English-as-a-Second-Language Reform Prompts Questions on What it Really Means to Prepare Middle Level Science Teachers

Drs. Gayle A. Buck, Ronald J. Bonnstetter & Beth Franklin

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to provide a descriptive, as well as interpretive, account of the necessary adjustments our middle level and secondary science teacher education programs should make in light of our increasing understandings of the needs of underrepresented populations, specially ESL students. Both a "Assimilationist" and "Emancipatory" perspective were reviewed to form the theoretical approach to the study. A qualitative research design was used to gather data from semi-structured interviews, observations and written document review. Sources of data included four middle level science teachers, five ESL middle level students, ESL research literature, and science education research literature. The results of looking at classroom practice, educational theory and research from both an assimilationist and emancipatory perspective has reinforced the need to not simply view ESL students from a deficit model, but to take advantage of the opportunity to learn from them and their unique experiences.

Perhaps if we weren’t going through a systemic review of our science education program, we may have been satisfied by adding an English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) component to our middle level methods courses, never questioning what impact it should have on the overall science education program. Or, if we weren’t taking part in an ESL reform initiative, we may have not had so many long, insightful, and sometimes contentious discussions on what science education for ALL Americans really means for science teacher education. But, they were both occurring simultaneously, eventually impacting each other in ways that would otherwise never have occurred.

The Center for Curriculum and Instruction at our university received a grant to foster program adjustments to prepare teachers to meet the needs of English-as-a-Second-Language learners. One of the goals of this program was to enable new middle level math, science and social studies pre-service teachers to use appropriate strategies when addressing the needs of limited-English proficient students by enrolling in redesigned middle level methods courses. In order to accomplish this goal, limited-English methods and strategies were to become integrated into everyone’s content methods courses. This meant we had to take a serious look at how to incorporate an ESL component into our middle level science methods courses.

At the same time, the science area, located within the Center for Curriculum and Instruction, began to develop an evaluation plan for our science teacher education program. A normative and pragmatic conception of effectiveness, as described by Shulman (1990), was employed. This project required us to review the literature, our beliefs, our students, and our schools to develop an ideology of good science teaching. We then compared this ideology to those of the various institutions and organizations to which we are accountable and made any necessary additions and revisions. The outcomes we find in the classrooms of our graduates would then be corresponded to this model. The overall "model" would be monitored and refined based on the success of their students.

In the beginning, the two project discussions, one on teaching ESL students and the other on good science teaching, were occurring simultaneously, but separate. However, eventually the two science educators in this study couldn’t separate a Tuesday discussion on constructivist science teaching from a Wednesday discussion on the cultural understandings being brought to the classroom by the ESL students. The questions of preparing teachers to teach ESL students were merging with questions on preparing teachers to teach ALL children. The ESL educator in this study was originally brought into the discussions to help delineate where these ESL considerations fit into the overall science education program.

As teacher educators we are held accountable for the preparation of new teachers. This means preparing them for complex problems in a living and evolving system such as education. No matter how prepared we were in content and practice, or how much experience in the classroom we had, we could not have been prepared for every future situation. However, we are accountable for preparing teachers for new situations. If there is a way to prepare science educators to address new areas, such as the increasing number of ESL students in our classrooms, it is to prepare them to research and improve their own situation and practice.

Action Research is carried out by a team of professionals seeking to improve their situation (Greenwood & Levin, 1998). It is a form of scholarship that is guided by the question, "How can I improve my practice?" (Whitehead, 1989). The basic action of this research routine is cyclical. One point on the cycle is "look". At this stage, the researchers gather relevant information and seek to build a holistic view of the situation. Another point on the cycle is "think". Here, the researchers explore, analyze, interpret and explain the situation. Also, on this cycle is the stage "act". It is here that the practitioners try out actions that will improve their practice. In this cycle the actions will lead to the "look" stage again (Stringer, 1999, pp. 18-19).

Action research is a systematic method of inquiry that is guided by a series of questions (Arhar, Holly, & Kasten, 2001). These questions include:

• What is our research interest?
• What are the values motivating our study?
• How will we address our question?
• How will we document the process?
• How will we interpret the data?
• How will we verify our interpretations?
• What will we do next and how will these actions make life better?
• How will we make this public?

What was our research interest?

The purpose of this study was to provide a descriptive, as well as interpretive account of the necessary adjustments we should make to our middle level science methods courses in light of our increasing understandings of the needs of underrepresented populations, specifically ESL students. The focus of this inquiry was guided by the outcome standards we are currently incorporating into our programs. The objectives of this case study were:

1. To design middle level methods courses that would enable graduating science teachers to use appropriate strategies to address the needs of limited-English proficient students.

2. To improve our middle level science methods courses. The improvements should be made in light of our increasing understanding of the changing student population.

The guiding research questions were based on the outcomes our teacher education program is currently utilizing. These standards are themselves adapted versions of the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) standards. The questions were:

1. What must the teacher candidate understands about how ESL children learn and develop, and what learning opportunities should they be utilizing to support the intellectual, social and personal development of ESL student?

2. What must the teacher candidate understand and what are the variety of instructional strategies they should be using to encourage ESL students’ development of critical thinking, problem solving, and performance skills?

3. What type of formal and informal assessment strategies must the teacher candidate use to evaluate the ESL learner?

4. What relationships with school colleagues, parents, and agencies in the larger community should the teacher candidate be using to support ESL students’ learning and well being?

5. What are the central concepts, tools of inquiry, and structures of science graduates must understand and how are they to teach and create learning experiences that make these aspects of science meaningful for the ESL student?

What Were the Values Motivating Our Study?

Our inquiry was guided by a theoretical underpinning. The amount and quality of research on science education for underrepresented populations has been growing over the past several years. A growing number of educational researchers (Barton & Osborne, 1995; Calabrese Barton, 1998; Duran, 1996; Ogawa, 1995; Rodriguez, 1998) support the notion that students of diverse ethnic and learning backgrounds can no longer be viewed as a matter of "special" education; it must be acknowledged as an issue of quality education.

However, a review of the educational research literature on multicultural science education reveals that the researchers in this field do not approach this issue from only one perspective. For example, Duran (1996), who describes strategies teachers can take in order to help their ESL students participate in the general science class discourse, approached this topic from a different perspective than does Barton and Osborne (1995), who describe an attempt to create and utilize an inclusive science pedagogy, "one that invites and values the experiences of Mexican-American adolescents and minorities" (p. 245).

It became evident to us that if we didn’t discuss the theoretical perspective that undermines our reform, we may be approaching this project with vastly different understandings. We needed to decide what counts as science and what was meant by "science for all." Therefore, we considered the process from both a "Assimilationist" and "Emancipatory" perspective. The resulting understanding formed the theoretical approach to our study.

Assimilation. A science teacher education program designed around an assimilationist perspective would be driven by the educational goal of helping all students, including ESL students, achieve in the mainstream science course structure. Western science would be viewed as the proper domain of science, and preparing teachers who are able to help all students acquire the knowledge of this domain would be a high priority of science education.

The resulting ESL plan from this assimilationist perspective (McCarthy, 1990), assumes that our teachers should be able to help ESL students succeed in mainstream science education and eventually take their place in prominent positions in science-related fields. If our goal was to prepare teachers to help ALL children assimilate into the mainstream science classroom we would include in our methods courses teaching strategies such as: (a) use the chalkboard more than usual; (b) prepare lists of terms on large paper which will be introduced in the lesson; (c) always print legibly; (d) when giving directions, give them one at a time and step-by-step; (e) use visual materials such as pictures, charts, maps, graphs, and illustrations; and (f) pay attention to which students seem to be the most friendly and willing to help the LEP students (Sutman, Allen, & Shoemaker, 1986). These strategies focus on helping ESL children follow along and succeed in mainstream science education.

Emancipatory. A program designed around an emancipatory perspective would be driven by the educational goal of addressing the social and political consequences of current practices in education. Western science has a powerful and distinctive structure that reinforces certain social structures that discriminate against certain groups. Opening the doors to science for different voices and standpoints, in this case the various cultures represented by the ESL students, would provide us with a more holistic understanding of ourselves and our world (Harding, 1991).

An increasing number of researchers (Calabrese Barton, 1998; Keller & Rodriquez, 1997; Mayberry, 1998) point out that although many may advocate for science for ALL Americans, few address the social and political consequences of the power structure of science education. Some stress the need for "students and teachers to develop a critical analysis of the epistemology of Western science, its privileging of the masculine, and its inability to reorient the relation of scientific inquiry to social policy and social development" (Clover, 1995).

As science teacher educators, we would approach the need for change from the perspective that our graduates will be teaching an increasing number of ESL students. These students are part of minority groups that are often the victims of the current social structure. We would approach change for teacher preparation by stating the need to establish a more equitable power structure. If we approached our reform from an emancipation perspective, perhaps we would prepare teachers who would be aware of the power arrangements in science and science classes. Or, we would provide teachers with the skills and knowledge needed to provide their students with an understanding of alternative views of science, or to question whose values are represented in the scientific establishment (Calabrese, 1998; Warren & Rosebery, 1993).

Balanced Perspective. Many educational researchers address the inherent problems with approaching education of diverse populations from solely a position of assimilation or emancipation (Brickhouse, 1994; Brickhouse & Stanley, 1995; Lee & Fradd, 1999). Advocating one position exclusively would prove to be detrimental to the students in the long run.

This was the same conclusion we, as science teacher educators, came to as we worked to determine the theoretical approach for our professional inquiry. Our graduates will leave to enter a world of educational standards, and accountability systems. They will also be entering a world where it is anticipated that by the year 2050, all of us in the United States will be minorities (Halford, 1999). Therefore, we decided to approach our course revisions from balanced perspective—preparing our teachers to help ESL students succeed in western science, while at the same time preparing them to create a science education that is responsive to an increasingly diverse world of needs and understandings.

How Did We Address Our Question?

The focus of this study was the improvement of our practice. Our sights had to remain on the classroom environments the overwhelming majority of our teachers would be entering. Therefore, our data sources not only included ESL educators and science educators, but also the classrooms for which we were preparing our students. These local classroom sources included middle level science teachers and ESL students.

We explored our questions by gathering a wealth of data. Our specific sources for data included (a) four middle level science teachers, (b) five ESL middle level students, (c) ESL literature, and (d) science education literature. The teachers were selected based on joint recommendations from ESL coordinators, science consultants, and university faculty. These teachers were middle levels science teachers who each had five or more ESL students in their science classroom. They were not exclusively ESL science teachers. Each teacher was recommended as a teacher that was successfully meeting the needs of ESL students in their mainstream science classrooms. Recommendations came from ESL consultants, science consultants, and university professors. The students were selected based on their presence in observed classroom activities and parental consent. The written documents were sought based on recommendations from ESL educators who consider science education, as well as science educators who consider ESL learners.

This data was collected by semi-structured interviews, observations and written document review.

Semistructured interviews. We utilized a semistructured format for the interviews with the middle level science teachers. This structure was utilized because the teachers in the schools we visited have not had formal training in meeting the needs of the ESL learner. Their understandings were situation specific and constructed from their own unique experiences. The semiformal structure allowed us to seek specific information while still allowing for our questions, as well as the issues of the teachers, to be explored. The questions were developed from this study’s research questions. The first author interviewed each teacher. The interviews were transcribed and the verbatim records were utilized in data analysis.

Focus group interviews. We selected a group interview strategy for the student interviews in an attempt to lower the power position of the researchers. Student group interviews were held at two different schools. The parental consent form was translated into the students’ first language and interviews were conducted in both English and Spanish, the later of which was the first language of three of the five ESL students.

The first and third author facilitated the group interviews, in an attempt to allow for interaction on both science education and ESL topics. The interviews were transcribed and the verbatim records were utilized in data analysis.

Observation. We observed four different classroom activities. Each classroom activity was observed by at least two of the three researchers, with the first author being present in all observations.

The classroom observations focused on classroom environment, description of participants, teaching strategies, desired conceptual understandings, student-teacher interactions, student-student interactions, and learning strategies.

In each observation, at least one of the observers was viewing the activity from an ESL perspective and one from a science education perspective. Each observer edited their observation notes; these notes were utilized during data analysis.

Written document review. Our review included over 30 written documents. These documents pertained to the education of ESL students with specific focus on classroom strategies. Together, these written sources provided a more holistic understanding of what the educational field tells us about preparing science teachers who are prepared to meet the needs of the ESL learner. The documents were used as data in a study and coded during the analysis. This coding system was applied to all data sources in order to gather the common strategies among educators from ESL education, science education, as well as the teachers and students in our study. These resources were not used to establish a literature review, looking at what different individuals say, but as data sources, looking at the common elements among all resources of information.

How Did We Interpret the Data and Verify Our Interpretations?

We developed the initial categorization system based on our research questions. The basic codes were teaching strategies, learning strategies, professional relationships, science curriculum, and assessment. Subsections for each group were then developed based on the theoretical approach, emancipatory or assimilation. The verbatim interview transcriptions, observation notes, and written documents were coded based on this system.

The coding system we applied to the written documents, observation notes, and interview transcripts provided lists of strategies for each the following categories, as well as their related subcategories. The strategies were identified as those derived from teacher interviews or observations, student interviews, or written documents. Those lists are presented in narrative form below. We were coding for the type of environment for which these strategies would be useful, assimilation or emancipation. Making assumptions about the perspective of the authors, teachers, or students is beyond the scope of this particular study. However, some general patterns were noted throughout the study and will be mentioned in the final discussions of this paper.

The coded categories were tested for completeness (Guba, 1978). The following steps were completed at several stages of the analysis.

1. The set should have internal and external plausibility; a property that might be termed "integratability." Viewed internally, the individual categories should appear to be consistent; viewed externally, the set of categories should seem to compromise a whole picture.

2. The set should be reasonably inclusive of the data and information that exist. This feature is partly tested by the absence of unassignable cases, but can be further tested by reference to the problem, which the inquirer is investigating, or by the mandate given the evaluator by his client/sponsor. If the set of categories did not appear to be sufficient, on logical grounds, to cover the facets of the problem or mandate, the set is probably incomplete.

3. The set should be reproducible by another competent judge. The second observer ought to be able to verify that (a) the categories make sense in view of the data that are available, and (b) the data have been

4.The set should be credible to the persons who provided the information that the set is presumed to assimilate. Who is in a better position to judge whether the categories appropriately reflect their issues and concerns than the people themselves? (Guba, 1978, pp. 56-57).

What Did We Find Out?

The first subgroup of learning opportunities could be utilized to foster mainstream scientific understandings for the ESL students. This list is based either on the assumption that (a) ESL students begin with different background knowledge, skills, and beliefs or (b) the ESL students lack the appropriate background knowledge, skills, and beliefs. The first making it necessary to build a bridge from existing knowledge to intended knowledge. In such case, the teacher would have to determine the existing knowledge, incorporate prior skills and knowledge into the lesson, and provide experiences that would foster the necessary accommodations for understanding. The latter making it necessary to step back and provide the necessary background experiences that would address deficits in understanding. It is recommended that teachers begin with concrete experiences to better provide students with conceptual structures and schemata. It is also suggested that teachers may need to help ESL students develop appropriate discourse and reasoning strategies. To accomplish this, teachers could have the ESL children sit next to competent and patient nonESL students who could explain and model thinking strategies, or the teachers could verbalize their own thinking and reasoning strategies.

In order to help ESL students develop mainstream scientific understandings and skills, cooperative learning is frequently recommended. Such opportunities could involve pairing ESL students with nonESL students who are willing to help them "understand" the content, or divide ESL students among groups consisting of mainly nonESL students, so they have the opportunity to have social interactions based on mainstream understandings. Such opportunities were prevalent in the teacher and student transcripts, as well as classroom observations.

The second subgroup of learning opportunities could be utilized to help teachers foster the ESL students’ scientific understanding of their world, as well as understanding their role in the scientific establishment. In order to accomplish the first, the teacher could incorporate the ESL students’ prior knowledge and abilities into the overall science curriculum and the lessons could incorporate the ESL students’ ways of knowing. In order to accomplish the second, the students should have the opportunity to apply new knowledge to realistic situations, collaborate with teachers on inquiry and active discovery, and make science investigations personally relevant and socially meaningful. Overall, learning opportunities should reflect the human experience, (not just western experience) inquire into authentic questions generated from students’ experience, and make connections across whole curriculum.

Cooperative learning can be utilized to foster the ESL students’ scientific understanding of their world, as well as their role in the scientific establishment. However, in contrast to the earlier mentioned focus, the focus here would not be on helping the ESL student assimilate into the culture of the nonESL student. Instead, cooperative learning opportunities would be structured in such a way that they help students achieve mutual understandings of each other’s cultures and life experiences.

The majority of the strategies we mined would be particularly useful for teachers whose goal is to help ESL students succeed in the mainstream science classroom (assimilationist). Many of these skills could be further described as "minor" strategies. That is, they can be easily added to an existing lesson plan. During the lesson, teachers may increase the use of the chalkboard, use simpler terms when possible, always print legibly, watch for facial expressions that show confusion, use a substantial amount of body language, make gestures that indicate very important ideas, give directions one at a time, let English speaking students repeat directions, encourage ESL students to speak up, and give clues when asking questions requiring higher order thinking strategies. Many such strategies were evident in our observation notes. Prior to the lesson, teachers could write key terms on butcher paper, develop handouts of class notes and lectures, gather a substantial amount of visual materials and concrete materials, seek out materials in the students’ first languages, and label relevant science objects around the room (beakers, thermometers, etc.). The teacher may also require the ESL students to keep notebooks or to provide discussion topics with the teacher during silent work periods, or work with nonESL students for class activities.

There are additional assimilative strategies that will possibly involve the incorporation of new approaches to teaching. These included using more hands-on activities, which was mentioned in all student/teacher interviews and observations the literature. Such strategies also include making lessons very structured, modeling labs prior to completion, reducing the amount of content coverage, keeping any readings or discussion to a short time frame, utilizing cooperative learning, spending more time building prior knowledge, and varying instructional strategies.

As mentioned, the majority of the strategies we mined, from the classrooms as well as the literature, would be particularly useful for teachers whose goals are to help ESL students succeed in the mainstream science classroom (assimilationist). However, there appeared to be a growing research interest in emancipatory teaching strategies for ESL students found in the literature. The most recent articles provided insight into possible strategies. We categorized these strategies further by determining if the emphasis was on "voice" or "relevancy." The first referring to strategies that allowed the student to give input and the later referring to an effort to make the lesson relevant to the unique life of the child. Although "voice" should lead to relevancy, teachers, parents, or society may also determine the later. Activities that provide the ESL students with a voice in the science classroom included using inquiry activities, discovery learning, support for the student’s language and home culture, identifying the sociocultural knowledge that all students may not share, and designing activities that explore those differences and creating community of learners which are fostered by all of the preceding strategies. There was also support for strategies that help make science classrooms more relevant for ESL students. These include teaching in ways that reflect human (not just western) life, encouraging parents to provide input into classroom activities and curriculum, incorporating the real-life experiences of the ESL students, and educating in natural settings.

There is a small, although increasing, amount of literature on assessment strategies that reflect different ways of knowing. Many proponents emphasized the need to bring students, parents, and community members in on learning and assessment design decisions. Within this, students and parents could set goals, monitor student progress toward those goals, and personally reflect on growth. These assessment goals should reflect their unique strengths. Overall, teachers should utilize processes that mirror the ways of knowing for represented cultures and design assessment procedures with students’ outside experiences in mind—what is authentic to this child?

There was also a selection of ideas for relationships that would foster an emancipatory science education for ESL students. Relationships could be established with parents, school colleagues, and community members. The parents could be part of the decision-making process of school vision statements and on curriculum decisions. In addition, they could be utilized in the classroom to help nonESL students, as well as the teacher, develop an understanding of their unique cultural experiences and understandings. In addition, relationships could be established with bicultural counselors. These counselors could help the teacher, as well as the ESL children, understand where their culture fits into the school experience. Community members could be brought into the classroom to help foster a community of cultures. Overall, the focus of this group of suggested relationships is developing partnerships with parents, community members, and ESL teachers, not for needed support of existing practices, but as equal partner in curriculum, instruction, and assessment decisions.

Taking an emancipatory perspective, the science curriculum would change. We did not find examples of such changes in the teacher observations or interviews. However, we did find many theoretical suggestions for this direction of change. The basic premise is that the concepts must be relevant to language minority students and they should enhance their understanding and appreciation of their cultural identity, as well as that of others. The scientific investigations should emphasize open-mindedness and self-fulfillment. The concepts selected for study should help the students make sense of their world, as well as prepare them for a better future. The concepts should be pulled from the students’ experiences and backgrounds. The ESL science literature, as well as the classroom data, left us with little more than a direction to proceed in order to determine what science concepts would be relevant for ESL students.

What Did We Learn About Our Teaching?

The purpose of this study was to provide a descriptive, as well as interpretive account of the necessary adjustments our education programs that certify middle level science teachers should make in light of our increasing understanding of the needs of underrepresented populations, specifically ESL students. The primary goal for the changes will not only be to prepare teachers to help ESL students adjust to the western science classroom, but also help these students, as well as their nonESL classmates, understand their role in science and science’s role in helping them improve their lives. Our data provided us with an insight into the understandings, strategies, and opportunities our graduates should be prepared to provide their students. We applied our new insights as we took a look at our existing program and pinpointed areas in need of change.

Content. Our graduates will be entering a world of educational standards and accountability systems. They, like the teachers we interviewed, must follow school standards. Likewise, their students will be entering worlds in which a sound understanding of western science is essential. It is our belief that our graduates must understand the central concepts, tools of inquiry, and structures of science in order to fulfill their contractual obligations, as well as to make these aspects of the discipline understandable to their students. Our program currently provides opportunities for our graduates to develop such understandings.

However, understanding western science processes and structures is no longer enough for our graduates. These teachers will also be entering a world of diversity. Understanding one culture and its ways of thinking will no longer be enough.

The data supports the need to prepare teachers who understand how to make science relevant to language minority students and they should be able to enhance these students’ understanding and appreciation of their cultural identity. However, the data did not provide us with an understanding of what content should be understood. Perhaps this is necessary. If we are to select concepts based on their applicability to the lives of culturally diverse students, we must continuously identify the concepts based on the lives of the specific students. The understandings must come from the children and their community. Therefore, an essential part of our program will be on providing our teachers with the communication skills necessary to discover what is relevant, and the learning strategies necessary to build their own understanding of the science content that will ultimately help their students.

Learning Strategies. An essential part of our program is facilitating an understanding in our students about how children construct understandings. We already work to provide the teachers with knowledge of the opportunities necessary to build the essential background understandings, and opportunities to bridge to desired understandings. However, based on our findings, we believe there is need for further development in three areas. First, the teachers need more opportunities to explore how background experiences could differ for ESL students. Second, the teachers need more strategies for exploring background understandings of new cultures they encounter, especially if the communication network is hampered by language differences. Third, the teachers need to understand the type of opportunities that would foster their students understanding of their world.

Teaching Strategies. Our students currently learn and apply a variety of teaching strategies. These strategies include many of the strategies that we coded as "assimilationist". We do need, however, to add to this list, as well as to provide our preservice teachers with more opportunities to utilize these strategies with ESL students and then to monitor and reflect on the results.

Although, we feel these "assimilationists" strategies are valuable, they are not enough. Therefore, upon reflection of what we learned from the process of this study, we believe we need to incorporate more discussions on the fact that these strategies are being utilized to help the ESL student "assimilate" into the existing classroom structure. Teachers need to understand the power position they hold and are applying in the classroom. This understanding is essential before they can understand and apply skills that will lead to a more emancipatory style of teaching.

Our program incorporates emancipatory teaching skills in the multicultural classes. However, these skills are currently not emphasized in the science methods classes. It has become clear to us that we need to do more to connect the teaching skills discussed in the multicultural classes to the science methods courses, as well as to the practicum experiences.

Assessment. Our current program emphasizes authentic assessment. The students spend a substantial amount of time developing the knowledge and skills necessary to select and apply appropriate assessment strategies. We also spend a considerable amount of time on rubric development. However, our newly forming understandings of preparing teachers for diversity has us questioning whether our students are able to develop assessment strategies based on alternative ways of knowing. Or, if they take into account diverse life styles as they attempt to make assessment strategies relevant to the lives of the students.

The data suggested that parents, students, and community members become active in assessment decisions. This is an avenue we have decided to explore further. A part of our teacher education experiences will include developing the communication skills necessary to accomplish this, as well as exploring what type of input such relationships provide.

Relationships. It has come to our attention that although we "cover" professional relationships in our science programs, we do not emphasize the importance of these relationships enough. We now question whether we do in fact instill an idea that parents and colleagues are valuable "aides" to the teachers. Instead, we need to emphasize that teaching is a cooperative activity in which all of those that have a stake in the child’s education should work together to help the child achieve.

Our research has reinforced the idea that the classroom culture doesn’t always reflect the teacher’s culture. Therefore, that teacher needs to become more intent on "discovering" what their students need, as well as the way in which they think and communicate. In addition, the data has illustrated how important it is to understand the standpoint of the members of the different cultures that are represented in our classrooms.

We also have some added concerns about fostering relationships. Our review has revealed that many of the ESL researchers and writers are not approaching science education from the same perspective as some science educators. Many make assumptions about the goals and nature of science education. There are others that see science as a vehicle for teaching English, not always exploring the science concept fully. Yes, we need to emphasize that teaching is a cooperative activity, but also prepare teachers to educator others on the science needs of the children.

What are the Implications for Our Courses? How Will This Make Life Better?

As we proceeded through this study, we came to realize how easy it is to look at ESL students from a deficit perspective when they have an obvious deficit in English language ability. This encourages us to focus on strategies to help them understand our words. However, if they have a language different from our own, they also have a culture different from our own. This means that they need to understand more than our words, but the way we reason and the structure of our disciplines. It also means we need to understand more than their limited English ability, but also the way they reason and their life experiences.

Our search reminded us about the unique experiences and ways of knowing these children bring with them. If we simply added assimilationist strategies to our syllabus, we would have missed the opportunity to "understand" these children. We want to provide these insights to our preservice teachers. Teachers need to see the whole child, not the English language deficit. They need to be able to communicate with these children, their community, and colleagues, in order to discover what it means to teach "science for all Americans."

Our research also led us to more questions. First, although we did not focus on the different approaches of each specific teacher, student, or educational researcher, it is difficult not to notice that, for the most part, the teachers approached the education of ESL children from an assimilistic perspective. The power positions they were taking were absent from their understanding. This leads us to question the abilities, knowledge, or attitudes that teachers need in order to approach education from an emancipatory perspective. Can such skills be taught? Are there particular experiences that may foster such perspectives and skills? Second, the teachers, students, and authors of written documents all supported the idea of cooperative learning in the science classroom. However, our own observations of these cooperative groups led us to question the role the ESL child takes, or is given, in such groupings. In our view, although the teachers did assign tasks, many of the ESL students were given the general role of "laborer." The nonESL students told them what to do, as well as what the ESL child should understand from the activity. We question whether this supports any education for the ESL child. In addition, the observed ESL student roles appeared to support an underling power structure. Is there a way to utilize cooperative learning that will truly foster the social, intellectual, and personal development of ESL students?

Finally, our experience of looking at classroom practice, educational theory and research from both an assimilationist and emancipatory perspective has reinforced our desire to not only teach these children, but to learn from them. However, our interviews with ESL students led us to question the knowledge, skills, and attitudes we, as researchers and teachers, need in order to foster such a relationship with ESL children. This can prove to be difficult when you come to the discussion with not only different languages, but also different ways of knowing as well. Our continuing goal is to prepare the best teachers for the children in our schools. As we strive to do so, we’ve come to realize that we need to not only give them the opportunity to speak, but they have know how to hear what they’re saying.

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