Instructional Evaluation
Asset-based Instruction for Multilingual Success
AIMS is a classroom-level companion to SIMS. Where SIMS evaluates building systems, AIMS evaluates instructional practice — the six categories of teacher decision-making that determine whether multilingual learners can access, engage with, and demonstrate learning in your classroom.
Is your instruction closing the gap?
Every multilingual learner arrives with a gap between what the curriculum demands and what they can currently access in English. That gap doesn't close on its own. It closes — or doesn't — through specific instructional decisions made every day. AIMS asks whether those decisions are happening, and how consistently.
Not every span is in place. The snapshot shows you which ones are.
Illustrative — each category is a span in the bridge your instruction builds
What AIMS measures
AIMS is answered by classroom teachers and ESL teachers. It asks about six categories of instructional practice — the decisions that determine whether multilingual learners can access content, participate in learning, and demonstrate what they know.
Each category is scored on a frequency scale: Never, Sometimes, Often, Consistently. The snapshot shows where practice is strong and where it has room to grow.
Academic language
Does instruction name and teach the vocabulary, sentence structures, and discourse patterns students need to access the content — not just the content itself?
Access and scaffolding
Are supports matched to students' proficiency levels in ways that open up grade-level work without removing its cognitive demand?
Asset-based practice
Does instruction draw on students' home languages, cultural knowledge, and prior experiences as resources for learning?
Academic discourse
Are students structured opportunities to use academic language in speaking and writing — not just to show comprehension, but to develop language?
Assessment
Do assessment approaches allow multilingual learners to demonstrate content knowledge in ways that are not limited by their current English proficiency?
Instructional collaboration
Do teachers co-plan or consult with ESL colleagues to align instruction and share responsibility for multilingual learners' language and content development?
Try the free AIMS Snapshot
One question per category. Results and recommendations on screen in about 3 minutes.
How AIMS connects to frameworks you already use
Every AIMS category connects to WIDA, TESOL's 6 Principles, Danielson, and Marzano. The crosswalk is a reference for instructional coaches and evaluators — use it to show how AIMS results map to the observation and evaluation frameworks your district already uses.
See where your instruction stands.
The free AIMS Snapshot takes about 3 minutes. Six questions, one per category. Results and recommendations on screen right away.