Reaching English Language Learners in Every Classroom

Energizers for Teaching and Learning

Debbie Arechiga

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781138475687
• eBook ISBN: 9781317929925
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Reach all of your English language learners with the effective and engaging approaches in this book. It's filled with practical tools, strategies, and real-world vignettes that will help you teach reading and writing to a diverse student population.
The book features Mental Energizers, aptitudes that will help sustain your commitment as you work in linguistically diverse classrooms. It also highlights Strategic Energizers, teaching approaches that promote student learning and engagement.
The classroom vignettes presented along the way show the Energizers in action. These Energizers, which can be used throughout instruction, will have you feeling ready and motivated to bring all of your English language learners to success!

1	English Language Learners and Schools at the Epicenter of Change

“[R]ecord numbers of immigrants . . . put classrooms on the front lines of America’s battles over whether and how to assimilate the newcomers” (Thompson, 2009).

“[P]ublic schools are at the epicenter of this change, and educators are on the front line in figuring out how to respond” (Noguera, 1999).

U.S. population trends have shifted dramatically over the last forty years, and public school enrollments are reflecting that change. The country—and our schools—are now more ethnically, culturally, and religiously diverse than ever before (Campbell, 2006). The old biracial (black/white) paradigm in the United States has evolved into a multiracial collage (Clark, 1999). And an extraordinary result of this growing diversity is just around the corner: the national adjustment to what has been called “the new majority” of minorities (Campbell, 2006).

The country—and our schools—are now more ethnically, culturally, and religiously diverse than ever before.

“Change is inevitable” goes the old saw. But perhaps no change could seem more fundamental and life-altering to many Americans than a shift in ethnic majority. In the very near future, there will be no such thing as a single majority group in the United States. All ethnic groups, including European Americans (whites), will be numeric minorities. This change has already occurred in several states and school districts (Campbell, 2006).

“Because there is no majority group, what does the term minority mean?” asks one writer. This seemingly simple question goes to the heart of the emotional and political concerns commonly voiced today. No doubt American communities and schools will be working out answers for the next several decades. The writer who asked the question offered this response: “Clearly, we all need to learn to get along.” Again, this concept seems elementary in the face of immensely complex issues, yet it’s hard to argue with its truthfulness. “Getting along” is a concept that children understand. Perhaps that’s partly why, as the writer notes, “historically the public schools are one of the few institutions where this cooperation has been taught” (Campbell, 2006).

In addition to the obligation to ensure that all students learn English, an important role for educators will be to help students choose inclusion and equality.

The public school has always served as the primary institution responsible for the integration of immigrant children into the American mainstream. That role continues today, with particular emphasis on the obligation of schools to ensure that all students learn English (Noguera, 1999). If schools and their communities are at the focal point of social change and political controversy today, they’re also at a point of great opportunity. One observer notes that “competing principles have coexisted throughout our history[:] The ideology of exclusion and dominance . . . [and] the ideology of inclusion and equality” (Thompson, 2009). Today, and in the coming years, one of our most important roles as educators will be to help our students choose inclusion and equality.

The change seems so sudden; how did it happen?

The changes that we’re feeling so keenly today began in 1965, when the Immigration and Nationality Act was amended to repeal long-standing quotas based on national origin. The law also gave preference to people with certain specialized skills and to reuniting family members separated by former immigration restrictions. As surprising as it seems today, those who drafted the new provisions didn’t expect a significant increase in immigration. But more immigrants poured into the United States than at any other time in history (Hirschman, 2006). The U.S. Census Bureau figures tell the story: 35.7 million foreign-born people lived in the United States in 2005, up from 24.5 million just ten years earlier (Maxwell, 2009). This influx is in addition to ten million newcomers in the 1980s and seven million in the 1970s (Capps et al., 2007). Nearly half these immigrants came from Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central America, while approximately 15 percent arrived from Asia. Less than 20 percent came from Europe and Canada; 80 percent became members of U.S. minority groups (Kenny, 2008).

The year 1965 not only ushered in a surge of immigration, but it also ended the baby boom. Following World War II, from 1946 to 1964, the birthrate averaged more than three children per woman. Most of these women were non-Hispanic whites. As the birth rates of baby boomers fell steadily, births to new immigrants increased rapidly (Mather, 2009). In 2009 whites had approximately one birth for every death, while Hispanics had about nine births for every death: Hispanic births represented more than half of the total gain in U.S. population during 2009 (Yen, 2008). The birthrate of all other minority groups has also exceeded that of whites (U.S Diplomatic Mission to Germany, 2010). According to the Census Bureau, minorities, collectively, will comprise more than 50 percent of the population by 2042 (up from 34 percent in 2008). Minority children will become the majority even sooner—by 2023 (Goldman, 2008). According to the Census Bureau, minority children will become the majority by 2023.

Becoming intentional and determined about diversity will help schools and other organizations make adjustments that will move productive change forward.

The history of the United States has always been a story of immigrants. That story is continuing with a greater-than-ever emphasis on diversity. Those who acknowledge that diversity is here to stay can help accommodate and even benefit from the change. Driven by competition and the need for profit, many businesses have made significant adaptations to appeal to a multicultural customer base. As early as the 1970s, Ma Bell, which has since become Verizon (as well as many other phone companies), began providing services in several languages other than English. A company spokesperson commented, “Back then, it was survival mode. Today, there’s a business reason to do it.” That business reason is its U.S. customer base, which is 11.2 percent Hispanic and 6.7 percent Asian, while multilingual customers are increasing at 9 percent each year. In addition, Verizon stores whose employees speak languages other than English are 20 percent more profitable than other stores. Verizon’s vice president for workplace culture, diversity, and compliance explained that these results don’t just happen: “You have to be as intentional and determined about diversity as any other business imperative” (DiversityInc., 2008). Intentional and determined about diversity—this phrase expresses succinctly the outlook that will enable individuals, communities, government agencies, schools, and other organizations to make adjustments that will move productive change forward. It’s a motto we should all consider adopting.

Historically, immigration and political controversy go hand in hand

Despite the fact that all U.S. residents other than Native Americans were new immigrants at some point in their family’s history, immigration has always been a contentious political issue. There’s a long-standing pattern of immigrants already assimilated into U.S. life resisting newer immigrants for fear that the newcomers will pose an economic threat (taking over jobs, overusing public services, etc.) and be culturally or religiously incompatible.

Assimilation doesn’t mean that the status quo remains unchanged. To a significant degree, immigrants have always reshaped the social landscape.

Perhaps one of the reasons that immigration has always been a political hot button is that assimilation doesn’t mean that the status quo remains unchanged. Instead, as researcher Hirschman (2006) declares, “The ‘new immigrants’ [of the early twentieth century] have remade American society in their image.” Because immigrants of that era settled in cities and provided labor for a newly industrialized economy, they ushered in “a more cosmopolitan America that places Catholicism and Judaism on a par with Protestant denominations.” According to Hirschman, the most important legacy of these Eastern and Southern European immigrants is that they paved the way for the New Deal (1930s), the Great Society (1960s), and the current wave of immigration from Asia and Latin America. In the process of joining American society, the immigrants of the early twentieth century changed that society markedly—and there’s no question that our newest immigrants will effect equally transformative changes. “Immigrants always change the United States as much as the United States changes them” (Kenny, 2008).

The great majority of today’s newcomers are people of color, which makes the issue of racial equality more significant than ever before.

The most notable difference between our present immigrants and those from prior eras is that the great majority of today’s newcomers are people of color. Their numbers are radically altering the ethnic and racial mix in many communities and will continue to do so. Unlike the German, Italian, Irish, Polish, and Jewish immigrants whose arrival was once vigorously resisted, Hispanics, Asians, and other people of color cannot eventually become “full-fledged white Americans” (Noguera, 2009). Clearly, the issue of racial equality is going to be more significant than ever before in American life.

While immigrants of the past settled mainly in large cities on the East and West Coasts, today they are going wherever they can find a demand for their labor, including suburbs, small towns, and rural areas. Ethnic diversity is often a new experience for these communities. In some locations, the immigrants have reinvigorated an area’s economic future; in others, they have been less than welcome. In either situation, the status quo changes, and residents must adjust (Noguera, 2009).

Many new immigrant families are not achieving upward mobility in successive generations.

In many Hispanic families, successive generations are no...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Meet the Author
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• How to Read This Book
• Free Download
• 1 English Language Learners and Schools at the Epicenter of Change
• 2 Energy for Teaching: The Mental Energizers
• 3 Opening the Doors to Literacy: A Comprehensive Reading and Writing Framework
• 4 Energy for Learning: The Strategic Energizers—An Introduction
• 5 Energy for Learning: Keep Instruction Comprehensible
• 6 Energy for Learning: Build Bridges for Language and Learning
• 7 Energy for Learning: Get Students Talking
• 8 Energy for Learning: Flood Instruction with Vocabulary
• 9 Energizers at Work: Transforming Teaching and Learning
• References