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Academic Language in Diverse Classrooms: English Language Arts, Grades 3-5
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Academic Language in Diverse Classrooms: English Language Arts, Grades 3-5
Promoting Content and Language Learning

Foreword by Douglas Fisher



September 2013 | 224 pages | Corwin

Make every student fluent in the language of learning.

Language has always been the center of English Language Arts, but with most states adopting CCSS, the focus on language and literacy across the content areas is required. Today it’s more essential than ever that English language learners and proficient English learners have the supports to access and achieve the language of school.

The Common Core and ELD standards provide pathways to academic success through academic language. Using an integrated Curricular Framework, districts, schools and professional learning communities can:

  • Design and implement thematic units for learning
  • Draw from content and language standards to set targets for all students
  • Examine standards-centered materials for academic language
  • Collaborate in planning instruction and assessment within and across lessons
  • Consider linguistic and cultural resources of the students
  • Create differentiated content and language objectives
  • Delve deeply into instructional strategies involving academic language
  • Reflect on teaching and learning

With dynamic classrooms and units of learning, this book gives you a streamlined path for designing and implementing curriculum that leads to student mastery of academic language—the key to school success.

“These volumes are packed with practical ideas that will help all teachers attend to language within their classrooms from the discourse level to word/phrase levels. This is a road map for teaching Common Core content in language rich classrooms, and hence a resource every teacher needs within arm’s reach! It’s all here and clearly presented; this is pure gold for everyone who teaches students to speak, listen, read and write in school, with special attention to English language learners.”
—Tim Boals, Executive Director of WIDA

 
Foreword by Douglas Fisher
 
Preface
 
Acknowledgments
 
About the Editors
 
1. Academic Language: A Centerpiece for Academic Success in English Language Arts by Margo Gottlieb and Gisela Ernst-Slavit
 
Examples From the CCSS for English Language Arts of Related Academic Language
 
2. Grade 3: Taking a Closer Look at Our Changing Environment by Terrell A. Young and Nancy L. Hadaway
 
3. Grade 4: Making a Difference in the World: Civil Rights, Biographies, and the Southeast Region by Penny Silvers, Mary Shorey, Patricia Eliopoulos, and Heather Akiyoshi
 
4. Grade 5: No Water, No Life; No Blue, No Green by Mary Lou McCloskey and Linda New Levine
 
Glossary
 
Index

“These volumes are packed with practical ideas that will help all teachers attend to language within their classrooms from the discourse level to word/phrase levels. This is a road map for teaching Common Core content in language rich classrooms, and hence a resource every teacher needs within arm’s reach! It’s all here and clearly presented; this is pure gold for everyone who teaches students to speak, listen, read and write in school, with special attention to English language learners.”

Tim Boals, Executive
WIDA

Academic Language in Diverse Classrooms is an invaluable resource for all K through 8th grade teachers, especially those working with diverse students. This book gives teachers both a clear explanation of academic language and specific strategies they can apply in their own classrooms. Throughout the book, contributors provide specific connections between the Common Core State Standards and Language Development Standards. Each chapter helps educators understand students’ academic language needs and, through a variety of classroom examples from each grade level, shows teachers how to teach academic language through content. “

Yvonne Freeman, Professor of Bilingual Education

Sample Materials & Chapters

Forward

1. Academic Language


Margo Gottlieb

Margo Gottlieb, Ph.D., is a staunch advocate for multilingual learners and their teachers. As co-founder and lead developer of WIDA at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2003, Margo has helped design and contributed to all the editions of WIDA’s English and Spanish language development standards frameworks and their derivative products. Being a bilingual teacher, facilitator, consultant, and mentor across K-20 settings, she has worked with universities, organizations, governments, states, school districts, networks, and schools in co-constructing linguistic and culturally sustainable curriculum and reconceptualizing... More About Author

Gisela Ernst-Slavit

Gisela Ernst-Slavit, PhD, is a Professor in the College of Education at Washington State University Vancouver. She investigates language teacher education in culturally and linguistically diverse settings using ethnographic and sociolinguistic perspectives. In addition to other publications, she is co-author of Access to Academics: Planning Instruction for K-12 Classrooms with ELLs (Pearson, 2010), From Paper to Practice: Using the TESOL’s English Language Proficiency Standards in PreK-12 Classrooms (TESOL, 2009), and TESOL PreK-12 English Language Proficiency Standards (TESOL, 2006). Dr. Ernst-Slavit, a native from Peru, has given... More About Author