NABE Conference Connecting Worlds with Bilingual Education January 19, 2006, Phoenix, Arizona Resear

1
NABE Conference Connecting Worlds with
Bilingual EducationJanuary 19, 2006, Phoenix,
ArizonaResearch Evaluation SIG Institute
Strategic Bilingual Research- Making Visible the
Invisible Overcoming Constraints in States That
Restrict Primary Language Instruction

• Theresa Austin, Manuel Chambers,Yvonne Fariño,
  Nélida Matos
• Language, Literacy Culture
• School of Education
• University of Massachusetts, Amherst

2
Cascading Effects of Multiple Education Reforms
No Child Left Behind Question 2 (Chapter 386)

• Scarcity of Highly Qualified Teachers in urban
  schools
• Decreased diversity in teacher population
• Policies of subtractive bilingualism in most
  districts
• Extreme cases of misinterpretation of Question
  2 in the classroom and administration
• English Language Learners - whose primary
  language cultures are rendered invisible
• Increased numbers of middle and high school
  students pushed out
• Dual immersion programs for few

3
Teacher Population - Becoming Less Diverse

• Boston falls short on teacher diversity.But
  recruitment rises for minority principals
• By Tracy Jan, Globe Staff   January 2, 2006

4
Identified Limited English Proficient Student
Population

• DOE,March2005,
• http//www.doe.mass.edu/ell/statistics/lep.html

5
Springfields Identified LEP

• Total 3612
• Spanish 3306
• Vietnamese 108
• Korean 9
• Chinese 9
• Arabic 6
• Khymer 5
• Portuguese 4
• Creole 1
• Cantonese 1
• Others 130

6
Holyokes Identified LEP

• Total N 1,939
• Primary Spanish Speakers N1,930
• Khymer N2
• Others N7

7
Program Distribution of Student Identified as
LEP (Massachusetts,DOE,2005)
8
Massachusetts Target versus Actual Achievement
per Years in U.S. Schools ( attaining
transitioning level)

• Year Target Actual
• 1 10 17
• 2 25 26
• 3 or more 40 48

9
Acquisition of Critical Content through English
Language Alliance(ACCELA )

• Holyoke
• Masters Cohort N 21
• Bachelor of General Studies in Interdisciplinary
  Inquiries in Linguistically Culturally Diverse
  Communities N19
• Administrators
• Springfield
• Masters Cohort 1,2,3 N 42
• Administrators
• University of Massachusetts
• School of Education Faculty
• Interdisciplinary Faculty

10
Build Shared UnderstandingsPower as

• relations among individuals or groups based on
  social, political, and material asymmetries by
  which some people are indulged and rewarded and
  others negatively sanctioned and deprived.
• important because of its effects, and the
  effects lead us to ask how they came about and
  what relations and processes produced them.
  Ideology interwines with power as individuals
  accept,believe, and internalize explanations and
  justifications for the asymmetries of their
  social world. p.5( Cherryholmes, 1988).

11
Building A Power To Mutually Influence Through

• participants engaging in a cyclical process of
  asking meaningful questions, collecting and
  critically analyzing data, and redesigning
  practices and assumptions
• multiple voices involved in inquiry
• the use of institutional spaces within the
  community for educational purposes, to create a
  dual-identity for those spaces reflecting local
  values and university values

• Manuel Chambers, Paraeducator
• Yvonne Fariño,Doctoral Student
• Nelida Matos, Doctoral Candidate

12
Sharing Power

• Faculty - Education, Performing Fine Arts,
  Humanities Arts, Social and Behavioral Sciences
  committed to
• using their power to legitimate the participants
  discourses
• developing researcher identities and skills
  through critical inquiry projects done in their
  communities
• building the participants understanding of
  academic literacy, which included development of
  their 4 basic skills, particularly writing

13
Researching with(in) Communities
14
Preparing Ourselves for Creating Power With
rather than Power Over

• Voice is not enough
• Becoming strategic with resources
• Re-formulating social identities in changing
  discourses
• Facing uncertainties with confidence
• Reflexivity to learn from past to build next
  steps

15
Community Outreach Presentation of Oral
Histories to the Holyoke Public Library
16
Investigating, Collecting, and Presenting Oral
Histories
17
Future Teachers in ACCELA
18
Critically Examining and Creating
Representations of Latinos in the Media
Broadcasting on UMass WFCR Tertulia
19
Building practices for critical democracy

• A language of possibility and hope for
• Guiding future teachers to discourses in which
  teachers become active critical social agents
• Acknowledge limitations of power of own knowing
  and authority (teacher education faculty,
  future teachers )
• Critically engaging in examining how the world
  works,understanding own location, challenging the
  inequities and affirming own identities and
  communities

20
References

• Austin, T Willett J. Gebhard, M. Lao, A.
  (forthcoming) Preparing Teachers from within
  Local Communities- Challenges for Latino
  Educators Crossing Symbolic, Cultural, and
  Linguistic Boundaries- Coming to voice with
  competing voices in ACCELA.
• Cherryholmes, C. (1988). Power and criticism.
  Poststructural investigations in
  education.NewYork Teachers College Press.
• Darder, A. (1991).Culture and power in the
  classroomA critical foundation for bicultural
  education. New YorkBergin Garvey
• Gebhard, M.Wright, M. Hafner, A. (2004).
  Teaching English-Language Learners "The language
  game of math". pp.33-46 in M. Sadowski (Ed.
  )Teaching immigrant and second language students.
  Strategies for success. CambridgeHarvard Press
• Guerra, J. (2004). Emerging representations,
  situated literacies and practice of transcultural
  repositioning, p.7 23 in M. Hall-Kells, V.
  Balester V. Villanueva (Eds). Latino/a
  Discourses. On language, identity literacy
  education. Portsmouth,NH Heinemann.
• Henig, J. R Hula, R. C. Orr, M. Pedescleaux,
  D.S. (1999).The color of school reform Race,
  politics and the challenge of urban education.
  Princeton Princeton University Press.
• Nieto, S.(2003). What keeps teachers going? New
  York Teachers College Press.
• Noguera, P. A. (1997). "Building school and
  university partnerships based upon mutual benefit
  and respect." In N. H. Gabelko (Ed.),
  Cornerstones of collaboration. Berkeley, CA
  National Writing Project Corporation.
• Willett, J. Rosenberger, C. (in press).
  Critical dialogue Transforming the Discourses of
  educational reform.  In Pease-Alvarez, L. and
  Schecter, S. (Eds.) Learning, teaching, and
  community. Lawrence Erlbaum Mahwah, NJ.