Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners ...

EDUCATOR'S PRACTICE GUIDE

WHAT WORKS CLEARINGHOUSETM

Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners in Elementary and Middle School

NCEE 2014-4012 U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) publishes practice guides in education to bring the best available evidence and expertise to bear on current challenges in education. Authors of practice guides combine their expertise with the available findings of rigorous research to develop specific recommendations for addressing these challenges. The authors rate the strength of the research evidence supporting each of their recommendations. See Appendix A for a full description of practice guides.

The goal of this practice guide is to offer educators specific, evidence-based recommendations that address the challenge of teaching English learners in the elementary and middle grades: building their English language proficiency while simultaneously building literacy, numeracy skills, and content knowledge of social studies and science. The guide provides practical and coherent information on critical topics related to literacy instruction for English learners, and is based on the best available evidence as judged by the authors.

Practice guides published by IES are available on our website by selecting "Practice Guides" at .

IES Practice Guide

Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners in Elementary and Middle School

April 2014

Panel

Scott Baker (Chair) Executive Director, Center on Research and Evaluation, Southern Methodist University

Esther Geva Professor, University of Toronto

Michael J. Kieffer Associate Professor, New York University

Nonie Lesaux Professor, Harvard University

Sylvia Linan-Thompson Associate Professor, University of Texas at Austin

Joan Morris Teacher Specialist, Pasadena Unified School District

C. Patrick Proctor Associate Professor, Boston College

Randi Russell Curriculum Support Specialist, Miami-Dade Public Schools

Research Staff

Russell Gersten Joseph Dimino Madhavi Jayanthi Kelly Haymond Rebecca Newman-Gonchar Instructional Research Group

Project Officers

Joy Lesnick Diana McCallum Institute of Education Sciences

NCEE 2014-4012 U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

This report was prepared for the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, Institute of Education Sciences, under Contract ED-IES-12-C-0016 by Instructional Research Group.

Disclaimer

The opinions and positions expressed in this practice guide are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the opinions and positions of the Institute of Education Sciences or the U.S. Department of Education. This practice guide should be reviewed and applied according to the specific needs of the educators and education agencies using it, with full realization that it represents the judgments of the review panel regarding what constitutes sensible practice, based on the research that was available at the time of publication. This practice guide should be used as a tool to assist in decision making rather than as a "cookbook." Any references within the document to specific education products are illustrative and do not imply endorsement of these products to the exclusion of other products that are not referenced.

U.S. Department of Education Arne Duncan Secretary

Institute of Education Sciences John Q. Easton Director

National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance Ruth Curran Neild Commissioner

April 2014 This report is in the public domain. Although permission to reprint this publication is not necessary, the citation should be as follows:

Baker, S., Lesaux, N., Jayanthi, M., Dimino, J., Proctor, C. P., Morris, J., Gersten, R., Haymond, K., Kieffer, M. J., Linan-Thompson, S., & Newman-Gonchar, R. (2014). Teaching academic content and literacy to English learners in elementary and middle school (NCEE 2014-4012). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE), Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from the NCEE website: .

This report is available on the IES website at and wwc/publications_reviews.aspx.

Alternate Formats

On request, this publication can be made available in alternate formats, such as Braille, large print, or CD. For more information, contact the Alternate Format Center at (202) 260-0852 or (202) 260-0818.

Table of Contents

Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners in Elementary and Middle School

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Introduction to the Teaching Academic Content and Literacy to English Learners in Elementary and Middle School Practice Guide. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Overview of Recommendations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Institute of Education Sciences Levels of Evidence for Practice Guides. . . . . . . . 8 Recommendation 1. Teach a set of academic vocabulary words intensively across several

days using a variety of instructional activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Recommendation 2. Integrate oral and written English language instruction into content-

area teaching. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Recommendation 3. Provide regular, structured opportunities to develop written language

skills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Recommendation 4. Provide small-group instructional intervention to students struggling

in areas of literacy and English language development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Glossary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 Appendix A. Postscript from the Institute of Education Sciences. . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Appendix B. About the Panel and Research Staff. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Appendix C. Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Appendix D. Rationale for Evidence Ratings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

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