Preparing Social Studies and ESOL Teachers for Integrated Language and Content Instruction in Support of ELLs

Abstract

This chapter presents a compelling case for preparing preservice and in-service social studies as well as ESOL teachers to integrate language and content instruction to offer ELs an entry point into developing conceptual understanding of core content. The chapter is built on a theoretical framework the authors generated for Conceptual Understanding (CU-C3LACI), by fusing the inquiry arc of the college, career, and civic life (C3) and language-based approaches to content instruction (LACI) (de Oliveira, Int Multiling Res J 10:217–231, 2016). Based on an ongoing study of high school social studies co-teaching teams consisting of one ESOL teacher and one social studies teacher, two case studies are included to provide readers with a rich selection of practices the co-teaching teams incorporated in their classes for concept development and attainment. Each case study is built upon lesson observations, interviews with the teachers, and additional artifacts and explores the extent to which the core principles of LACI informed instruction. The chapter concludes with implications for both preservice and in-service teachers to incorporate language-based strategies to increase students’ conceptual understanding of the content. The applications section offers strategies on how the chapter may be used with preservice and in-service teachers.

Appendices

Appendix 1

LACI Interview Protocol

• CONNECTION: Pedagogy and curriculum are connected to students’ backgrounds and experiences, making content explicit.

  • How do you as co-teachers make connections to students’ backgrounds and experiences, making content explicit?

• CULTURE: Cultural and linguistic resources, or “funds of knowledge,” that ELLs already possess are used to support academic learning as ELLs develop new resources to be able to participate in new situations, bridging home and school.

  • In what ways are students’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds used as resources?

  • How do your ELs develop new linguistic resources to actively participate in learning?

• CODE-BREAKING: Code-breaking integrates language and content as instructional components and involves explicitly teaching ways of doing school, academic literacy, and disciplinary, linguistic, and cultural codes of content learning.

  • How do you integrate content and language?

  • How do you explicitly teach students ways of doing school, focusing on academic literacy, and disciplinary, linguistic, and cultural codes of content learning?

• CHALLENGE: Classroom goals and activities explore disciplinary literacy and higher-order thinking and reasoning. High challenge and high academic standards and content are maintained for ELLs.

  • In what ways do the classroom goals and activities explore literacy and language skills needed for social studies as well as higher-order thinking and reasoning?

• COMMUNITY and COLLABORATION: Collaboration is a key component of practice as communities of learners socially co-construct knowledge.

  • What are the key components of practice you use to develop communities of learners that are co-constructing knowledge?

• CLASSROOM INTERACTIONS: Classroom interactions focus on “interactional scaffolding,” use of oral discourse to prompt elaboration, build academic literacy, and move learning forward, through linking prior and new experiences; appropriating and recasting students’ contributions; and using initiation, response, feedback (IRF) sequence.

  • How do you implement classroom interactions (teacher to student and student to student) to focus on oral language development?

_______________

Based on de Oliveira, L. C. (2016). A language-based approach to content instruction (LACI) for English language learners: Examples from two elementary teachers. International Multilingual Research Journal, 10(3), 217–231. doi.org/10.1080/19313152.2016.1185911

Appendix 2

Self-Assessment Based on the LACI Framework (6Cs)

CONNECTION : Pedagogy and curriculum are connected to students’ backgrounds and experiences, making content explicit.

• 1. How do we establish and activate students’ background knowledge to introduce and connect to the subject matter?

  • ____ connect to earlier discussion/lesson

  • ____ encouraging recall of prior learning

  • ____ questioning to link self to text

Please describe:

CULTURE : Cultural and linguistic resources, or “funds of knowledge,” that ELs already possess are used to support academic learning as ELs develop new resources to be able to participate in new situations, bridging home and school.

• 2. What strategies do we use to support academic learning by using students’ cultural resources and “funds of knowledge?”

  • ____ use of home language support

  • ____ use of cognates

  • ____ forging connections to the students’ cultural and familial

    experiences

  • Please describe:

• 3. How do we use these strategies to connect to new resources and situations?

CODE-BREAKING : Code-breaking integrates language and content as instructional components and involves explicitly teaching ways of doing school, academic literacy, and disciplinary, linguistic, and cultural codes of content learning.

• 4. What instructional strategies do we employ to explicitly teach language and content, and instill code-breaking skills in the following areas:

  • (a) Presenting ideas:

    • ____ verbal resources (i.e., shared language learning, peer support)

    • ____ visual resources

    • ____ others (please explain)

  • (b) Enacting a relationship with the reader or listener: How do we support students in identifying the nature of interaction with the subject matter in the following aspects:

    • ____ Formal vs. informal

    • ____ Close vs. distant

    • ____ Attitude or learning environment

  • (c) Constructing a cohesive message: How do we use verbal and visual resources (texts and images) to organize information in a meaningful and cohesive manner.

COMMUNITY and COLLABORATION : Collaboration is a key component of practice as communities of learners socially co-construct knowledge.

• 5. What type of student grouping(s) do we use to facilitate collaborative learning and understanding?

• 6. In what ways are students provided opportunities to choose and change groupings within the unit of instruction (individual, pair, group)?

• 7. How are tasks assigned to ensure equitable participation in our co-taught classroom learning community?

• 8. What type of scaffolding is employed to support student co-construction of knowledge?

CHALLENGE : Classroom goals and activities explore disciplinary literacy and higher-order thinking and reasoning. High challenge and high academic standards and content are maintained for ELs.

• 9. How do our learning goals and activities challenge all students to:

  • ____ Remember

  • ____ Understand

  • ____ Apply

  • ____ Analyze

  • ____ Evaluate

  • ____Create

CLASSROOM INTERACTIONS : Classroom interactions focus on “interactional scaffolding,” use of oral discourse to prompt elaboration, build academic literacy, and move learning forward, through linking prior and new experiences; appropriating and recasting students’ contributions; and using initiation, response, feedback (IRF) sequence.

• 10. How do we facilitate student interactions and oral discourse to

  • ____ link learning to prior out-of-school, home, and school experiences?

  • ____ point to new knowledge?

  • ____ recap learning experience?

• 11. What strategies do we use to recast student contributions and engage students in subject-specific and context-appropriate discourse?

• 12. How do we use verbal or gestural cues to incorporate the initiation, response, feedback (IRF) sequence and to further student participation and understanding in the following areas:

  • ____ communicating expected responses?

  • ____ seeking clarification of a concept?

  • ____ probing a student’s response?

  • ____ eliciting detailed explanations of particular points within the lesson/discussion?