Bilingual education has steadily risen in the United States since the Supreme Court case of "Lau vs. Nichols in 1974." Despite this proliferation of bilingual programs, notable challenges and discrepancies exist for bilingual programs devoted to Asian languages and Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities. The rising…

In this article, the author focuses specifically on how what she calls non-specialist teachers (i.e., those who are neither bilingual nor ESL teachers) can benefit from the practices of bilingual and ESL teachers, and how teacher educators can incorporate this knowledge in their curriculum and pedagogy. To do so, she uses examples from research…

The stage is set for major change in California early childhood education (ECE). The State's requirements for Transitional Kindergarten instruction, teacher training, and professional development could lead to mandated integration of existing, impressive Dual Language Learner (DLL) resources, guidance, and best practices. In addition to more…

University-based teacher educators across the U.S. have become increasingly focused on making their practices relevant to the needs of teacher candidates. Teacher educators are engaged in a variety of approaches as a means to improve the preparation that they provide to teacher candidates, in order to continuously examine their expertise. These…

Today, effective and creative teacher designed instruction is being replaced by scripted reading programs. These programs are changing the role of the teacher in the classroom from professionals to mere transmitters of knowledge. The idea that the role of the teacher had changed became evident while conducting a study with elementary school…

In this article, the author describes pre-service teachers' understandings of English language learners (ELLs) and the ways that their understandings evolved through participation in a Structured English Immersion (SEI) course. To provide the context of this study, the author begins with a brief review of recent policies in Arizona that affect the…

The Census 2000 Brief (U.S. Department of Commerce, 2004b) indicates that English is not the heritage language of approximately one in five Americans, and the number of limited English proficient (LEP) students, also known as English language learners (ELLs), grew about 50 percent in the last decade. It is estimated that nearly 400,000 ELL…

While programs have been established to support secondary level English Learners (ELs) in their transition to institutions of higher education (IHEs), limited attention has been given to how to support adult ELs who struggle with the academic language demands of their college or university content-area courses. Research indicates that many EL…

Assessing the preparation of preservice candidates for quality teaching, both for mainstream students and for ELs, requires reliable and valid assessments that pay close attention to context, process, and reflection, factors that traditional evaluations of teaching either ignore or undervalue. In this article, the authors focus on one high-stakes…

Mathematics teaching and learning are inherently complex practices, and reports suggest that American teachers are not as successful at teaching mathematics as the authors might hope. In this article, the authors explore how a seemingly ubiquitous new technology--the personal audio/video player--just might help teachers improve mathematics…

The purpose of this study was to examine the extent to which the Stanford Teacher Education Program (STEP) effectively prepares new teachers to meet the needs of language minority students in California. Specifically, the authors studied the extent to which the program prepares students to meet the criteria of the Crosscultural Language and…

In this article, the authors describe the results of research that explored how Proposition 227--a measure that mandates English immersion instruction for all English language learners--has affected bilingual teachers at varying points in their professional development. The perspectives of preservice, novice and veteran bilingual teachers offer…

Despite the ethnic and linguistic diversity found in California's public schools, or because of it, in 1998 voters approved Proposition 227, a ballot initiative designed to dismantle bilingual education programs in the state. By the 2003-2004 school year, the California Department of Education reports that statewide 8,908 teachers were providing…

When planning to teach science to students who are English language learners (ELLs), science teachers and some science educators look to sheltered instruction as a potential guide. The possibility of blending inquiry-based teaching with a sheltered instruction framework seems a promising method for providing high-quality science learning…

Second language learners continue to languish in California public schools in spite of six years of promises following passage of the controversial ballot initiative "English for the Children" (Proposition 227) to fix the education of English Language Learners (ELLs) through English-only instruction. In addition, with the development of…