Literacy Minnesota works to build a more equitable society by making quality literacy education available to all. Our new ESL curriculum, English Unlocked, introduces a more accessible, comprehensive experience for teachers and learners alike. The curriculum contains four levels (beginning literacy, beginning, intermediate and advanced) with 9-12 units each. The English Unlocked curriculum team will periodically update lessons, based on learner and teacher feedback.

The English Unlocked curriculum was written by experienced Adult Basic Education instructors to support adult ESL learners. It is aligned with the College and Career Readiness Standards for English Language Arts. The curriculum supports teachers and volunteers, regardless of experience, by providing detailed, easy-to-navigate lesson plans. Every lesson plan includes detailed suggestions to make the activities easier or more challenging, depending on the needs of the students.

• All student handouts are included and can be copied at the beginning of the unit and given to the students as a complete unit packet.
• Lessons include opportunities for learners to review.
• Units have a side-by-side layout; there is one page of teacher instructions per student page.
• Unit objectives are clear and measurable.
• Ongoing level objectives may signal a students’ readiness for the next level.
• Lessons are flexible and allow teachers and learners to determine the pace.
• Lessons follow a predictable structure that allows teachers and learners to focus on skills and content.

Please view the English Unlocked curriculum Level Chart  for test score and reading level alignment.

The English Unlocked curriculum supports the College and Career Readiness Standards (CCRS) for English Language Arts. Throughout all levels of the curriculum, learners practice reading and interpreting complex text, giving evidence, and building knowledge. View College and Career Readiness in English Unlocked for a more detailed description of the standards supported by the curriculum and the way those anchors were scaffolded for adult ESL learners in the target levels. 

Reading and Interpreting Complex Texts

Students need to read text that has the right level of complexity so the text will challenge them to grow their reading abilities, but without being so complex that students are frustrated. The goal is productive struggle. English Unlocked texts are measured to ensure that the text is at the right level for students, while being of high interest and when possible, authored by adult learners.

Giving Evidence

The CCR standards ask students to give evidence from text to support answers to questions. English Unlocked curriculum questions are carefully chosen and sequenced so the process of rereading and answering builds students’ comprehension of a text. Students are expected to interact with a text multiple times so they can find and use information from the text in their writing, answers, and in class discussions.

Building Knowledge

Students build knowledge through the process of rereading texts and answering (either in writing or through discussion) carefully crafted questions that ask them to dig deeper and deeper into the meaning of the text. This is different from learning directly from the teacher. Beginning readers build their knowledge through reading picture stories, listening, and discussions. Beginning language learners will continue to use pictures,

In our pilot classrooms, one unit for beginning literacy through intermediate took approximately 2 weeks to complete for classes meeting 8 hours per week. One Advanced unit took approximately 3 weeks to complete for classes meeting 8 hours per week. Of course, this is dependent upon how frequently a class meets and specific learner levels. Lessons are purposefully meant to be adaptable in order to be paced at the learning level that best matches specific learner needs and to meet different program structures.

We value feedback from instructors and students! Teachers are encouraged to provide feedback through our English Unlocked Teacher Feedback Form. We appreciate your feedback. Our curriculum team will review feedback periodically and make revisions.

We also have an English Unlocked Student Feedback Form to capture valuable learner perspective on the lessons. Please consider supporting learners to provide their feedback. To facilitate your class providing feedback, we have developed Lesson Ideas available in the English Unlocked Guiding Documents Folder .

Yes! Please email us at englishunlocked@literacymn.org and provide the following information: What are you purchasing and how many? Name, title, organization name, address, phone and email address.

English Unlocked was developed because of our former curriculum no longer met the more rigorous standards for adult education. While we are no longer updating the former curriculum, search the Educator Resources Library to find free teaching ideas.