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##  Teaching Educators about Language: Principles, Structures, and                  Challenges. ERIC Digest.                                                     

The promise of education reform is that all children will receive a             quality education. But there are enormous challenges to reform,                 including resource inequities, an aging teaching force, and public              doubts about school effectiveness. Moreover, school reform policies             place enormous strain on teachers and students: Teachers need to                implement new curricula and ensure that they are providing                      appropriate instruction. Students--including English language                   learners--must learn challenging content and pass statewide                     assessments in order to graduate in many states. 
These new demands            coincide with the well-documented changing face of the U.S. student             population. More teachers are responsible for the education of                  children from diverse backgrounds--children who speak little or no              English upon arrival at school, children who may have had                       interrupted schooling in their home country, and children whose                 families may have had little exposure to the norms of U.S. schools.             In general, the U.S. teaching force is not well prepared to help                culturally diverse children succeed academically and socially,                  because pre-service teacher preparation programs have not offered               sufficient opportunities for learning to teach culturally diverse               students. As a result, many teachers have been learning on the                  job (Clair, 1995). 
Fillmore and Snow (2000) assert that teachers              need an understanding of educational linguistics--how language                  impacts teaching and learning--to do their work well. They argue                that knowledge about language will enhance teachers' practice in                general, and in particular, it will aid them in teaching                        literacy (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998) and in working with English             language learners (August & Hakuta, 1998). This Digest focuses on               principles and structures for professional development of practicing            teachers that can help them gain the knowledge they need about                  language and on some challenges to overcome for providing good                  professional development opportunities. LANGUAGE: A CENTRAL                   COMPONENT OF TEACHERS' WORKFillmore and Snow (2000) distinguish             five teacher functions in which language is central. Teachers are               communicators: They need to be able to communicate effectively and              have strategies for understanding what students are saying. Teachers            are educators: They are responsible for subject area instruction.               They must also select educational materials and provide learning                opportunities that promote second language acquisition for students             who are learning English and that promote language development for              native English speakers. They need to be able to distinguish                    language behavior that is developmentally predictable from that                 which is not and provide appropriate instructional intervention.                Teachers are evaluators and their decisions have important                      consequences for students. There are far too many instances of                  students being placed in inappropriate educational programs because             judgments of ability are influenced by misunderstandings of language            behavior.  Teachers are educated people: Information about language             is essential to being a literate member of society. Teachers are                agents of socialization. They play a central role in socializing                children to the norms, beliefs, and communication patterns of                   school--and for immigrant children and native-born children from                non-majority backgrounds, to the patterns of mainstream U.S.                    culture. Basic knowledge about language and culture and how these               systems can vary is fundamental to helping diverse students succeed             in school. 
Fillmore and Snow (2000) suggest that teachers should              have knowledge of a number of topics regarding oral and written                 language, including the basic units of language, regular and                    irregular forms in English, vocabulary development, dialect                     regularity, academic English, language acquisition, the complexity              of English spelling, patterns of rhetorical structure, quality and              correctness in writing, and text comprehensibility. They suggest                courses or course components that would allow teachers to learn                 essential information about language: language and linguistics,                 language and cultural diversity, sociolinguistics for educators in a            linguistically diverse society, language development, second                    language teaching and learning, the language of academic discourse,             and text analysis in educational settings. PROFESSIONAL                       DEVELOPMENTWhat kinds of professional development experiences               can help practicing teachers learn more about language and apply                that knowledge to improving classroom practice? Clearly, short-term             professional development experiences are inadequate: Teaching and               learning are complex, and teachers need time to learn and experiment            with new concepts in the classroom, just as their students do.                  Principles of effective teaching and learning for students extend to            effective professional development for teachers (Rueda, 1998). To be            successful, professional development must be long term, and it must             incorporate opportunities for learning that center on teachers and              students. Hawley and Valli (1999) suggest eight principles of                   effective professional development: It should be driven by an                   analysis of teachers' goals and student performance; it should                  involve teachers in the identification of what they need to learn;              it should be school based; it should be organized around                        collaborative problem solving; it should be continuous and                      adequately supported; it should be information rich; it should                  include opportunities for the development of theoretical                        understanding; and it should be part of a comprehensive change                  process. Because in-service teacher education on language in                    teaching and learning must address teachers' attitudes toward                   language and toward students who speak languages other than English             and dialects other than Standard English, it calls for extensive                commitments of time. Teachers need time to reflect on the meaning of            education in a pluralistic society, on the relationships between                teachers and learners, and on social attitudes about language and               culture that affect students (Clair, 1998; Gonzalez &                           Darling-Hammond, 1997). 
There are a number of professional                    development structures that can incorporate these principles,                   including teacher networks and collaboratives (Renyi, 1996),                    university-school partnerships (Darling-Hammond, 1994), action                  research groups (Check, 1997), and teacher study groups (Clair,                 1998). What these structures have in common are opportunities for               teachers to learn together in coherent and sustained                            ways. CHALLENGES FOR IMPROVING PROFESSIONAL                                   DEVELOPMENTDesigning opportunities for teachers to learn about              language must link three essential elements: principles of effective            professional development, appropriate content, and skilled                      professional developers. Integrating these elements presents                    significant challenges. First, understandings of effective                      professional development have changed much faster than practice.                Many professional development experiences continue to be short term             and disconnected from the reality of teachers' work. Second, under              pressure to raise test scores, administrators and other educators               may have trouble understanding how knowledge about language will                help students succeed in school. Finally, identifying qualified                 professional developers with the knowledge, skills, and attitudes               necessary to provide effective professional development on                      educational linguistics is daunting. These professionals need to                have extensive knowledge about language and school reform and                   experience providing long-term professional development in schools.             One way to overcome this challenge is teaming school personnel who              provide professional development with university faculty or others              with expertise in applied linguistics. Working together in schools,             these teams can explore how language affects learning in particular             contexts and build knowledge about language and                                 education. CONCLUSIONThe demands of school reform and the                 changing face of the U.S. student population require that all                   teachers learn more about the role of language in teaching and                  learning. This knowledge can enhance their practice overall,                    improving their ability to teach literacy, and it can increase their            effectiveness with students who speak languages other than English              and dialects other than Standard English. Long-term professional                development that views teacher and student learning as paramount                must play a central role. The challenges are real but worth                     confronting, because high-quality education demands a well-educated             teaching force. REFERENCESAugust, D., & Hakuta,                           K. (Eds.) (1998). "Educating language minority children."                       Washington, DC: National Academy Press. 
Check, J. (1997). Teacher             research as powerful professional development. "Harvard Education               Letter, 13," 6-8. 
Clair, N. (1995). Mainstream teachers and ESL               students. "TESOL Quarterly 29," 189-196. 
Clair, N. (1998). Teacher            study groups: Persistent questions in a promising approach. "TESOL              Quarterly 32," 465-492. 
Darling-Hammond, L. (1994). Developing                professional development schools: Early lessons, challenge, and                 promise. In L. Darling-Hammond (Ed.), "Professional development                 schools: Schools for developing a profession" (pp. 1-27). New York:             Teachers College Press. 
Fillmore, L.W., & Snow, C. (2000). "What              teachers need to know about language." [On-line]. Available:                    http://www.cal.org/ericcll/teachers.pdf 
Gonzalez, J.M., &                     Darling-Hammond, L. (1997). "New concepts for new challenges:                   Professional development for immigrant youth." McHenry, IL, and                 Washington, DC: Delta Systems and Center for Applied                            Linguistics. 
Hawley, W.D., & Valli, L. (1999). The essentials of              effective professional development. In L. Darling-Hammond & G.                  Sykes (Eds.), "Teaching as the learning profession: Handbook of                 policy and practice" (pp. 127-150). San Francisco:                              Jossey-Bass. 
Renyi, J. (1996). "Teachers take charge of their                 learning: Transforming professional development for student                     success." New York: National Foundation for the Improvement of                  Education. 
Rueda, R. (1998). "Standards for professional                      development: A sociocultural perspective" (Research Brief No. 2).               Santa Cruz, CA: University of California, Center for Research on                Education, Diversity & Excellence. 
Snow, C.E., Burns, M.S., &                 Griffin, P. (Eds.). (1998). "Preventing reading difficulties in                 young children." Washington, DC: National Academy                               Press. 
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This digest was prepared with funding from the U.S.            Dept. of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement,             National Library of Education, under contract no. ED-99-CO-0008. The            opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the positions or                  policies of ED, OERI, or NLE.                                                **Title:** Teaching Educators about Language: Principles, Structures, and                  Challenges. ERIC Digest.                                                     **Document Type:** Information Analyses---ERIC Information Analysis Products (IAPs) (071); Information Analyses---ERIC Digests (Selected) in Full Text (073); **Available From:** ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and Linguistics, 4646 40th Street               NW, Washington, DC 20016. For full text:                                        http://www.cal.org/ericcll/DIGEST.                                           **Descriptors:** Diversity (Student), Elementary Secondary Education, English (Second            Language),  Faculty Development,  Knowledge Base for Teaching,                  Language Acquisition,  Language Role,  Linguistics, Literacy, Second            Language Learning,  Teacher Education                                        **Identifiers:** ERIC Digests                                                                 
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