1st Edition

Teaching Emergent Bilingual Students Flexible Approaches in an Era of New Standards

    Recent educational reform initiatives such as the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) largely fail to address the needs--or tap into the unique resources--of students who are developing literacy skills in both English and a home language. This book discusses ways to meet the challenges that current standards pose for teaching emergent bilingual students in grades K-8. Leading experts describe effective, standards-aligned instructional approaches and programs expressly developed to promote bilingual learners' academic vocabulary, comprehension, speaking, writing, and content learning. Innovative policy recommendations and professional development approaches are also presented.

    I. Policy
    1. Language Education Policies in the Common Core Era: Policy Initiatives That Affect Emergent Bilingual Youth, Francesca López
    2. Effective Instruction for Emergent Bilingual Children: Accelerating English Acquisition While Developing Biliteracy, Kathy Escamilla and Susan Hopewell
    3. Response to Intervention for Emergent Bilingual Students in a Common Core Era: Guiding Principles for Distinguishing between Language Acquisition and Learning Disability, Amy M. Eppolito and Vanessa Santiago Schwarz
    II. Pedagogy
    4. English Learners and Instructional Texts: Evidence, Current Practice, and a Call to Action, Elfreida H. Hiebert
    5. Supporting Linguistically Diverse Students to Develop Deep, Flexible Knowledge of Academic Words, Amy C. Crosson
    6. Using Strategy Instruction to Promote Reading Comprehension and Content Learning, Alison Boardman and Cristin Jensen Lasser
    7. Dialogic Reasoning: Supporting Emergent Bilingual Students’ Language and Literacy Development, Marcela Ossa Parra, Christopher J. Wagner, C. Patrick Proctor, Christine M. Leighton, Dana A. Robertson, Jeanne R. Paratore, and Evelyn Ford-Connors
    8. Writing Arguments: The Experience of Two Mainstream Teachers Working with Multilingual Students, María Estela Brisk, Yalda M. Kaveh, Pat Scialoia, and Beverly Timothy
    9. Energizing Reading: Engagement in Teaching and Learning, Ana TaboadaBarber and Peet Smith
    10. Situating the English Language Arts Common Core Standards in Science: Enhancing Access to Language for Emergent Bilingual Students, Marco A. Bravo
    III. Professional Learning
    11. Academic Language and Literacy in Every Subject (ALLIES): A Capacity-Building Approach to Supporting Teachers in Grades 4–8, Susan P. O’Hara, Robert Pritchard, and Jeff Zwiers
    12. Supporting Linguistically Responsive Teaching: e-Learning Communities for Academic Language Learning in Mathematics and Science (eCALLMS), Kara Mitchell Viesca, Boni Hamilton, Anne O. Davidson, and the eCALLMS Team
    Index

    Biography

    C. Patrick Proctor, EdD, is Associate Professor in the Lynch School of Education at Boston College. Previously he was a third- and fourth-grade bilingual teacher and worked in district, state, and nonprofit settings on issues pertaining to bilingualism and literacy. Dr. Proctor’s research is broadly focused on emergent bilingual learners from Spanish-speaking homes in K-8 settings. Within that context, his work targets language use and development, cross-linguistic relations, instructional interventions, and teacher practice. He has published many articles and book chapters, has developed language-based and reading curricula, and has worked in close collaboration with Boston-area schools facilitating the translation of research to practice.

    Alison Boardman, PhD, is Assistant Research Professor in the School of Education at the University of Colorado Boulder. A former elementary and middle school special education teacher, Dr. Boardman works closely with teachers and school leaders to study and innovate reading instruction across content areas in classrooms that include emergent bilingual students and students with disabilities. She recently led a project to build school- and district-level capacity to sustain best practices for literacy instruction in language arts, social studies, and science classrooms, and is currently involved in developing project-based learning curriculum and multimodal composition opportunities for diverse learners in ninth-grade language arts classrooms. She has published numerous articles and books on reading comprehension.

    Elfrieda H. Hiebert, PhD, is CEO and President of TextProject, Inc. She has worked in the field of early reading acquisition for more than 40 years as a classroom teacher, teacher educator, and researcher. Her research, which addresses how fluency, vocabulary, and knowledge can be fostered through appropriate texts, has been published in numerous scholarly journals and books. Dr. Hiebert’s contributions to research and practice have been recognized with such honors as the Research to Practice Award from the American Educational Research Association and the Oscar S. Causey Award from the Literacy Research Association.

    "An important, much-needed contribution to the field. The book covers an impressive breadth of topics and draws from various strands of research. It will be useful to scholars, to faculty engaged in the preparation of future teachers, and to practitioners. I recommend it highly for preservice teacher education programs."--Guadalupe Valdés, PhD, Bonnie Katz Tenenbaum Professor of Education, Stanford University

    "This book is a response to the silence of the CCSS on emergent bilingual students. It is a loud statement of how policy, pedagogy, and professional learning cannot be 'common,' but must clearly differentiate among students. Readers are guided to adapt their pedagogical and assessment practices in order to provide emergent bilinguals with a truly equal educational opportunity."--Ofelia García, PhD, Urban Education PhD Program, The Graduate Center, City University of New York

    "A 'must read' for those working with English language learners. This book offers key components to aid those supporting emergent bilingual students through a study of best practices from all over the United States."--Alexandra Montes McNeil, EdD, Principal Leader, Office of the Superintendent, Boston Public Schools

    "As policy and standards continue to move forward, it is crucial to address the needs of emergent bilingual students. The editors have provided a clear and progressive view of many avenues for addressing these students' strengths and needs in the classroom. Accessible to future and current practitioners alike, this book should be required reading in all literacy education programs."--Julie L. Pennington, PhD, College of Education, University of Nevada, Reno
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