Thoughts on Oysters Changes to the bilingual program - opinions from parents in the school???

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03/15/2009 17:58

Subject: Thoughts on Oysters Changes to the bilingual program - opinions from parents in the school???

Anonymous

Dear Oyster-Adams Families:

Over the last two months, during Principals’ coffees at both campuses, I have spoken with a number of you about our emerging thoughts on improving the Oyster-Adams instructional model. On behalf of the staff and administration, I’m pleased to be able to share with you a summary of the plans and look forward to more discussion about it.

Why Are We Proposing A Change to Oyster-Adams’ Instructional Model?

For more than three decades, Oyster (now Oyster-Adams) has been a national model of bilingual education. However, in recent years—and for a number of different reasons—the school has experienced:

• A downward trend in test scores
• A widening achievement gap between students from different racial, ethnic and socioeconomic groups (particularly for our English Language Learners)
• A decrease in language fluency for our Spanish Language Learners

Despite a wealth of resources, most notably nearly double the faculty of every other school in this system, our program is not working as effectively as it must to educate all of our students in two languages.

I spent the first several months of my tenure as Principal doing a lot of listening, observing, and consulting with staff to determine where and why we are struggling. Since then, the staff and I (in consultation with outside experts) have been working to shape a response.

I recognize the risks and anxieties that come with any change, and certainly don’t take it lightly given the long history of the school. But the facts tell us that we must try something new if we want to reach our goal of producing students who are truly bilingual and biliterate. I believe the proposal that follows will help get us there.

Challenges With Our Current Model

The Oyster-Adams faculty and administration see the following six challenges at the heart of our difficulties in reaching our goals.

1. Not true immersion: The current model of having two different languages constantly present in every classroom does not allow for true immersion in either language. Walls are covered in both languages and, when both teachers are engaged with students, two languages are being used simultaneously. This arrangement gives second language learners a “life-boat” in their native language at all times. They are never truly immersed.

2. Inefficient Use of Two Teachers: Oyster-Adams is privileged to have a robust teaching staff with two teachers per classroom in PK-5. However, in the current model, equal and effective use of both teachers does not happen consistently. If one teacher teaches and the other is not engaged with students, then a great resource is being wasted. Or, as noted above, if both teachers are fully engaged with students, the presence of both languages compromises immersion and language acquisition.

3. Who’s in charge? Having two professionals in the classroom who are “equals” requires on-going negotiations that take up a great deal of time for Oyster-Adams teachers. Sometimes these negotiations are successful, and sometimes not. Even the most successful partnerships struggle on occasion, and all of our teaching teams sometimes experience a lack of clarity about (and conflict over) decision-making. While usually resolvable, these conflicts and negotiations take precious time away from lesson planning and instruction.

4. Inequity in Human Resources for our Middle School: While the elementary grades have two teachers per classroom, the middle school does not have this resource. This has been a challenging transition for students and teachers, especially given the expectation that middle school students are being educated in two languages.

5. Lack of SLL and ELL support: In the current model, each teacher has only 50% of the students’ time yet must deliver the full curriculum. As a result, there is little time for small group help and additional support for English Language Learners or Spanish Language Learners.

6. Duplication of Resources: Currently, each elementary classroom has double resources (one set of everything in each language): two classroom libraries, two sets of math books, science books, leveled readers, etc. Since each student can only use one book at a time, we end up with enough material school-wide for twice as many children as we have. It is not only an inefficient use of resources, but also takes up a lot of space in the classroom.

Proposed Model

The following instructional model seeks to address all of these challenges. It has these main features:

• Single language immersion in each classroom
• Consistent ELL and SSL support in all grades K-8
• Specific role definition for teaching teams
• Greater continuity of teacher-student relationships over time

Here’s how it would work.

Kindergarten through 5th grade. In grades K-5, single language immersion classrooms (with two teachers per classroom) would replace the current bilingual classrooms. Each child would therefore have two different classrooms (a Spanish classroom and an English classroom).

Students would alternate between their English classroom and their Spanish classroom on a per-subject or per-day basis. Children from two different grade levels (K & 1, 2 & 3, and 4 & 5) would share the two classrooms, though they would not be in the classroom at the same time.

There would be two same-language teachers in each classroom, one from each of the two grade-levels. When the children from one grade level are in the classroom, the teacher from that grade level would be the “lead teacher” responsible for planning and leading instruction. The second teacher would provide language support. When the group of children from the other grade level comes to the classroom, these teachers would switch roles.

In the end, each student, in addition to having a lead Spanish teacher and a lead English teacher (as they do now), would also have a regular language support teacher in both languages.

Looking at what happens in each classroom:

4A/5A SPANISH CLASSROOM 4A/5A ENGLISH CLASSROOM

Middle School/Intermediate Campus. The Middle School model (one teacher per subject, with a goal of half the subjects delivered in each language) would remain as is. However, when the 4th and 5th grade teachers are in their language support role, they would be available to all grades, 5-8. As a result, we anticipate that each 4th and 5th grade teacher would be able to spend approximately 1 hr/day supporting instruction at the Middle School level, meaning an additional 6 hrs/day of ELL and SLL support for our middle schoolers.

This sharing of resources is possible at the 4th and 5th grade levels because, in general, the students are closer to being bilingual, they don’t need the two-teacher presence as intensively, and they require less help to navigate content.

Pre-Kindergarten. The PK model would remain as is, with one bilingual classroom. Space limitations mean the school cannot support more than one PK class, so the new model cannot be applied. That said, we are considering strategies for increasing the percentage of Spanish in the PK year.

How Would This Model Address The Challenges?

1. True immersion: All K-8 classrooms will be either all English or all Spanish. Only one language would be spoken, and all resources and décor in the room would be in that language. Students would have a true immersion experience.

2. Effective Use of Two Teachers: Because of the single language nature of every classroom, all teachers can be effectively engaged with students at all times (in other words, a lesson in Spanish does not mean the English teacher cannot participate fully and meanginfully).

3. Classroom lead role is clear: In each classroom, the two teachers from two different grades will be alternating the “lead” role. Each is unequivocally the lead for the children at his or her grade level.

4. Additional Resources for Middle School: The Middle School will have up to 6 hours/day of additional ELL and SLL support, from Oyster-Adams teachers who already know the students from the earlier grades.

5. Consistent SLL and ELL support: With two teachers of the same language in the classroom, there will be double the opportunity to provide ELL support when the children are in their English classroom and SSL support when they are in their Spanish classroom.

6. Streamlining of Resources: All Spanish resources will be consolidated into Spanish classrooms and the reverse will take place in English. On the flip side, there will be two grade levels of subject textbooks in the classrooms.

Other important considerations:

With two teachers from consecutive grades working together, there is increased knowledge and collaboration vertically between teachers. In addition, student-teacher relationships will develop over a longer period of time, allowing for greater continuity, deeper relationships, and more effective teaching.

Next Steps

As an administration and staff we are very excited about the possibilities this model presents and are continuing to work through the many details. We also recognize that there will also be a period of transition as we begin implementing the new model.

We are fully aware that there are a number of new challenges to resolve related to scheduling, teacher-to-teacher planning and communication, and teacher-parent communication. We currently have a team of teachers and administrators laying out the details so that we can be well prepared for implementation in August. We will continue to update you as we finalize our plans.

As always, I am eager to hear your thoughts.