Progressing Students' Language Day by Day

Alison L. Bailey is Professor of Human Development and Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles, working on issues germane to children’s linguistic, social, and educational development. She has published widely in these areas, most recently in Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, Teachers College Record, Educational Researcher, and Review of Research in Education. Her previous books with Margaret Heritage include Formative Assessment for Literacy, Grades K-6 (Corwin Press) and Self-Regulation in Learning: The Role of Language and Formative Assessment (Harvard Education Press). Other recent books include Children’s Multilingual Development and Education: Fostering linguistic resources in home and school contexts (Cambridge University Press), and Language, Literacy and Learning in the STEM Disciplines: How language counts for English Learners (Routledge Publishers). She serves as a member of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Standing Committee on Reading, the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME) Task Force on Classroom Assessment, and the National Academy of Sciences’ Consensus Committee on English Learners in the STEM Disciplines. Margaret Heritage is an independent consultant in education. For her entire career, her work has spanned both research and practice. In addition to spending many years in her native England as a practitioner, a university teacher, and an inspector of schools, she had an extensive period at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), first as principal of the laboratory school of the Graduate School of Education and Information Students and then as an Assistant Director at UCLA’s National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing. She has also taught courses in the Departments of Education at UCLA and Stanford University. She is a regular presenter at conferences across the United States and internationally. Her most recent book with Corwin, co-authored with Christine Harrison, is The Power of Assessment for Learning: Twenty Years of Research and Practice in UK and US Classrooms.

"I’ve worked with ‘mainstream’ content area teachers in my role as a program developer and school change coach for many years, focused on building their skill in working with the English Learners in their classrooms. In the past I’ve relied heavily on promoting the sheltered instruction practices (i.e. SIOP) that we know help make content accessible for students who are learning language. But until the DLLP appeared, we’ve never had a tool that allows mainstream teachers to understand where their students are in terms of their English language development."I see the need most immediately when teachers tell me standards-based assessments don’t reflect what they know their students know. What they are really saying is their students lack the language skills to provide rigorous, academic explanations of their knowledge. As a former science teacher, I could not be satisfied with watching a student engage in a lab activity. They also needed the scientific language skills to explain what they had done and what their results were. Guessing that they understood the concepts while failing to nourish and build their scientific language skills meant I was only doing half my job."The DLLP provides the tools to dig in and understand where students are in terms of their specific language development, and gives insight to every teacher on how to support and build those skills. The progressions are clear and intuitive, you don’t need to be a linguistics expert to work with them. In my role as a program developer the DLLP has been a game changer, giving ME a language and a skill I can support and nurture in all the teachers I work with."

• Foreword by Paola UccelliPrefaceAcknowledgmentsAbout the AuthorsAbout the ContributorsPART I. LAYING THE GROUNDWORKChapter 1. Definitions and ContextsChapter 2. What Is the DLLP Approach?Appendix 2A: Research Methods and ProtocolsAppendix 2B: Directions for Teachers’ Tool for Documenting Language Features in the Classroom for Formative PurposesChapter 3. Formative AssessmentPART II. FEATURES OF THE DLLP APPROACHChapter 4. Word Features of the DLLP ApproachAppendix 4A: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Sophistication of Topic-Related VocabularyAppendix 4B: Student Self-Assessment DLLP GraphicAppendix 4C: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Sophistication of Verb FormsAppendix 4D: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Expansion of Word GroupsChapter 5. Sentence Features of the DLLP ApproachAppendix 5A: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Sophistication of Sentence StructureChapter 6. Discourse Features of the DLLP ApproachAppendix 6A: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Coherence/CohesionAppendix 6B: Discourse Connector ListsAppendix 6C: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Establishment of Advanced Relationships Between IdeasAppendix 6D: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on StaminaAppendix 6E: Practice Finding the “Best Fit” on Perspective-TakingAppendix 6F: Written Language Features of the DLLP ApproachPART III. LEADING LANGUAGE AND CONTENT LEARNINGChapter 7. Leadership and Communities of Practice to Support DLLP ImplementationAppendix 7A: Agendas for Communities of PracticeIndex