Using SIOP Model to Engage Students and Promote Academic Knowledge of English Learners (ELs)

The increased number of English learners (EL) in mainstream classrooms in the United States necessitates the use of effective strategies to support ELs' learning. Previous studies have shown that the sheltered instruction observation protocol (SIOP) model is effective in teaching content subjects to EL students. In this chapter, the SIOP model has been incorporated to teach a science unit to students of level-3 English proficiency. This chapter includes an introduction, literature review, unit about plants, and conclusion. The unit has 10 lessons with several features of the SIOP model to serve as an example for mainstream classroom teachers. Features used in this unit include visuals, graphic organizers, vocabulary previews, hands-on activities, video clips, charts, rubrics, and different forms of assessment. If implemented, the SIOP model can be a tool for classroom teachers in making content knowledge accessible to EL students and help them succeed in their learning.

The Threat of Downward Assimilation Among Young African Immigrants in U.S. Schools

This chapter presents research implications geared toward preventing the downward assimilation trend prevailing among young African immigrants in US public schools. Secondary data from three qualitative studies of integration and adaptation processes of African-born immigrant youth in urban school settings helped identify signs of downward assimilation, especially among males. Salient signs of this trend include low academic achievement, gang inclination, and defiance towards authority. Four major theories—segmented assimilation, socio-ecological theory, intersectionality, and critical race theory—served as framework for the analysis of the risk factors that may lead young African immigrants to follow the downward assimilation path. The analysis reveals the need for intervention measures at the federal, state, and school levels to reduce the vulnerability of non-predominant minority youth in US school settings and the moral responsibility of school authorities to ensure their welfare. Recommended preventive measures include (1) educating immigrant families and school communities; (2) encouraging collaboration and dialogue between African community organizations, school administration, and policymakers purported at creating a favorable school climate for the marginalized African immigrant youth; (3) increasing intervention measures, such as school-community mediation and political representation.

My Friends and Family

This chapter documents an activity during a Family Literacy Night in Latino community of the Southwest. All of the families participating were of Spanish-speaking (i.e., México, El Salvador, Puerto Rico). From a socio-cultural perspective, three points became clear through the interaction: (1) as parents and children collaborated around short texts, they were able to share their individual schema as well as their social, cultural, and linguistic capitals in conversation and in writing Spanish and English; (2) parents naturally assumed the role of mentor throughout the writing sessions; (3) when afforded topic choice and scaffolding for cultural adhesion, students generate texts that reflect their personal perspectives and lived experiences. Thematic analysis of the data revealed that the ELL writers signaled their quotidian concerns and challenges as the reasons for wanting a s/hero. The results argue that, for increased writing in English, educators are well advised to frame school tasks within their students' cultures.

What Teachers Need to Know About English Language Learners' Translanguaging in the Classroom

This qualitative research study focuses on English language learners who are continuing their education in the U.S. high schools and examines their translanguaging in the classroom. When students are learning a second language, they use their linguistic repertoire and their knowledge in English and their native language for negotiation of meaning. In order to gain a better understanding of the students' translanguaging, one ESL teacher and 10 ESL students were interviewed and observed in a classroom. The ESL students spoke Arabic as their native language and had beginning to intermediate proficiency levels. The findings of the study showed that English language learners use various strategies to make the content comprehensible by making connections between their knowledge in their L1 and L2.

Facilitating Linguistic and Academic Success for Newcomer English Language Learners

The landscape of peoples in need has changed dramatically and appears to grow more complex. For today, leaders and citizens in the United States must decide how best to address the needs and aggregate issues related to the very large numbers of refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burma, Iraq, Bhutan, Somalia, Syria, and numerous other nations fleeing persecution owing to their political or religious beliefs. Complicating the challenges encountered by newcomer English language learners (ELLs) and their teachers is the wave of xenophobia that has once again had a global impact. Gleaning lessons learned from previous United States refugee resettlement programs about the societal adjustment and educational achievement experienced by refugees from Southeast Asia, from the Cuban Haitian program, from the resettlement of the Karen and Chin Burmese, and others will empower teachers to facilitate greater academic achievement among newcomer ELLs.

Culturally Relevant Preparedness Using STEAM Integrative Teaching in the Classroom

Although there exist some studies that examine culturally relevant teaching and its positive impact on learning outcomes; overall, these studies are not abundant, and teachers are generally unaware of the educational frameworks that would allow them to apply their theoretical knowledge of culturally relevant preparedness in practice. In this respect, STEAM can be a perfect solution for reinforcing culturally relevant teaching at schools. First, culturally relevant teaching requires certain conditions (e.g., diversity, inclusion, a teacher's willingness to learn, etc.) that are inherent in the STEAM educational framework. Second, the STEAM educational framework shares similar values with culturally relevant teaching (e.g., brain focus on social and cross-cultural skills, pedagogical focus on teachers' learning, etc.). Finally, the literature review demonstrates that there are numerous strategies of using the STEAM educational framework to reinforce culturally relevant teaching (e.g., to design a culturally relevant program based on STEAM).

Cultural Experiences of Early Childhood Teachers and the Relationship to Self-Reported Multicultural Teaching Competencies

Various studies around multicultural education have looked at ways to identify the multicultural teaching competencies teachers need to teach diverse learners. Many of these studies have closely focused on teacher's perceptions, sensitiveness and behavior. However, there are limited studies regarding how teacher's cultural experiences are associated with multicultural teaching competencies. This chapter looked at the cultural experiences of early childhood teachers and how those relate to the teacher's multicultural teaching competencies. Fifty-seven early childhood teachers were investigated that were recruited from a state early childhood education conference by completing The Wayson's multicultural teaching scale. Positive correlations were identified suggesting a possible link between teacher's cultural experiences and their multicultural teaching competencies.

Teaching Mathematics to English Learners

Recently, teachers in the United States are encountering an influx of multilingual immigrant students. The linguistic diversity can be challenging for teachers who need to think about how to foster language and disciplinary knowledge awareness in meaningful ways. Multimodal instruction (i.e., use of gesture, drawing, and movement) can serve to support conceptual understanding of emergent bilingual students in disciplinary areas such as mathematics or science. The purpose of this chapter is to investigate the interplay between gestures and mathematical concepts. This study takes place in a ninth grade ESOL Coordinate Algebra Classroom. Using systemic functional multimodal discourse analysis, the researchers analyze the teacher's gestures through a corpus of three video recorded lessons. The results show that the teacher's gestures endowed with meanings and mathematical concepts can enhance students' understandings. These findings can contribute to recent research on multimodal pedagogic practices among teachers with multilingual and multicultural students.

Ready Together

Many challenges that English learners (ELs) face are compounded for children and families from undocumented immigrant backgrounds. Educators, school support staff, community-based organizations, and other service providers play key roles in advocating during a sudden immigration crisis. A sudden immigration crisis occurs when children experience the sudden loss of a caregiver or family member due to deportation procedures. This chapter describes a “Ready Together” (RE-TO) rapid response initiative, which consists of three components: First, it provides a rationale as to why teacher education programs should prepare future educators to respond in case of sudden immigration crisis. Second, it conceives of a “rapid response team” for schools working with students from diverse immigration backgrounds that includes roles and responsibilities for administrators, counselors, and teachers, and third, it provides examples of emergency preparedness plans, workshop topics and materials that prepare families with documents and directives in case of a sudden immigration crisis.

ILLs for ELLs

The number of U.S. residents who are linguistically diverse has increased significantly over time, and many of these residents are school-age children who are learning English and grade-level content simultaneously. The task of promoting success for these students while holding them to the same high academic standards as their native English-speaking peers can be a daunting one, as teachers also strive to encourage acceptance and a safe context for learning and growth to occur. This chapter highlights one classroom teacher who implemented an instructional strategy, Interactive Learning Logs, which allowed her to create a classroom environment that promoted acceptance, high expectations, and skillful differentiation to meet the needs of all of her students, including her ELLs. The chapter shares this teacher's personal experiences with the ILL strategy and how it enhanced ELL student performance through planned instructional supports.