Elementary Teacher Inquiry to Develop Linguistically Responsive Pedagogy for Emergent Bilingual Students

• In Event: 66.087 - MTCC Roundtable Session 30
  In Roundtable Session: 66.087-2 - Empowering Teachers to Conduct Research in Their Classrooms: An Investigation of Teacher Inquiry Across Three Teacher Preparation/Professional Development Programs

Abstract

Purpose & Theoretical Framework
Issues of inequitable learning opportunities for linguistically diverse students are compounded by problems of inadequate teacher preparation to work with students identified as English Learners (ELs) (Gandara, Maxwell-Jolly, & Driscoll, 2005) and teachers’ beliefs about who should serve the ELs in their classrooms (Yoon, 2008). Teacher inquiry has potential to focus teachers on linguistically diverse students’ work products and processes to develop asset-based perspectives and responsive instructional practices (Other & Author, 2018). In this paper, I report on a five-month professional development project utilizing teacher inquiry to support teachers to design instruction responsive to their emergent bilingual students. In California, designing Designated English Language Development (ELD) and Integrated ELD in response to newly adopted state ELD standards and the California English Language Arts/ELD framework posed a challenge as participating teachers reported little to no training with these standards and framework and little professional development focused on teaching linguistically diverse students.

Methods & Data Sources
Participants in this teacher inquiry project included one assistant professor and nine K-5 elementary teachers from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Participants had one to ten years teaching experience. Seven teachers taught general education and two served as special education resource teachers. Teachers elected to participate and served across three school districts in a rural/coastal county with the second largest percentage of ELs in California. Inquiry processes included learning from and about students (interviews and student work analysis), unpacking the ELD standards and related concepts, monthly meetings that included peer dialogues, reading/discussing self-selected professional literature, and individual site-based meetings with the facilitating professor. Teachers respectively focused curricular design on reading comprehension/vocabulary, academic discussion, or writing. Data collected include teacher memos on analysis of student work, teacher memos on interviews with three focal students, monthly teacher reflections after each meeting (January-April), field notes from monthly group meetings, field notes from individual meetings between professor and participants, inquiry project slide presentations, and an end of project survey. This paper responds to the question: In what ways does teacher inquiry deepen inservice teacher pedagogy and knowledge of students to design responsive instruction for their linguistically diverse students? Data were analyzed using the constant comparative method (Strauss & Corbin, 1990) to identify themes of teacher learning and practice as facilitated by teacher inquiry processes.

Results & Significance
Findings report how intentional framing of inquiry protocol prompts facilitated teachers to elicit and identify learners’ strengths rather than focusing on weaknesses, and how attention to planning for language objectives and intentional linguistic scaffolding supported students talk, reading, and/or writing respectively. Analysis revealed teachers’ agentive decision-making coupled with teacher reporting of student growth in focal areas. Recommendations for future research on teacher inquiry to support asset-based pedagogy for linguistically diverse students are discussed, as well as implications for teacher inquiry as sustained professional development to address issues of equity and social justice for linguistically minoritized students.

Author

• Joanna W. Wong, California State University - Monterey Bay