Classroom conversations: Opportunities to learn for ESL students in mainstream classrooms.

Combine theory and practice within social, cultural, and historical contexts to help ESL students succeed.

The focus of education in the United States has changed dramatically over the last 30 years. We have shifted from primarily addressing the needs of native English-speaking students to including a rapidly growing number of children from linguistically and culturally different backgrounds. The state education agencies of the United States reported a total of over 3 million students who were learning English as a second language for the 1996-1998 school year (Macias, Nishikawa, & Venegas, 1998). During the 1990s, the student populations of ESL students increased annually at an average of 8% (Garcia, 1998). It is projected that between the years 2000 and 2020, there will be a 47% increase in Hispanic children from the ages of 5 to 13 in U.S. schools (National Center for Education Statistics, 1997).

There are numerous ways to address linguistically and culturally diverse student populations: Limited English proficient (LEP) and language minority are two common descriptions. These two particular categories, however, imply a deficit or negative representation. I have chosen in this article to use the term English as a second language (ESL) to describe these students, realizing that English may be a third, fourth, or nth language that the student is learning.

Meeting the educational needs of the growing numbers of ESL students has become an increasingly important and complex concern for educators and policy makers alike. When dropout rates are examined, for example, statistics reveal that Hispanic students are more likely than white or black students to leave school before completing a high school program (National Center for Education Statistics, 1998). It is crucial that, as educators, we closely examine the theoretical backgrounds of our beliefs to determine how mainstream values affect educational opportunities for the linguistically and culturally diverse students in our classrooms. What are optimal learning environments for these students? What are the assumptions that guide our instruction? Do ESL learners have sufficient and appropriate opportunities to advance their learning? The educational decisions we make about ESL students have a tremendous impact on their future.

An understanding of the issues affecting ESL students in mainstream classrooms is one step toward planning sound educational programs for them as they make the transition to English literacy and mainstream classrooms. Some of these concerns include levels of English proficiency, impact of classroom language, opportunities for academic growth, and the building of classroom communities. A careful consideration of these points from a theoretical framework based on social constructivist principles can lead to a solid foundation on which to build educational programs for these students. As Gee (1996) pointed out, literacy cannot be defined as simply reading and writing. Literacy instruction also involves "talking, interacting, valuing, and believing" (p. 40). Therefore, we must carefully combine theory and practice within broader social, cultural, and historical contexts to produce reasoned decisions as we guide the academic progress of ESL students in mainstream classrooms.

Second-language proficiency

One topic that has enormous impact on the opportunities to learn for second-language learners is their actual level of English proficiency. According to research in language development, there is a continuum of development beginning with basic conversational skills and continuing toward academic language proficiency (Cummins, 1981). Cummins described this development as a distinction between interpersonal communications skills and cognitive academic language proficiency. The beginning communicative level is typically context embedded and cognitively undemanding. Examples of this level include simple greetings, information requests, descriptions, and expressions of feelings. It usually takes an ESL student 2 to 3 years to develop proficiency in communicative language.

Academic language, on the other hand, is context reduced and cognitively demanding. This level of language development includes such skills as comparing, classifying, inferring, problem solving, and evaluating. Success in school depends on proficiency at this level, which takes from 5 to 10 years to achieve (Collier, 1987, 1989; Collier & Thomas, 1989; Cummins, 1981; Krashen & Biber, 1988). To assume that students who demonstrate a beginning level of language proficiency understand the more difficult academic language of content lessons is problematic.

Corson (1995) indicated one reason why this academic language takes so long to develop. About 60% of the English words used in text come from Greek and Latin sources, while the bulk of conversational vocabulary originates from the Anglo-Saxon lexicon. The Greco-Latin vocabulary tends to have multiple syllables and low frequency; the …