Sixth International Conference on Immersion and Dual Language Education: Connecting Research and Practice Across Contexts

Paper/Best Practice Session (1 hour)

Spanish-English

Two-Way Bilingual Immersion

Elementary (K-5)

An elementary school will share its transition in curriculum development from a monolingual approach taught in two languages to a fully integrated biliteracy curriculum.  The school will share mistakes it made, celebration of successes and the processes used that may be helpful for other schools developing DL curriculum.

Frank Porter Graham Bilingüe has transitioned over the last thirteen years in the development of curriculum for its dual language program.  The program initially began with some elements of dual language guiding principles with subjects being taught and assessed in both languages, but little integration among the two languages and less rigor in the sequence of Spanish literacy instruction.  The school strengthened its Spanish literacy program and sequence of instruction and then implemented practices from Dual U, which introduced the school to the BUF (Biliteracy Unit Framework).  In an effort to implement Common Core and navigate teaching teams in both dual language and English only classrooms, the school adopted PBL (Project Based Learning, which was guided by the work of UbD (Understanding By Design) and backward planning.  In closely examining results, the school was still not as successful academically in both English and Spanish, but it had highly engaging classrooms and projects.  The school and district studied with the Center for Biliteracy and have now developed biliteracy units of study that support language and literacy development in both English and Spanish that are contextualized in content and projects.  The session will share samples of curriculum over time along with student achievement results as well as samples of the current units of study.