The article addresses the demographic circumstances of student diversity, which have grown significantly in American schools in recent years and have posed a challenge for school reform. The article examines the emerging knowledge base and discusses federal education reform policy changes related to student cultural and linguistic diversity. (SM)

Reactions of 30 bilingual teachers and 20 administrators to implementation of Proposition 227 match those of educators throughout California. Teachers worry about the erosion of primary language programs, the imposition of English-only standardized testing, and the lack of clear leadership on policy implementation. Administrator concerns include…

Notes the challenges posed by cultural diversity in the United States. Presents a demographic assessment of factors relating to the schooling of culturally diverse populations, analysis of challenges associated with the growing number of language-minority students who are Hispanic, and conceptual and empirical perspectives precipitating a more…

This chapter addresses the theoretical and empirical knowledge bases related to bilingualism and second language acquisition in Chicano children. Research concerning bilingual acquisition has found that the linguistic, cognitive, and social characters of the bilingual child develop simultaneously. Furthermore, all three areas of development are…

Spanish/English bilingual kindergarten teachers and parents serving as instructional aides in the same bilingual education classrooms served as subjects in a study on classroom interaction. Audio/video recordings of small-group instruction sessions of teachers and parents were subjected to discourse analysis. A point of interest was the…