District Mandates and Biliteracy
It’s a question we get a lot:
“What happens if my district says I HAVE to use ___(insert program name here)____ with my class? I’m not sure how to integrate it with biliteracy instruction!”
The Year-at-a-Glance (which is our biliteracy curriculum map condensed to one page so we can carry it with us) is the foundation to our BUFs which feed our plan books. What’s missing?? District mandated curriculum. It’s in there, but I’ve advocated for biliteracy instruction then adapted and enhanced the boxed program to fit only where it works within our standards-based plan and biliteracy units.
I’m not here to tell you to NOT follow the directions of your administration! I understand (completely, believe me) that sometimes we are mandated to do things that may not match our philosophy, the most recent research, or the needs of our students. However, I have a few tips that have worked for me and may ease your trepidation when approaching teaching for biliteracy under district monolingual mandates.
Tip One: Advocate
Story of my life!
I have yet to come across a district mandated program that was written for developing bilinguals and where biliteracy is the goal. The programs that I have come across have been written from a monoliteracy perspective. There is nothing wrong with this – for the monolingual classrooms. What can be challenging, though, is when we try to use these programs in classrooms that are teaching for biliteracy. Our students’ brains are developing differently than the brains of students in monolingual classrooms. Our learners use their linguistic resources in BOTH languages to learn how to read, write, listen, and speak in BOTH languages. Our students’ progress charts look different than progress charts in monolingual classrooms, their strategies sound different than in monolingual classrooms, and their goals and results are different than in monolingual classrooms. So why are they being compelled to follow a program not written for their special brains, experiences, and goals?!?
image credit: https://www.ted.com/talks/mia_nacamulli_the_benefits_of_a_bilingual_brain
There are many benefits to being bilingual, such as advantages in sustaining attention, advantages in representation and retrieval, and advantages in warding off dementia (Bialystok, Craik, and Luk have a fascinating article here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3322418/). These advantages are supported by research (did you read that article??), but may be hard to “prove” within the classroom if our students are forced to use a program written for monolinguals. If we are not attending to their needs as bilinguals and assessing them in both languages, we will miss out on data that celebrates many of the gifts and advantages of bilingualism, as mentioned in this article by Annabelle Humanes:
As a biliteracy educator, I advocate for my students at every chance I get. I explain to stakeholders the WHY behind what we do (supported by research) and the fact that our HOW can look different from monolingual classrooms. With that, I remind our administration of those differences; that patience is essential and that our approach cannot be boxed. I won’t be using the district-adopted program exactly as written because it doesn’t align with teaching for biliteracy and the needs of my students. Fortunately, I have an administrator who is open, accommodating, and understanding. Not everyone is as fortunate as I am….
Tip Two: Adapt
That said, some things are out of our control and districts will mandate what they will mandate. I encourage you to have a frank conversation with the appropriate stakeholders regarding the use of a packaged program in the biliteracy classrooms. The programs will need to be adapted to be the most effective when teaching for biliteracy. Many writing workshop programs, for example, are very effective within monolingual classrooms! Elements of these programs can and do work in the biliteracy classroom as well; just remember that writing in English is different than writing in Spanish. The Spanish teachers will have to work around adapting the program (if they, too, are required to use it), especially as kids get into writing longer pieces of writing and the structure of the writing really begins to show the difference between how we write in Spanish versus how we write in English. (Refer to pages 155-165 of Teaching for Biliteracy for How Spanish Works and tips on the structure of Spanish.)
As for the English side, see if you can adapt the lessons to support the Biliteracy Units of instruction. If the program progresses through the writing genres, is it possible to jump around according to which writing genre is being taught in the particular biliteracy unit? Comb the writing lessons from the program and, while using the same strategies, adapt the topic to match your unit of instruction. For example, if my unit of instruction was Living and Nonliving and I HAD to teach opinion writing because I was directed to go in the order of the writing program, I would have my students write about their favorite animal perhaps, but really emphasize the oracy building before writing. The Waves unit in first grade might be a great place to do an expository writing piece on how sound travels from a guitar to our ear (this could also be narrative, depending on how you present it).
In In the living and nonliving unit I teach in Kindergarten, I have my students learn the conventions of writing questions and answering them. Here you can see the question is written by one student, and another student must respond with evidence and using a complete sentence. They practice expository writing here. Later, I can use the same format to do opinion writing with a prompt of What is your favorite animal?
If it is a comprehensive literacy program, see what parts you can incorporate into your content area. As a biliteracy teacher, I do not have time in my day to teach literacy and science as separate units. So instead I incorporate my literacy standards into my science units. I always do my weather unit toward the beginning of the kindergarten year, while we are still studying a specific “letter of the week”. So during “S” week, our list includes words like snow, storm, sleet, scarf, sun, and so on. This is instead of the program’s suggested pictures of a seal, sand, sandwich, and sun…all of which start with “s” but are unrelated otherwise. It may work to still follow the scope and sequence, if necessary, but instead infuse the language of the CONTENT area (and related literature) to the skills and standards taught within the mandated program.
Even if many of your students begin their biliteracy development as monolingual English speakers, remember that from the day they start kindergarten they become developing bilinguals, and their brains are developing as bilingual brains. In addition, for all of our developing bilinguals, oracy before writing is essential regardless of the grade level. Connecting all areas of comprehensive literacy with content makes it more, well, comprehensible for all learners.
Tip Three: Enhance
I teach narrative writing within my Forces and Motion unit in Kindergarten. We have a TPR for each of the stages of the narrative (1 finger up for first, hand jumping over hand for next, and so on) which we use as we fill out this graphic organizer on writing how we made a toy move.
If adapting the units is NOT an option (although please advocate for that flexibility!), be sure to set your students up for success with oracy building. When mentor texts are used in a writing program, think about starting with an Adapted Reader’s Theater (check out ART in the Teaching for Biliteracy book on page 81) so that students have a rich understanding of the text, and use Total Physical Response for the writing terms (introduction, body, paragraph, closing, opinion, narrative, etc.). It will take you longer that the monolingual classrooms to get through the writing units, but your students will benefit from the added supports.
Within systematic phonics programs, add the content vocabulary that works for the area of word study determined by the program, as in my example above from the weather unit and words that begin with “s”. Perhaps some read aloud texts can be replaced or supplemented with content-related texts within the given genre. Whatever the mandates are, be sure you are supporting your students – all of them – with interactive, graphic, and sensory supports to help them access the curriculum as developing bilinguals. Check out the ideas for these supports from WIDA here.
I know my tips do not create a perfect unit or weave-in of a required program. However, the hope is that with strong advocacy for the needs of developing bilinguals, a willingness to be flexible and creative, and infusing content whenever possible, we all can make district mandates work within the framework of teaching for biliteracy. ¡Buena suerte!
