- Build in certain instructional conditions, such as student goal setting, self-directed
learning, and collaborative learning, to increase reading engagement and conceptual
learning for students (Guthrie, and others, 1999; Guthrie, Wigfield, and VonSecker 2000).- Make connections between disciplines, such as science and language arts, taught
through conceptual themes. - Make connections among strategies for learning, such as searching, comprehending,
interpreting, composing, and teaching content knowledge. - Make connections among classroom activities that support motivation and social and
cognitive development.
Contributing to the motivation and engagement of diverse learners, including ELs, is
the teachers’ and the broader school community’s open recognition that students’ primary
languages, dialects of English used in the home, and home cultures are valuable resources in
their own right and also to draw on to build proficiency in English and in all school learning (de
Jong and Harper 2011; Lindholm-Leary and Genesee 2010). Teachers are encouraged to do the
following:
- Make connections between disciplines, such as science and language arts, taught
- Create a welcoming classroom environment that exudes respect for individual students
and their families and communities and for cultural and linguistic diversity in general - Get to know students’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds and how individual students
interact with their primary language, home dialect, and home cultures - Use the primary language or home dialect of English, as appropriate, to acknowledge
them as valuable assets and to support all learners to fully develop academic English
and engage meaningfully with the core curriculum - Use texts that accurately reflect students’ cultural, linguistic, and social backgrounds so
that students see themselves in the curriculum - Continuously expand their understandings of culture and language so as not to
oversimplify approaches to culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogy (For
guidance on implementing culturally and linguistically responsive teaching, see chapters
2 and 9 of this ELA/ELD Framework.)
To improve adolescent literacy, the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) Practice Guide, Improving
Adolescent Literacy: Effective Classroom and Intervention Practices (Kamil, and others 2008), offers
five research-based recommendations:
- Provide direct and explicit comprehension strategy instruction
- Provide explicit vocabulary instruction
- Provide opportunities for extended discussion of text meaning and interpretation
- Increase motivation and engagement in literacy learning
- Make available intensive individualized interventions for struggling readers taught by qualified
specialists
These recommendations echo, in part, the themes and contexts of the CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy
and the CA ELD Standards and are addressed in the discussions that follow.
Grades 9 to 12 Chapter 7 | 671