Developing literacy in second-language learners: Report of the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth (original) (raw)
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Developing Literacy in Second-Language Learners
Educational Researcher, 2009
Teaching language-minority students to read and write well in English is an urgent challenge in the nation's K-12 schools. Literacy in English is essential to achievement in every academic subject-and to educational and economic opportunities beyond schooling. Compounding this challenge are increasing numbers and diversity of language-minority students. These indicators illuminate the challenge: • A large and growing number of students come from homes where English is not the primary language. In 1979, there were 6 million language-minority students; by 1999, this number had more than doubled to 14 million students. • Language-minority students are not faring well in U.S. schools. For the 41 states reporting, only 18.7 percent of English-language learners scored above the stateestablished norm for reading comprehension (Kindler, 2002). • Whereas 10 percent of students who spoke English at home failed to complete high school, the percentage was three times as high (31 percent) for languageminority students who spoke English and five times as high (51 percent) for language-minority students who spoke English with difficulty (National Center for Education Statistics, 2004). Language-minority students who cannot read and write proficiently in English cannot participate fully in American schools, workplaces or society. They face limited job opportunities and earning power. Nor are the consequences of low literacy attainment in English limited to individual impoverishment. U.S. economic competitiveness depends on workforce quality. Inadequate reading and writing proficiency in English relegates rapidly increasing language-minority populations to the sidelines, limiting the nation's potential for economic competitiveness, innovation, productivity growth, and quality of life.
with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds learned to participate in reading, writing, and talking about books in a literature-based instructional program. Our analyses revealed a gradual release of responsibility from the teacher to students as they developed the knowledge and skills needed to respond to books and explore personal meanings collaboratively through guided participation. Accompanying these changes in participation structures and practices were exceptional gains in student performance on both related (metacognitive control) and unrelated (reading and unfamiliar sight words) measures of reading ability. A pattern of three distinguishable but overlapping stages emerged from our analyses of student-teacher interaction patterns: (1) teaching by telling, (2) teaching by modeling and scaffolding, and (3) teaching from behind. Five features of the focal teachers instruction were pivotal in promoting this transformation of responsibility. First, the teacher created a classroom learning community in which students felt respected and their experiences and knowledge were valued. Second, the teacher allowed time to build opportunities to engage students in reading, writing, and talking about age-appropriate and quality literature. Third, the teacher challenged students to think critically and reflectively about what they read by asking open-ended but pointed questions. Fourth, the teacher employed multiple modes of teaching-telling, modeling, scaffolding, facilitating, and participating. Finally, the teacher persisted in maintaining high expectations for all of her students.
New approaches to gender, class, and race in second language writing
Journal of Second Language Writing, 2003
Gender, class, and race are constitutive elements essential to writers' agency and identity. However, these categories are not typically paid substantial attention in second language writing as well as in the larger field of second language acquisition and bilingual development, although issues of gender have been explored to a greater extent than the other two categories. This article summarizes constructivist and poststructuralist approaches to gender discussed recently in the larger field of second language learning and applies key concepts to issues of gender, class, and race in second language writing as well as interrelations among them. Recent discussions on gender and language have problematized fixed understandings of the gender binary in relation to language use. They have explored how gendered use of language is socially and discursively constructed and how gender, language, power, and discourse are related to each other in dynamic and transformative ways. It is suggested that new approaches to gender, class, and race be dialectic in that they should both explore differences between social categories in a non-essentialist way and expose discourse and power relations that are embodied in these differences. Future research agendas on gender, class, and race in second language writing that incorporate these approaches are suggested. #
Gender and English Language Learners: Challenges and Possibilities
2009
INTRODUCTION During the past decade, several scholars in the fields of language education, second language acquisition, and bilingualism have addressed the influence of gender on access to linguistic and interactional resources, on dynamics of classroom interaction, and on language learning outcomes (Ehrlich, 1997; Norton, 2000; Pavlenko, 2001; Pavlenko et al., 2001; Sunderland, 2000). The field of TESOL has also exhibited a growing interest in the impact of gender on ESL and EFL learning, seen in the increasing number of plenaries, panels, discussion groups, and papers on the topic. Yet the nature of the connection between the two phenomena, gender and language learning, remains elusive, or rather it is seen differently by different scholars and educators. Some studies continue to appeal to variationist and interactional sociolinguistics methodology, treating gender as a variable, while others, grounded in critical, poststructuralist, and feminist theory, approach gender as a syste...
Journal of Literacy Research, 2010
The purpose of this article is to respond to a review of the report Developing Literacy in Second-language Learners: Report of the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth, written by our respected colleague Kathy Escamilla, which appeared in a recent edition of the Journal of Literacy Research. This will also give us the opportunity to offer a brief update of the research on effective reading and writing instruction for English-language learners that has appeared since 2002, the cut-off year for the inclusion of studies in the original panel report. Downloaded from 342 AUGUST, SHANAHAN youth ages 3-18 with respect to their attainment of second-language literacy and to produce a comprehensive report evaluating and synthesizing this literature. The increase in students in U.S. schools who come to English as a second language is remarkable and represents a major challenge to American education. The Department of Education rightly wanted to provide research-based information for schools on how best to facilitate their English learning. It was necessary for the panel to limit its inclusion to studies that were published in English (no matter what languages may have been the focus in the studies); thus, the majority of such studies were conducted in the United States, followed by those from the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia, with some studies from the Netherlands, Finland, and Israel. A primary purpose of the report was to establish a foundation for current and future research and as such was intended primarily for researchers. Within the selection criteria established, the panel was comprehensive in its review of the research: It focused broadly on languageminority students, and included a variety of study types addressing a wide array of questions pertinent to the literacy education of language-minority children.
TESOL quarterly, 2004
ccclxxvi TESOL QUARTERLY is an international professional organization for those concerned with the teaching of English as a second or foreign language and of standard English as a second dialect. TESOL's mission is to ensure excellence in English language teaching to speakers of other languages. TESOL encourages professionalism in language education; individual language rights; accessible, high quality education; collaboration in a global community; and interaction of research and reflective practice for educational improvement. Information about membership and other TESOL services is available from TESOL Central Office at the address below.
Writing & Pedagogy, 2011
Identity texts, literacy engagement, and multilingual classrooms: What do these terms mean and encompass, and how do they play out with today's highly diverse school-aged population, their teachers, and their families? The articles included in this volume of Writing & Pedagogy deal with the educational experiences of individuals from marginalized social groups, adding names and faces to individuals who teach and learn in multilingual classrooms. The latter term refers to classrooms that are multilingual by virtue of the large number of home languages spoken by students in these classrooms, home languages that are not the same as the language of instruction. The articles in this special issue illustrate how and why multilingual learners' literacy engagement, or personal investment in schooling, increases when teachers, peers, and their own parents view students' literacy productions positively. The term used for these productions or "texts"-be they written, spoken, visual, musical, or any combination thereof-is identity texts to emphasize that they express the learner's identity. taken together, these articles offer readers a global view of the relationship between providing spaces that honor marginalized groups' languages and cultures, of why marginalized individuals invest themselves in those spaces, and of how such investment influences children's subsequent academic achievement. The contributors draw on Cummins' (2001; this volume) academic language learning and literacy engagement frameworks to capture, untangle, and illustrate the dialectical interplay and writing & pedagogy
EXPLORING LITERACY PRACTICES IN A SECOND LANGUAGE
There has been a consensus in research and practices that social and cultural aspects of lives contribute to literacy development, particularly in second language learning. The conception of literacy has been shifting from the lens of formal literacy learning in school settings into broader opportunities in sociocultural contexts, and some may exclusively look at the intersection between the two. In this article, I discuss the concept of continu-ities of literacy development and out-of-school literacy practices by carefully interpreting empirical research that have been done in the last decade. The discussion in this article enriches the notion of literacy learning that diverse settings of literacy practices, parents' role, and various available texts are significant predictors to the continuities of literacy development. I argue that ESL learners independently mediate their own literacy development either at school or community by taking advantages of rich opportunities available at the environment, which explained novice-expert relationship, hybridity, and intertextuality. A growing body of research has informed the continuities of language and literacy practices across spaces or contexts including schools (
Maintaining a Minority Language: A Case Study of Hispanic Teenagers
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 2006
New in the McGraw-Hill second language professional series, this volume is a welcome addition to current resources for English as a second language~ESL!, English as a foreign language~EFL!, and foreign language~FL! teachers seeking an introduction to research and practice in second language~L2! writing instruction+ The book unifies insights from multiple sources from a SLA perspective+ An experienced language teacher, teacher educator, and researcher, Williams emphasizes that writing involves more than text production; "it is also a learning and thinking process"~p+ 76!+ Although grounded in SLA theory, the volume synthesizes rather than surveys research findings and is geared toward nonspecialists, principally students, preservice teachers, and practitioners who "feel unprepared to teach @L2# composition"~pp+ 1-2!+ Consistent with the Professional series format, the text eschews bibliographic references: Readers seeking primary sources will find bibliographic citations only at each chapter's conclusion+ Decidedly practical in orientation, chapters include prompts designed to help readers apply the content to classroom practice+ Sample materials e+g+, instructional activities, student writing, scoring rubrics! punctuate most chapters, which conclude with a synthesis of main points and a list of readings for beginning students+ Chapter 1 introduces factors that influence SLA, such as implicit and explicit knowledge, input, system and item learning, attention, practice, and time, acquainting readers with the cognitive, sociocultural, and educational contexts for academic L2 writing+ In chapter 2 Williams considers how texts, L2 writers, and instructional processes influence language development, stressing the importance of audience awareness in teaching L2 writing+ The chapter curiously underrepresents social constructionist and discursive models of L2 literacy+ Offering general guidelines for designing classroom tasks, chapter 3 presents methods and techniques suitable for L2 learners at beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels+ The chapter also appraises technological approaches to teaching L2 writing+ Chapter 4 focuses on text production activities involving invention, drafting, and revision+ The author effectively summarizes the conventional wisdom on managing teacher and peer response in L2 classrooms+ Chapter 5 pursues these themes by assessing mixed research findings on teacher feedback and peer response and suggests implications for educational practice+ Chapter 6 elaborates on the feedback topic by outlining basic principles of writing assess-ment+ The chapter begins with a nontechnical survey of key "terms, concepts, and issues in testing,"~p+ 119! that some readers might find less than complete+ Core constructs such as reliability and validity, for example, are treated in the simplest terms+ Omitting trait-based scoring, the author describes both holistic and analytic rating scales, the