Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Teaching in Practice : A Case Study of a Fourth-Grade Mainstream Classroom

As a result of increases in immigration, more students from cultur­ ally and linguistically diverse backgrounds are entering K—12 class­ rooms in the United States. Thus, the need to study the education of diverse learners is intensified. Drawing upon semi-structured interviews, observations, and informal conversations, this case study examined how a fourth-grade mainstream teacher at an urban public school put culturally anc linguistically responsive instruction into practice. The data analysis was informed by a framework that focused on three levels: instructional, institutional, and societal. Directions for future research are discussed. An increase in immigration has resulted in a greater number of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students in K—12 mainstream classrooms. It has been estimated that CLD students account for approximately one of three students in schools in the United States (National Center for Educational Statistics, 2016). Within this group, English language learners (ELLs) represent the fastest-growing sector of the student population (Franquiz & Salinas, 2011). While English is the language of schooling, Spanish is the home language of the majority of the CLD students, with over 350 other languages also represented (Garcia, Arias, Murri, & Serna, 2010). Along with increasing linguistic diversity, CLD learners also bring into classrooms home cultures that can enrich the educational experience of their classmates. However, educational policies in recent decades have marginal­ ized many CLD learners. At the federal level, the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act [NCLB] (2002) has increasingly challenged bilingual students and eventually left them behind (Menken, 2008). NCLB requires that from their third year in the United States ELLs must take the same standardized tests and meet the same annual standards as their native-English speaking counterparts. In response, schools often prioritize CLD students’ English language learning over acquisition of content-area knowledge (Evans & Hornberger, 2005), putting their overall academic development at risk. In addition, CLD children’s heritage language development may be neglected (Crawford, 2004) as a result of state-level policies such as Arizona’s Proposition 203 (2000), Colorado’s Amendment 31 (2002), and Massachusetts’s Question 2 (2003) that advocate English-only with the possible effect of losing a family heritage language within two generations (Fillmore & Snow, 2000). In response to the challenges posed by the growing CLD stu­ dent population, culturally and linguistically responsive (CLR) pedagogy has been developed and implemented (Banks & Banks, 2009; Gay, 2010; Ladson-Billings, 1994; Lucas &Villegas, 2013). CLR pedagogy, also known as culturally relevant teaching or cultur­ ally congruent teaching, is a combination of culturally responsive and linguistically responsive teaching. CRT addresses the educational inequity faced by many CLD students by providing instruction that reflects and connects closely with learners’ cultures (Gay, 2010; Vavrus, 2008; Villegas & Lucas, 2002). Within this pedagogy, lin­ guistically responsive teaching is a direct effort to support CLD learners by helping teachers to understand and apply second lan­ guage learning principles to teaching ELLs (Lucas, Villegas, & Freedson-Gonzalez, 2008). Given the complexity of educating CLD learners, this case study, part of a larger longitudinal study, was designed to answer the following questions: (a) How does thejocal teacher perceive diver­ sity and CLR pedagogy? (b) How are CLR elements irrfused into classroom instruction? (c) How do the larger institutional and community contexts impact the teacher’s CLR practices? To answer these questions, this case study focused on a fourth-grade mainstream teacher in an urban public school who put CLR teaching into practice. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK To describe culturally responsive teaching, Richards, Brown, and Forde (2007) developed a three-dimensional (institutional, per­ sonal, and instructional) framework that focuses on teachers and schools. For this study, the framework (see Figure 1) was adapted in three ways. First, while the institutional dimension is the school, and the personal dimension is the teacher (beliefs, practices), the instructional dimension is CLR pedagogy, as it is widely accepted that culture and language are interconnected and interdependent (Hinkel, 1999; Street, 1993). Second, to account for the larger context, institutional support (coworkers, principal) and societal support (research university) were added to include factors that influence schools and practitioners. Finally, with support at both institutional and societal levels, the teacher is placed at the center of the framework; it is the teacher who must develop sociocul­ tural and sociolinguistic awareness and hone practice to m eet the needs of diverse students (Lucas & Villegas, 2013; Villegas & Lucas, 2002). The teacher must also attend to the larger institutional and societal contexts (Bailey, Curtis, Nunan, & Fan, 2001) that influ­ ence practice.