This article reports on a formative experiment involving the implementation of long-term multifaceted vocabulary instruction in second-grade Spanish-English dual-immersion classes. The findings indicate that students in the second year of the project showed accelerated growth in English vocabulary knowledge in comparison to the norming sample of a…

Articles in this issue examine (1) the primary sources of variability in reading and language achievement among Spanish-speaking English learners (ELs) in the United States, (2) the extent to which poor performance at the end of grade 2 is identifiable in developmental trajectories beginning in kindergarten, (3) the relations among core reading…

In Texas, English language learner (ELL) students are assessed annually in academic subject areas using the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) at elementary and middle school levels. This supplemental report describes continuously enrolled Austin Independent School District ELLs' performance as compared with all AISD…

AISD staff's top three suggested priorities for the Dual Language (DL) program in 2013-2014 were: professional development opportunities, program alignment, and increased availability of materials and resources.

The study examined how the English reading performance of predominantly Spanish-speaking students in transitional bilingual education compared with the performance of predominantly Spanish-speaking students in structured English immersion. The study analyzed data on three cohorts of students in six schools in Los Angeles; Denver; Albuquerque; St.…

This report presents information on the Connecting Worlds/Mundos Unidos Project and provides a general comparison overview of accomplishments during its five years of operation. The Connecting Worlds/Mundos Unidos Project has been operating in the El Paso Independent School District (EPISD) for eleven years, but in the present format as a Jacob K.…

Two-way bilingual immersion education, offered in a fast-growing number of primary schools in the United States, provides primary language maintenance to minority language speakers while simultaneously offering an enrichment "foreign" language immersion experience to English-speaking children in the same classroom, generally with the same teacher.…

Two-way immersion is a model for bilingual education designed to help language-minority students develop additive bilingualism while at the same time offering language-majority students a chance to learn a second language. There is a great deal of rhetoric around two-way immersion that claims these programs aim to improve overall equity among…

For new educators, the obstacles of high-stakes testing, curricular mandates, and their own inexperience and self-doubt can render teaching for justice and equity overwhelming, seemingly impossible ideals. However, as students are increasingly tied to prescriptive curricula and academic performance standards, the goals of social justice and…

This study examined the code-switching patterns in the speech of immigrant Spanish-speaking children. Seven- and 10-year-old boys and girls from bilingual classrooms were each paired with a mutually selected friend, and their speech was collected in two contexts: while the children waited for an expected science experiment and when they worked…

The Seattle Public Schools serve one of the most diverse student bodies in the nation. The school system's enrollment represents many racial and ethnic groups and includes students from around the world who come to Seattle speaking many languages and families who came to the city generations ago. The challenge facing Seattle and all other major…