Abstract
English Language Learners (ELLs) are frequently left on the periphery of classroom interactions. Due to misalignment of language skills, teachers and peers communicate with these students less often, decreasing the number of opportunities to engage. Exclusion can be avoided with learning activities that invite all students to participate and contribute ideas. We argue that environments and activities that privilege scientific inductive reasoning increase possibilities for emerging bilingual students to engage. This study investigated first-grade students' discussions about factors that affect how objects float. Students came from a variety of language backgrounds; all were considered beginner/intermediate ELLs. Results show that the goal of inducing principles from actual phenomena encouraged students to communicate their ideas and reasoning, boosting students' confidence in expressing themselves. Following the hybrid space argument of Vygotsky's theory of concept formation, we illustrate that physics can be particularly suitable context for the co-development of concepts and English language skills.
Highlights
With the expected shifts in our country’s population, there will be an increase in the number of emerging bilingual students in schools
We argue that a science classroom centered on evidence-based and inductive reasoning is well-suited for engaging emerging bilingual students
The most elaborate contribution came from Ellie, a Chinese student who had arrived in the US at the beginning of the school year
Summary
With the expected shifts in our country’s population, there will be an increase in the number of emerging bilingual students in schools. Already a large number of students in the educational system are learning English as a second language, with a small number of teachers trained to meet their language needs [1]. Because of marked difference in language skills between teachers and English Language Learners (ELLs), as well as between monolingual and bilingual students, ELLs tend to not be fully incorporated into classroom activities. Because of pressures to increase language fluency of ELLs, there is a nationwide trend of teachers and administrators to decrease the amount of classroom time devoted to science [2]. We argue that a science classroom centered on evidence-based and inductive reasoning is well-suited for engaging emerging bilingual students. When students participate in the process of scientific induction, we expect them to engage with peers in discussions about tangible, shared observations and questions that are meaningful
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