Abstract
Over a 4-year period, a large urban California school district developed and implemented a blended inquiry science and English Language Development (ELD) program in an effort to provide their English language learners opportunities to develop proficiency in English through participation in inquiry-based science. The resulting, “science/ELD blended program,” utilized a combined science/ELD lesson plan to structure and guide teachers’ efforts to use science as the context for language development. In this paper we describe the development and outcomes of this program. A sample that included 3 school principals, 60 teachers, and over 2000 students in Kindergarten through 5th grade provides windows into the effectiveness of the program. Implementation of this program resulted in enhanced status for science, increases in students’ English oral language use, and changes in teachers’ understanding of their own teaching practice. Additionally, participating students’ English and science achievement, compared to a similar group of students who were using the district’s established English language development curriculum, demonstrates modest, but statistically significant improvement. Results from this study suggest that restricting instructional minutes for science to provide additional time for ELD and English language arts may be unnecessary. Rather, allowing consistent time for science instruction that incorporates ELD instruction along with inquiry science experiences may provide the authentic and purposeful context students need to develop new language without restricting access to science content.
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Appendix: Planning Sequence of 5E/ELD Lesson Design
Appendix: Planning Sequence of 5E/ELD Lesson Design
In teachers’ use of the science/ELD blended design template a specific sequence was followed. This sequence begins with identifying the development of a science concept through the 5Es (Step 1). Teachers then develop details of an inquiry science lesson designed to achieve each conceptual goal independent of language objectives (Step 2). Finally, teachers modify the lesson by adding appropriate ELD support (Step 3). This sequence is illustrated in the tables below. For Steps 2 and 3, only the Engage phase of the lesson is shown. For further details regarding this sequence see, Gomez Zwiep et al. 2015).
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Step 1: Plan conceptual storyline of each E
Teacher | Student | Science concept | |
|---|---|---|---|
Engage | SC: Sounds can be heard all around us | ||
Sounds have different qualities | |||
Explore | Sounds are made by vibrations. Changing the vibrations can change the sound | ||
Explain | Vibrations cause the sounds to be created. Different kinds of sounds can be made from the vibrations | ||
Extend | Sounds can be high or low (precursor to pitch) |
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Step 2: Develop science lesson sequence and predict student responses
Teacher | Student responses | Concept |
|---|---|---|
I want everyone to close your eyes and listen to all of the different sounds that you hear | SC: Sounds can be heard all around us | |
Sounds have different qualities | ||
Give students 30 s to a minute to listen for sounds. (If the school area is particularly quiet, make some sounds like crumpling up a piece of paper or banging a trash can.) | ||
What were the sounds like? | Bird, Boys, Talking, Bugs, Cars |
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Step 3: ELD supports: Identify appropriate language function match; insert appropriate language scaffolds; adjust Expected student responses for proficiency levels of students in the class
ENGAGE: Teacher | Low | Med | High | Science concept/Language function |
|---|---|---|---|---|
I want everyone to close your eyes and listen to all of the different sounds that you hear Give students thirty seconds to a minute to listen for sounds. (If the school area is particularly quiet, make some sounds like crumpling up a piece of paper or banging a trash can.) Turn to your partner and tell him or her what sounds you heard Partner A will tell partner B one thing they heard Then, partner B will tell partner A one thing they heard Keep going until you have shared all the things you heard (Students take turns sharing with their partners). What were the sounds like? Turn to your partner and describe the sounds Who can share with the class something their partner shared? Record the types of sounds on the board/graphic organizer as students share | Bird, Boys, Talking, Bugs, Car | The birds outside, Students next door, Flies buzzing It was soft | I heard whispering, It was loud yelling, The buzzing was tiny. I heard students in the class next door. | SC: Sounds can be heard all around us Sounds have different qualities LF: Describing |
Bird chirping, talking, cars, buzzing, loud, quiet, soft | Student share ideas from their partner talk. | |||
| ||||
Great! So there are different types of sounds around us. Let’s find out more about sounds. | ||||
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Zwiep, S.G., Straits, W.J. (2017). The Integration of English Language Development and Inquiry Science into a Blended Professional Development Design. In: Oliveira, A., Weinburgh, M. (eds) Science Teacher Preparation in Content-Based Second Language Acquisition. ASTE Series in Science Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43516-9_9
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