Effective Professional Development to Improve the Teaching of English Learners: Can Strategies Alone Change Teacher Practices to Be Culturally Responsive?

• In Event: 66.087 - MTCC Roundtable Session 30
  In Roundtable Session: 66.087-5 - Increasing Teachers' Efficacy and Cultural Responsiveness in Teaching English Language Arts

Abstract

This dissertation research study focuses on effective PD and teachers' awareness of culturally responsive teaching for English Learners (ELs). Teachers are not prepared to teach linguistically and culturally diverse students in today’s classrooms. The case study includes 30 teacher participants, 3 instructors, and the project director. The study examined the framework of culturally responsive teaching, effective PD, and constructivism. The study argues that in order for even well-designed reform models of PD to create sustained instructional change, there must be the inclusion of deeper conceptual understanding of SLA and culturally responsive teaching.

Author

• Christina Tesnow Kozlowski, University of Michigan-Dearborn