Pre-service teacher preparation in the United States is becoming progressively more challenging with respect to the demands on teachers. This study examined the impact of tutoring approach on pre-service teachers? skills to work with English language learners through a qualitative research design. Content analysis was used at the thematic level on…

Background: Although some investigations of phonological development have found that segmental accuracy is comparable in monolingual children and their bilingual peers, there is evidence that language use affects segmental accuracy in both languages. Aims: To investigate the influence of age of first exposure to English and the amount of current…

Using a low-inference observation instrument, we investigated the effect of an ongoing, intensive, and structured virtual professional development (VPD) based on the fidelity of implementation (FOI) across treatment and control conditions in a randomized controlled trial validation study implemented in 116-bilingual classrooms in seven Texas…

In this descriptive study the efforts of a faculty to prepare a cohort of pre-service bilingual education teachers to pass a newly adopted state certification test of academic Spanish are presented. The faculty's efforts were aimed at offsetting a low pass rate on this test, but unfortunately efforts fell short. To unpack this outcome, the authors…

Purpose: The present study investigated the effects of supporting both English and Spanish on language outcomes in bilingual children with hearing loss (HL) who used listening devices (cochlear implants and hearing aids). The English language skills of bilingual children with HL were compared to those of their monolingual English-speaking peers'…

First language learners acquire vocabulary in the context of participation in discourse, and the quantity and richness of that discourse is the best predictor of their progress. Similarly, we argue, engagement in discourse, in particular debate and discussion, is an effective component of classroom instruction for second and foreign language…

Young monolingual children typically demonstrate frequent tense shifting during narrative development, whereas older children maintain a consistent narration tense. Therefore, inconsistent tense usage in older children could be an indication of overall limited language skills. However, information regarding tense use in bilinguals has been…

Although the research literature regarding language growth trajectories is burgeoning, the shape and direction of English Language Learners' (ELLs) language growth trajectories are largely not known. This study used growth curve modeling to determine the shape of ELLs' language growth trajectories across 12,248 oral narrative language samples…

This article is to report an action research conducted in two sections of a course called Second Language Acquisition and Development during the fall semester of 2011 and the spring semester of 2012. By focusing on a three-way blended learning (BL) environment--face-to-face (F2F), eLearning, and Second Life (SL, a virtual-world environment), this…

This article examines the unique contributions that bilingual and bilingually credentialed teachers make to the instruction of emergent bilinguals in the United States. This mixed methodological study involved 474 teachers in Arizona, California, and Texas, which represent distinct language policy contexts. Results revealed that, irrespective of…

This study examined the effect of a quasi-experimental project on fifth grade English learners' achievement in state-mandated standards-based science and English reading assessment. A total of 166 treatment students and 80 comparison students from four randomized intermediate schools participated in the current project. The intervention consisted…

The Bilingual Reading Study employs several measures of oral language proficiency: (1) a standardized oral language proficiency test, the Language Assessment Scales (LAS); (2) teacher ratings on the Student Operational Language Assessment Scale (SOLA); (3) teacher ratings on the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) Oral Language…

One hundred twenty first-grade Mexican-American students (60 from each Fort Worth and Laredo, Texas) were subjects of an experiment which attempted to determine whether bilingualism inhibits verbal ability in one or both of the children's languages. The PPVT-A (Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, Form A) was used to test verbal ability and…

To gather information to assist policy makers, curriculum designers, and classroom teachers in planning and delivering language and reading instruction that will promote success in school of children from complex language backgrounds, a 6-year longitudinal investigation begun in 1978 tracked approximately 250 Spanish-speaking children from low…

The Texas Education Agency provides bilingual education/teacher training institutes and contracts with school districts, colleges, universities, education service centers and individuals to conduct these institutes throughout the state. This manual was developed as a guide or model for the implementation of the training institutes. The manual…