This dissertation draws on both qualitative and quantitative approaches to investigate the linguistic practices of teachers and children who are learning Mandarin Chinese as a Heritage Language (CHL) in two dual immersion preschools in California. CHL children have been interpreted as novice members in local speech communities who actively explore…

This dissertation consists of three empirical studies that explore the educational experiences and trajectories of English learners (ELs) and students with disabilities. The first study uses longitudinal data from four large California school districts to examine the characteristics of long-term ELs (LTELs) and former ELs--those reclassified as…

The Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing, 2nd Edition (CTOPP-2; Wagner et al., 2013) is commonly used in k-12 public schools to assess basic cognitive processing skills foundational for reading achievement. Psychometric support for its use with dual language learners (DLLs), a group representing over 10% of the school-aged population in…

The RP Group's Multiple Measures Assessment Project (MMAP) produced this technical report as part of a series on how California's community colleges can ensure more English learners (ELs) successfully complete "gateway" English coursework -- courses that satisfy the English writing requirements for completion of an associate's degree as…

California is on the cusp of implementing universal preschool--a step that could help level the playing eld for young children. Over the next few years, all four-year-olds will become eligible for Transitional Kindergarten (TK), which has been part of the state's early learning programs since 2012. In this report, the authors examine the…

Purpose: Emergent bilinguals (EBs) from Spanish-speaking households are a sizable and quickly growing segment of the preschool population in the United States. However, there is limited research on the provision of opportunities for EBs to engage in language-rich classroom discussion, particularly in English-dominant contexts where most EBs attend…

L2 lexical studies have established that learners need to acquire knowledge of the first 3,000 most frequent words in order to enjoy 95% coverage of the vocabulary used in spontaneous speech (Nation 2006). However, there has been little data available that reveal how many of these most frequent words can be recognized by university language…

This study examined factors affecting international students' willingness to communicate (WTC) in English as a second language (ESL), focusing on second language (L2) self-confidence, acculturation, and motivational types. L2 self-confidence was hypothesized to predict L2 WTC and to mediate the correlation between acculturation and L2 WTC for…

Objective: Extensive reform has been implemented in community colleges across the nation to help expedite the attainment of students' academic goals of degree completion and transfer to 4-year institutions. Reform at the institution in this study resulted in replacement of the college writing placement exam and the precollegiate course sequence…

This study examines the effects of English Learner (EL) status on subsequent Special Education (SPED) placement. Through a research-practice partnership, we link student demographic data and initial English proficiency assessment data across seven cohorts of test takers and observe EL and SPED programmatic participation for these students over…

In teaching newcomer students, educators must envision how to provide opportunities for language use and development through age-appropriate content instruction. This article describes a design research study, in which we developed and piloted 5th grade science units and studied the participation of two newcomer students in sense-making…

Using student-level longitudinal data from one large urban school district, I examine Long-term English Learners' (LTELs) characteristics and their linguistic and academic performance in comparison to on-track English learners and initially fluent students. I also investigate what factors are related to their becoming LTELs. This study focuses on…

Building on research that has demonstrated the benefits of Dual-Language Bilingual Education (DLBE) programmes on students' bilingual, academic, and cross-cultural development (Lindholm-Leary and Hernández 2011), this study examines the links between dual language proficiency and competence in elementary students enrolled in a Cantonese DLBE…

This research compared the relative impact of different preschool activities on the development of bilingual students' English-language skills. The study investigated whether bilingual preschool children would engage more, and use more of their second language (English), during free-play (non-academic) versus teacher-structured (academic)…

Using mixed methods, we investigated (a) the association of the extent of English learner (EL) classroom-level segregation (proportion EL) and number of EL English proficiency levels with elementary EL academic achievement, using 2 years of administrative data, and (b) school staff--reported opportunity to learn-related advantages and…