What about your school—have new standards raised the bar for teaching and learning science? Chances are likely your answer to the question is a resounding albeit trepidatious yes. As of the end of the 2018–19 school year, 42 states and the District of Columbia had adopted the Next Generation Science Standards* (NGSS) or standards that are based on the National Research Council’s A Framework for K–12 Science Education, affecting 84 percent of US students.9
“Appendix D—All Standards, All Students” recognizes that the NGSS presents learning opportunities and challenges to student groups that have traditionally been underserved in science classrooms, and that includes students who are English language learners.10 It states that “When supported appropriately, … [ELLs] are capable of learning science through their emerging language and comprehending and carrying out sophisticated language functions … using less-than-perfect English.”
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“NGSS-based science instruction allows students to share, engage, and build on prior knowledge and experiences to make sense of phenomena,” Heller explains. “Providing Spanish components to support the English language materials, English language learners and speakers can work collaboratively to develop a richer set of ideas based on prior knowledge and shared experiences with handson investigations. For ELL students, this also allows them to strengthen their reading, writing, and comprehension skills.”
Start with phenomena. Phenomena are learning opportunities. These naturally occurring events generate students’ interest, motivating them to develop driving questions as they investigate, model, and explain the phenomena. Curricula should engage students in an investigative phenomenon through a variety of media, including videos that immerse students in the phenomena and spark their curiosity.
- As students watch a phenomena-based video, teachers can reinforce language development by having students record questions and observations in notebooks.
- Science terms along with the student-friendly definitions should be highlighted in the unit for the teacher to introduce, so both English speakers and learners share a common vocabulary from the get-go.
- Teachers can assess prior knowledge of the phenomenon and link science to reading, writing, and math using class charts, science notebooks, interactive whiteboard activities, and small- and large-group discussions.
Heller notes that videos in
Building Blocks of Science 3D™ units let the teacher choose the language: the video’s audio and closed captioning are available in both English and Spanish. Spanish speakers can listen in English while they read the Spanish captions, or vice versa, so they’re engaged and motivated to ask questions and share their ideas as they build toward the standards.
Explore through home-school connections. Relating science lessons to their homes and communities helps English language learners approach science through the lens of their current life experiences.
“Appendix D—All Standards, All Students” affirms this: “Through NGSS, students can engage in scientific and engineering practices, crosscutting concepts, and disciplinary core ideas by connecting school science to their out-of-school experiences in home and community contexts.”
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Take-home science activities— investigations students do at home with their families to support concepts learned in science class— help connect school and home by validating science knowledge and inviting interaction with students’ families. To address the student population who speak a Spanish dialect at home, making materials such as student investigation sheets and literacy readers available in Spanish helps strengthen students’ academic vocabulary in their native language, further connecting school and home experiences.13
An effective curriculum can also encourage family participation in learning through topic-specific activity sheets with directions for the parent, simple background information, and a space for students to record observations and data, Heller says. He cites the digital interactive student investigation sheets that let the teacher choose the language by toggling between English and Spanish in
Building Blocks of Science™ 3D lessons as examples. The teacher can then provide the sheets to ELLs who speak Spanish in their home language.
Collaboration is key. As students work together to explain a phenomenon, they need to communicate to present evidence as they share and develop their observations. As stated in the blog post “Rethinking Language Goals in Science with Three-Dimensional Learning,” coauthors Emily C. Miller, a lead writer for the NGSS Diversity & Equity Team, and Rita MacDonald, an academic English language researcher at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research, note that this collaborative exploration and students’ shared ideas drive development and sensemaking for both English speakers and learners.14
In the classroom, teachers can cultivate collaboration by using age-appropriate, interactive, hands-on materials that provide opportunities for students to interact as they work in pairs, in small groups, and/or at learning centers. A curriculum’s resource for teachers should offer guiding questions to foster group discussions and informal teacher-student talks as well as provide assessment opportunities of student progress. Then through their own observations, kinesthetic activities, and ensuing discussions, students can develop explanations of the concept or topic they are studying, supporting their claims with evidence and reasoning.
Digital simulations of a phenomena are effective tools that let students manipulate and visualize new concepts, Heller says. Manipulating simulations can drive understanding for all students, but it’s particularly beneficial for ELLs to be able to switch between English and Spanish as they build language skills while working with classmates to make sense of the phenomena.
Engineer it. When students actively investigate and explain real-world phenomena, they are acting as scientists. They then, as engineers do, engage in scientific engineering and design to develop solutions to problems.
In engineering practices, communication is crucial as students design models for possible solutions, develop solutions, and improve their solutions through hands-on testing and analysis. This provides an optimal opportunity for classroom teachers to partner with an ELL specialist to reinforce science learning and vocabulary as students apply the science knowledge they have acquired to engineer a solution to the problem.
Guides for the teacher. With challenging new standards for science teaching and learning, teacher’s guides that introduce the academic vocabulary of science coupled with a Spanish translation are now more than ever a classroom essential. A version of the teacher’s guide in Spanish can be especially helpful for bilingual educators who teach in a Spanish immersion or dual-language classroom, Heller notes, allowing them to move easily between languages. With access to guides in both English and Spanish, these teachers can have at their fingertips the pertinent language needed to introduce lessons to both English speakers and learners as well as anticipate student questions that may contain less familiar Spanish phrases.
Choose the right curriculum. Reports from the National Research Council note that “provided with equitable learning opportunities, students from diverse backgrounds are capable of engaging in scientific practices and meaning-making in both science classrooms and informal settings.”16 As a curriculum specialist, Heller is all too aware of the tendency for nondominant groups to be less likely to have access to high-quality learning environments. However,
“Appendix D—All Standards, All Students” advises that “School resources are likely to have a greater impact on the learning opportunities of non-dominant students who have traditionally been underserved in science education.”
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“In order to provide high-quality science instruction for all students, as emphasized by the Framework and NGSS, it is essential to provide resources for teachers to support diverse learners,” Heller explains. “The Spanish language supports we’ve created in Building Blocks of Science 3D for both students and teachers help to achieve this goal.”