by Dr. Elke Schneider, Winthrop University
Who are multilingual language learners?
Multilingual language learners (MLLs) in middle and high school settings are as uniquely different as any plant and animal life, as the human race itself. Their personal life stories, their own or their families’ immigration stories from the past make them fascinatingly diverse members of a classroom when it comes to learning disciplinary content such as social studies, science, math and even English Language Arts. For instance, many are born here in the United States and have only known schooling in America (called second generation immigrants) while others have distinct socio-emotional imprints from their migration story (first or 1.5 generation immigrants) with either no or partial schooling experiences in the country they left. Students who have spent much time in refugee camps or an otherwise long migration experience with no or hardly any schooling (Students with Interrupted Formal Education or SIFE students) require significantly different attention than those born in the US without such experiences.
One might think only of the ‘deficits’ MLLs may have regarding the disciplinary curriculum content and/or language and cultural competencies. However, this narrow view fails to consider that MLLs can be great assets in an interdisciplinary learning community because of their varied life and home culture experiences. As educators, we can provide support mechanisms for language and content issues and integrate MLLs as valuable contributors to interdisciplinary learning in which everyone’s life story and experiences provide meaningful pillars for learning.
What constitutes interdisciplinary literacy?
Interdisciplinary literacy is based on the understanding that literacy, the ability to read, write, hold critical, academic dialog about disciplinary content with active listening and speaking skills, is a vital component of learning in every content area, may that be science, social studies, English language arts or mathematics. Digital literacy skills can also be added to interdisciplinary literacy since much of today’s learning in middle and secondary schools involves using digital devices and learning how to use digital resources in effective and ethically appropriate ways. These components are all embedded in South Carolina’s recent Career Ready Standards (2024) as well as in new 2024 Read to Succeed Standards. Each content area discipline has discipline-specific questions that are asked and pursued along with unique vocabulary and sentence structures that are used in discipline specific readings and writing. These discipline-specific features are new for all students, not just MLLs, but MLLs in various language acquisition stages will require specific support to become comfortable in using these unique disciplinary literacy skills.
What is the challenge for multilingual language learners with interdisciplinary literacy?
Based on their life story and background knowledge on content, MLLs require different kinds of support. Most commonly, it is the content language support that is in focus. However, language acquisition and acculturation to the school system and way of life go hand in hand. The more safe and accepted MLLs feel in the learning community of the school and the classroom, the faster their language skills improve (Ariza & Coady, 2018). Their background knowledge on academic content is also a key factor in determining what kind of language and social-emotional support MLLs need to succeed in interdisciplinary learning.
How can we support MLLs in succeeding in interdisciplinary literacy?
While collaboration with the multilingual teacher is paramount when paying individual attention to MLLs’ socio-emotional and academic needs, the general education teacher plays a crucial role in helping MLLs succeed in the interdisciplinary learning settings common in middle and high schools. The ways MLLs can be supported include a) helping MLLs comprehend and use the codes of disciplinary literacy, including both language features and disciplinary procedures, b) utilizing and honoring MLLs’ home language and cultural /content knowledge, c) providing an interactive, collaborative, and trusting learning environment in which peers and teachers interact closely and teachers foster questions and dialog. Here are some selected ideas how to ensure MLLs feel actively integrated in interdisciplinary learning.
Suggestions for content literacy instruction
Utilizing and honoring MLLs’ home language and cultural /content knowledge
- Take time to develop a personal bond with your MLLs by spending lunch time in small groups with them or individually to build the trust based necessary for MLLs’ healthy risk taking in the challenging tasks of disciplinary literacy. In this process, find out about MLL’s home situations and cultural and academic background and interests so you can utilize that when helping students make personal connection to disciplinary literacy tasks.
- Prior to any disciplinary literacy task and content introduction, activate MLLs’ prior knowledge by eliciting experiences from their home culturewhere appropriate (i.e., wild life, weather, socio-cultural routines, historic sites, life/historic events, or how basic math skills were taught in the home culture). Focus on making real life connections of the disciplinary literacy content/skill explicit. This provides MLLs with motivation to explore disciplinary language and content because they feel valued and see a real life connection.
Providing an interactive, collaborative, and trusting learning environment
- When possible, build in station work in which students work collaboratively in teams, native speakers and MLLs mixed together so they naturally engage in problem-solving team work and language use prior to individual work or assessment tasks. For a different collaborative learning set up, pair MLLs up with a trusting peer (native speaker or MLL) to talk through the steps of a tasks before requiring written notes. (i.e. math task, comprehension questions, science report content)
- Include project-based learningin which MLLs can engage hands-on without being at a linguistic disadvantage. Using foldables in which student can paste drawings to images with supporting phrases or given sentence frames allows MLLs to demonstrate gained knowledge. This can meaningfully replace a standard written exam. (for resources see Dinah Zike’s website: https://dinah.com)
- Schedule regular personal or small group meetings to check on and provide individualized learning support and feedback on learning progress. This is much more easily done when the classroom is set up for station and group work so that individual or small group conferencing can naturally be integrated. This allows for personal teacher-student connections in which MLLs can ask questions that they otherwise might not dare ask in front of the whole group.
Helping MLLs comprehend and use the codes of disciplinary literacy
- Explicitly teach content specific vocabulary in connection with common phrases and sentence frames typical for the discipline so that MLLs can get used to using these structures with the vocabulary. In this practice, provide at least 10-20 opportunities for MLLs (and other students who struggle with academic language tasks) to orally use the content vocabulary and break multisyllabic words down first demonstrating how to say these words syllable by syllable and then blending them together into the whole word at natural pace after having gone slowly on each syllable. For instance, for the word ‘photosynthesis’, the teacher has students repeat several times “photo”, then “syn”. Then students are shown to blend “photosyn” together several times. Then “the” (with unvoiced TH and long E)”, then “sis”, then “thesis” and then all syllables together as a whole word pronounced as ‘photosynthesis” several times in whispering, loud, happy, grouchy, or stern tones of voices to make the repetition more fun. Then students practice using the word in given sentence frames with common verbs and structures used to discuss and write about photosynthesis.
- For MLLs, vocabulary instruction includes Tier 1, 2, and Tier 3 vocabulary. Therefore, word and language structures at Tier 1 (basic common life vocabulary) and Tier 2 (words that can be used in common life and disciplinary-specific contexts)
- Support learning resources with visuals such as graphic organizers, handouts, PowerPoint Presentations and posters (illustrations graphs, pictures) so MLLs can derive meaning from them. If content specific graphs or charts are used, do not assume that MLLs know how to interpret and use them. Instead, demonstrate explicitly how to gain information from them. This is an essential component of building visual literacy in the content areas.
- Encourage and provide space on graphic organizers or other platforms, for MLLs to use in their home language to engage in interdisciplinary literacy learning. This assists in utilizing translanguaging and the use of the whole learner with their home and new culture knowledge. It also fosters a sense of being respected as a multilingual learner.
- Visually display sentence frames typical for a given task. For instance, sentence frames needed to complete certain math task in all its steps or sentence frames to use to make statements about a science experiment, or sentence frames to talk or write about a comparison of historic facts or two poems. MLs can use such structures in oral reflection about content or a task they have completed. Since even standardized math exams require students to write down their reasoning for steps taken, practicing orally before asking students to write down their thoughts is crucial (for more on academic oral language practicing in content areas, see Zwiers reference below). These sentence frames can vary in complexity so that various language competencies can be addressed in a scaffolded way. The following table (Table 1) provides a selective collection of sentence structures commonly used in interdisciplinary literacy settings:
Table 1: Examples of Sentence Frames for oral and written tasks
| Literacy context | For oral dialog | For writing |
| Compare-contrast information | …. is/look/feels like. But …. Is/feels/looks like….…. Is/has/can…. On the contrary/in contrast, …..When I look at…., on the one hand I notice…., on the other hand I see…. I hear you but I see x differently/ I have another perspective to offer. While you…., I think…. because…. I would like to add a contrasting point of view/argument…. | When comparing…., it is obvious that….. is/has/shows…… while….. is/shows/has…. In contrast to…., x can….. As opposed to …, X can … because…..While……., x can/does….Contrary to…., …… |
| Cause and effect information | In my observation of/experience with…, I see the cause for….. in……I think based on what I read in…/we saw in the video clip, …. happened because….I conclude/infer that … because/because of …..Because….., …. happened.Because I forgot to…., I miscalculated….One reason for…..seems to be…. since/because….. | As a result of…., ….. X was/is caused by….. Due to……, ……… Consequently, Based on information by (author) on page,… …. resulted in…. |
- Use gap filling exercises or assessments only with word banks. This allows MLLs to find the correct word which they can only do if they can receptively recognize the correct word. You can place more than the needed words in the word bank to increase the challenge. Without word banks, MLLs in initial and medial language acquisition stages are put at unjust disadvantages.
- Allow for digital translation devices to assist when needed and let students write their translanguage findings down in a digital or handwritten resource file/folder. Allow students to use this as a reference whenever needed. Discuss this approach with grade level teams so MLLs can use their resources across disciplines.
- Provide opportunities forchoral or paired readingto increases MLLs’ linguistic confidence in interdisciplinary reading, writing oral tasks. In choral reading, teachers read sentence by sentence with appropriate intonation, pausing, phrasing and pronunciation in natural pace and ask students to repeat these modeled sentences aloud as a class chorally. Students follow along on their own printed text copy. Teachers select such sentences/passages for choral reading based on important information and vocabulary.
- A variation is choral responses of essential content in phrases and sentences. The teacher mindfully makes an important statement and then has students chorally repeat that essential content once or twice by saying the information/sentence again but then letting students complete the sentence with the missing information.
- In order to build basic content vocabulary and routine language for novice MLLs with next to no understanding of English, label classroom items, provide images/photos with supporting language underneath for content specific routines (i.e. science lab procedures, mathematical procedure). Do also for content specific items such as science, math, social studies, technology tools (i.e., cursor on screen, magnifying glass, microscope, ruler, compass, scale, historic timelines, poetry features)
Selected resources:
- Ariza, E. N. & Coady, M. R. (2018). Why TESOL? Theories and issues in teaching English to speakers of other languages in K-12 classrooms. (5th edition). Kendall Hunt.
- Blair, L., Oliveira de, L. C., & Avalos, M. A. (2024). Expanding teacher understanding of scaffolding for multilingual learners using a language-based approach to content instruction. TESOL in Context, 33(1), 25-42.
- Harrell, A. & Jordan, M. (2019). 50 strategies for teaching English language learners (6th edition). Pearson.
- Zwiers, J. (2019). Next steps with Academic conversations. New ideas for improving learning through classroom talk. Routledge.
