support Matters in an International School Setting
Language is the medium through which every other subject is taught. In a US-curriculum school like ours, a student is not simply learning English. They are learning in English, across science labs, humanities seminars, and collaborative inquiry projects. Research in second-language acquisition draws a helpful distinction here, and the broader challenge of overcoming language barriers in a global school setting is one worth understanding before choosing a program. BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) is the conversational fluency a child can pick up on the playground in a year or two. CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) is the academic English for multilingual learners that takes longer to build. It is the vocabulary, syntax, and reasoning needed to write a literary analysis or defend a lab hypothesis. Parents who want to go deeper can read academic language and English Language Learners from Colorín Colorado.
The children we welcome each August arrive with very different profiles. Some speak three languages at home and read English comfortably. Others are beginning with the alphabet. A one-size program would fail both ends of that spectrum, which is why our ELL provision is built around individualised placement and steady progression rather than a single standardised track.
Over 25 years, we have supported multilingual learners from more than 30 countries, and our ELL program places every new student along a documented pathway from assessment to full mainstream participation.
Understanding the ELL Program Landscape: Key Models Explained
Before describing what we do, it helps to name what exists. Most international schools draw from three recognisable instructional programme models for English language learners, each with real trade-offs. You will also see the terms English as a Second Language (ESL) and English Language Development (ELD) used alongside ELL; they describe overlapping provision, and we use them interchangeably here. A well-designed English language development program in an international school draws from more than one model, choosing the right tool for each student.
Pull-Out ESL Support
In a pull-out model, students leave the mainstream classroom for part of the day to receive targeted English instruction in a smaller group. The advantage is focused attention on specific language skills. The drawback, when used alone, is that students can miss content-area learning while they are out of the room, and the ESL class can feel disconnected from what the student is studying elsewhere.
Content-Based and Sheltered Instruction
Content-based language learning and sheltered instruction weave English development directly into subject teaching. A science teacher pre-teaches key vocabulary. She uses visual scaffolds. She adjusts the language demand of a task without diluting its academic content. Accreditation bodies and second-language researchers increasingly favour this integrated approach because students develop academic English while they learn the subject, not after.
Full Immersion with Structured Scaffolding
An English immersion program for children places a student in the mainstream English-medium classroom from day one, with targeted scaffolds layered in: sentence frames, bilingual glossaries, paired partners, and differentiated assessment. Done thoughtfully, it produces the fastest functional fluency. Done poorly, it leaves children adrift.
Our ELL program draws deliberately from the second and third models. We believe students learn English best when they are using it for something that matters to them, surrounded by peers who are doing the same.
How the QISS ELL Program Works: From Assessment to Integration
This is the section parents tell us they need most. Here is what actually happens when our English Language Learning program meets a new non-native speaker.
Step 1: Proficiency Assessment on Enrolment
Every prospective student who will benefit from ELL support completes a language proficiency assessment as part of our admissions process. We evaluate listening, speaking, reading, and writing separately, because a child may be a confident speaker but an emerging writer, or vice versa. The assessment measures English proficiency for international students arriving from many different educational backgrounds. It gives our ELL team a placement profile (not a score to pass or fail) that tells us exactly where to begin.
Our admissions lead, Ms. Paula O’Connell, walks each family through the results personally. Parents leave that conversation knowing what their child can already do in English, what the first term will focus on, and how progress will be measured.
Step 2: Personalised ELL Instruction
Once enrolled, students receive ESL support for students calibrated to their level. Our approach combines pull-out vs push-in support deliberately, choosing the right setting for each learner. Beginners work in small groups with our ELL specialists on foundational language: phonics, high-frequency vocabulary, and spoken confidence. They also sit in mainstream content classes with scaffolded materials. More advanced learners receive push-in support, where our ELL specialists work alongside classroom teachers inside the regular classroom. The setting is chosen to match the student rather than the system.
Our overall 3:1 student-teacher ratio means ELL support is genuinely individual. Our ELL teachers hold specialist qualifications in TESOL or equivalent and use differentiated instruction to meet each child at their current level of academic English for multilingual learners. They work in close partnership with classroom teachers so that what a child practices in ELL directly supports the novel they are reading in English class or the unit they are studying in social studies.
Step 3: Supported Transition into Mainstream Classes
ELL is never a destination. The goal, from the first week, is full participation in the mainstream US curriculum. As students demonstrate growth in classroom performance, in standardised language assessments, and in teacher observation, the intensity of direct ELL instruction tapers, and monitoring support takes its place. Families receive termly updates so the pathway is visible, not mysterious.
Our inquiry-based learning model helps enormously here. When a lesson centres on a question rather than a lecture, a student who is still building English vocabulary can contribute through observation, diagram, hypothesis, and dialogue. Thinking and language grow together.
The Mindful Hearts Difference: Language Learning and Wellbeing Together
A child who feels anxious does not learn language. A child who feels safe, seen, and included does. This is not a sentimental claim. It is one of the most consistent findings in second-language acquisition research, and it shapes how we run our classrooms.
Our Mindful Hearts philosophy rests on four values: Compassion, Integrity, Inclusivity, and Creativity. For a new ELL student, Inclusivity is not an abstract poster on a wall. It is the classmate who slides over a bilingual dictionary without being asked. It is the teacher who waits the extra six seconds for a thoughtful answer. In our community, multilingualism is the norm rather than the exception. Our student body spans dozens of nationalities and home languages, and a child who speaks Korean, Russian, or Mandarin at home is not an outlier.
Leader in Me at QISS, our school-wide leadership framework, plays a quiet but powerful role for ELL students. It builds daily habits of self-advocacy: asking a teacher to repeat a phrase, requesting a clarification in a small group, volunteering to present first rather than last. In our classrooms, we regularly see ELL students use Leader in Me goal-setting routines to track their own vocabulary growth and take initiative in group work, often weeks before they feel fully fluent.
ELL Support Across Every Division: Pre-K Through High School
Language development looks different at age four than it does at age sixteen. Our English as a second language K-12 provision reflects that across our four school divisions: Early Childhood, Lower School, Middle School, and High School.
Early Childhood and Lower School
In Early Childhood and Lower School, our English immersion program for children happens through play, song, story, and routine. Young ELL students are immersed in a print-rich environment with strong visual and gestural support. Our teachers use predictable language patterns that help children map English onto what they already know. Children at this age often reach conversational fluency within a year, and we focus on building strong early literacy alongside it.
Middle School
Middle School is where academic English becomes more demanding: longer texts, abstract concepts, and analytical writing. Our ELL team works shoulder-to-shoulder with content teachers to pre-teach vocabulary, chunk reading tasks, and build the writing structures students will rely on in high school. This is also the stage where many of our ELL students take full ownership of their learning and begin to see themselves as strong English users rather than English learners.
High School and College Readiness
In High School, ELL support shifts toward academic precision and college readiness. Students prepare for AP coursework, standardised testing, and university application essays. Our AP and SAT Test Center on campus gives students a concrete endpoint to prepare for. Our average SAT of 1300 and average AP score of 4.0 reflect the work students put in alongside their teachers.
The outcome speaks for itself: 100% of our graduates have been admitted to college, every year, including students who began their QISS journey with limited English. Our college counselling and university placement team supports every student in telling their own story to admissions officers, language journey included.
What to Look for When Choosing an ELL Program: A Parent's Checklist
Whether you are touring QISS or another school, the questions worth asking about any ELL program international school families consider are the same — and families who are still comparing international schools more broadly may find it useful to read that guide alongside this one. English language support within an international curriculum deserves scrutiny, and we encourage families to look for:
- Specialist-qualified ELL teachers with recognised credentials in TESOL, applied linguistics, or equivalent (not classroom teachers asked to stretch into a second role)
- Accreditation oversight through bodies like WASC and CIS, which QISS holds in full. Both require documented ELL provision as part of school-wide review, and you can also read our perspective on CIS-accredited schools in China, the WASC accreditation standards for international schools, and the CIS accreditation framework directly
- Transparent assessment and progression criteria so you can see, term by term, how your child is growing
- Integration with the mainstream curriculum rather than a parallel track that separates ELL students socially or academically
- Small class sizes that make individual attention real; our 3:1 ratio is a meaningful part of why our approach works
If a school cannot answer these questions clearly, that itself is useful information.
Starting the Conversation: Next Steps for Families Considering QISS
Every student who walks onto our 48,000 m² Laoshan campus began somewhere. Some arrive already fluent, some with a handful of English words, and all of them capable. If you are weighing whether our ELL program in Qingdao is the right home for your child’s next chapter, we would be glad to meet you properly.
The most helpful first step is a conversation with our admissions director, Ms. Paula O’Connell, who can listen to your child’s specific language background and map what the first year might look like. You can reach her directly at admissions@qiss.org.cn or +86-532-6889-8888. We also warmly invite you to visit campus, to sit in on an ELL session, meet our teachers, and see our students at work. For families further afield, we are happy to arrange a virtual tour.
If you want to read more before reaching out, you can explore our ELL program in detail or browse our admissions and open days calendar. To schedule a campus visit or begin the admissions conversation, email admissions@qiss.org.cn or call Ms. O’Connell’s team today. We look forward to welcoming your family to QISS.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is an ELL program and how does it differ from a standard ESL class?
We use ELL, ESL, and ELD interchangeably to describe English language support for non-native speakers. Our ELL program differs from a standard ESL class by integrating language development directly into subject teaching rather than isolating it, so students build academic English while learning science, history, and other content that matters to them.
What types of ELL program models exist and which does QISS use?
We draw deliberately from content-based instruction (where teachers weave English development into subject teaching with scaffolds like pre-taught vocabulary and visual supports) and full immersion with structured scaffolding (where students sit in mainstream classes from day one with targeted supports like sentence frames and bilingual glossaries). We avoid pull-out models used alone because they separate students from content learning.
How does QISS assess a new student's English proficiency level on arrival?
Every prospective ELL student completes a proficiency assessment measuring listening, speaking, reading, and writing separately, because a child may be confident speaking but emerging in writing. Our admissions director then walks families through the results personally, explaining what their child can already do and what the first term will focus on.
What does day-to-day ELL support look like inside a QISS classroom?
We combine pull-out and push-in support based on each student’s needs: beginners work in small groups with ELL specialists on foundational language, while also sitting in mainstream classes with scaffolded materials; more advanced learners receive push-in support where our ELL specialists work alongside classroom teachers inside the regular classroom. Our 3:1 student-teacher ratio means support is genuinely individual.
How does the QISS ELL program transition students into mainstream academic classes?
As students show growth in classroom performance, standardized assessments, and teacher observation, the intensity of direct ELL instruction tapers and monitoring support takes its place. Families receive termly updates so the pathway is visible, and our inquiry-based learning model helps because students can contribute through observation, diagram, and dialogue even while building vocabulary.
Can a child with little or no English still thrive in a US-curriculum international school?
Yes. We have supported multilingual learners from over 30 countries for more than 25 years, and 100% of our graduates have been admitted to college every year, including students who began with limited English. Our ELL program places every new student along a documented pathway from assessment to full mainstream participation.
What qualifications and experience do QISS ELL teachers hold?
Our ELL teachers hold specialist qualifications in TESOL or equivalent and work in close partnership with classroom teachers so that what a child practices in ELL directly supports their work in other classes. We employ specialist-qualified ELL teachers rather than classroom teachers stretched into a second role.
How does QISS's ELL program connect to its broader Mindful Hearts and holistic philosophy?
Our Mindful Hearts values of Compassion, Inclusivity, and Creativity shape how we support ELL students: multilingualism is the norm in our diverse community, and our Leader in Me framework builds daily habits of self-advocacy like asking for clarification and tracking vocabulary growth. We know that a child who feels safe, seen, and included learns language far more effectively than one who feels anxious.
