What Do Students Say About "Responsive Science Pedagogy"? Emergent Bilinguals Reflect on Literacy Experiences

• In Event: Student Literacy Practices and Perspectives: A Critical Look at the Literacy Experiences of Nondominant K–12 Students

Abstract

Overview
The paper examines secondary school student perspectives about scientific literacy related to a secondary science teacher intervention supporting emergent bilinguals. While the body of knowledge related to best teaching and learning practices for emergent bilinguals in secondary school settings is growing (Bunch, 2013; Callahan and Shifrer, 2016; Flores, Kleyn & Menken, 2015), there are few available research and professional development models focus on integrating science, language, and literacy pedagogy for these students. This paper centers on how student perspectives and their writing of the scientific phenomena can be analyzed in terms of their understanding of how science is communicated (Language and literacy use in science) and how they make sense of science experiences in and out of the classroom (Contextualized learning).

Theoretical Framework
The data collected is part of a larger longitudinal study testing the impact of a new secondary science teacher education framework that integrates language and literacy pedagogy and the teaching of emergent bilinguals in science classrooms through four pedagogical practices including 1. Scientific sense-making, 2. Language and disciplinary literacy development, 3. Contextualizing science activity, and 4. Scientific discourse (Author, 2016). The instructional framework surrounding the four instructional practices informing the secondary science teacher education study draws from attention to the productive possibilities for using language and literacy pedagogy. The instructional framework advances the mutually beneficial qualities across language, literacy, and science learning (Lee et al., 2013).

Data Sources/Methodology
Pilot individual oral students interviews (n=20) were audio-recorded and transcribed following standard conventions for interview analysis. The pilot data collected and rubric developed was used in preparation for analyzing a larger student data corpus of student interviews (n=50). Student participants are drawn from classroom where participating second-year teachers are located. A sub-sample 2-3 students are interviewed including 1-2 emergent bilinguals per classroom. Each oral language interview lasted 15-20 minutes and was administered once. The objective of collecting oral student data focused on augmenting the student writing and reading assessment data collected before and after a unit on natural selection. The goal of student interviews was to capture student oral language functions (scientific discourse, vocabulary) related to scientific and engineering practices and their familiarity with relevant intervention practices. An interview codebook was developed to analyze interviews using theory-driven and data-driven qualitative constructs following previous methodological work on the development of interview codebooks (DeCuir-Gunby, Marshall and McCulloch, 2011; Ryan and Bernard, 2003; Saldaña, 2013).

Results/ Scholarly Contribution
Results from this study provide an important snapshot of how adolescent emergent bilinguals view the teaching and learning literacy in science. That is, results reflect prevailing views from secondary science students about how they view ‘responsive science pedagogy’ in their classroom. Lastly, research student perspectives of their contexts of learning are increasingly demonstrating the importance of understanding student literacy experiences (Garza, and Soto Huerta, 2014; Murillo, and Schall, 2016).

Authors

• Jorge L. Solis, The University of Texas - San Antonio

• Vicki J Lynton, The University of Texas at San Antonio