We are all talking: a whole-school approach to professional development for teachers of English learners

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of a professional development program that included two distinct components: strategies for infusing student-talk into grade-level lessons in science and mathematics; and school-level learning communities focused on readings and discussions of student-talk research. This article reports the program’s impact on longitudinal school-level outcomes in a high-minority, low-socioeconomic school district in the United States. Data include the English Language Arts and Mathematics California Standards Test scores for second-grade students before the professional development began and at the end of each program year. Based on linear regressions that cluster standard errors at the school level, the findings show greater increases in Test scores for English learners (and all students) in participating schools than in non-participating schools. The results suggest that professional development which integrates language with content and focuses on school-level collaboration is a potential model for addressing needs of English learners.