Chapter 8: Support and Challenge in Science Classroom Discourse for Upper Elementary English Language Learners

The increasing number of English language learners (ELLs) placed into elementary mainstream classrooms raises important questions about preparing elementary mainstream teachers to work with ELLs (de Jong, Harper, & Coady, 2013), in particular, ELLs in upper elementary science classrooms and their scientific literacy task of learning from science textbooks. Thus, recent work has called for preparing upper elementary teachers to support students, including ELLs, in reading science texts (Bryce, 2011; de Oliveira & Dodds, 2010;,Fang et al., 2010). To read science textbooks effectively, students, including ELLs, need to be able to engage with the meanings presented in science textbooks. But teachers’ instructional support depends on their understanding of the nature of both the support and the challenges encountered by diverse students in mainstream science classroom discourse (Gibbons, 2006). Because there is still a lack of empirical research in this area, further research is needed to investigate the existing upper elementary science classroom discourse and to understand how students are supported and challenged in their learning of science from classroom discourse.