Scaffolding Scientific Language in a Hypersegregated "Dual"-Language Program

• In Event: Challenging the Notions of Academic Language in English and Spanish in an Era of Disciplinary Literacies/Practices

Abstract

Dual Language (DL) programs require teachers to scaffold language (Ciechanowski, 2014) as the model depends upon students being linguistically diverse (Lindholm-Leary, 2001). While the gentrification of DL programs is a problem in certain settings (Valdez, Freire, & Delavan, 2016), other schools are hypersegregated and lack student diversity (Valdés, Capitelli, & Alvarez, 2011). This study asked, how do bilingual teachers’ instructional supports facilitate or hinder students’ use of the language of Science in Spanish and/or English in a hypersegregated “Dual” Language program?

Instructional supports become scaffolds (Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976) when they are contingent upon students’ current abilities and gradually released to allow for transfer of learning and responsibility to the student (Athanases & de Oliveira, 2014; van de Pol, Volman, & Beishuizen, 2010). When teachers scaffold learning, a knowledgeable other or “expert” forms supportive conditions that enable the learner to successfully do more than they could do independently (Wood, et al., 1976). Since DL programs teach content in two languages, scaffolding is critical for Science instruction (Ciechanowski, 2014).

This qualitative comparative case study explored the language instructional supports used by three Latinx bilingual teachers in a hypersegregated “Dual” Language program during Science instruction. The school uses the term “Dual Language” for marketing purposes despite its hypersegregated demographics: 99% percent students of color (90% Latinx), 98% low socioeconomic status, and 84% classified as English Learners. The purposeful sample (Bogdan & Biklen, 2003) includes kindergarten, second, and fourth grade bilingual teachers to explore how instructional supports were employed across the elementary years.

Part of a larger study, data sources included 36 hours of observation and audio recording over a three-month period. Audio was transcribed and memos were written after each observation. Three semi-structured interviews (Merriam, 2009) were conducted and member checks were completed at the mid-point and end of the study. The constant comparative method (Merriam, 2009) was employed and data reduction tables (Miles & Huberman, 1994) were created. Three phases of etic coding resulted in increasingly granular results.

Teachers employed a wide range of language development supports (Table 1). However, the supports did not change across grades or languages. While the content deepened, the expectations for students’ independent language production did not. Students’ linguistic participation was entirely teacher directed rather than student initiated. As Author (2019) found in English monolingual Language Arts classrooms, the linguistic supports were routinized rather than adaptive to student needs, and teachers did not gradually release the language task to the students. Teachers were not scaffolding but using routine supports instead (Athanases & de Oliveira, 2014). Language supports (Table 1) resulted in the language of display rather than language of ideas (Author, 2014) due to a “nonconversational style of instruction” (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988, p. 100). A lack of independent language production in Science is particularly concerning in hypersegrated schools as students of color are underrepresented in Science (National Science Foundation, 2019).

Author

• Allison Briceno, San José State University