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UBC Theses and Dissertations

How three elementary teachers integrated language and content using the knowledge framework and how their LEP students responded Sampson, Brenda Louise

Abstract

Researchers and teachers have been interested in how to effectively integrate language and content for the benefit of Limited English Proficient (LEP) students. One approach is the knowledge framework (Mohan, 1986) which potentially supports cooperation between teachers, helping clarify relationships between language development and content. This qualitative study describes the type of knowledge framework (KF) based language/content tasks used by both a novice KF and an experienced KF grade seven social studies teacher, and by the KF experienced LEP teacher who serviced students from both classrooms. It identifies the ways these teachers integrated language and content: by directly observing all three classrooms several hours per week for a year, by describing each teacher's classroom planning, strategies and tasks, by noting how they were the same or different for each teacher, and by noting how students responded to these strategies. Important questions were: (a) How did the two experienced KF teachers compare with the novice in their use of the framework? (b) In what ways did the experienced social studies' and LEP teachers collaborate using the KF? (c) Did the experienced KF social studies teacher use different framework based strategies than the LEP teacher? (d) How did the LEP students respond to this KF approach? Analysis suggested: (a) the novice KF teacher used parts of the framework for specific short term writing tasks; the two experienced framework teachers used it in their long term organisation across the areas of reading, writing, listening and speaking, (b) The experienced KF social studies and LEP teachers were able to collaborate by sharing similar framework based approaches and methods, (c) Similar to Mohan (1986, p.39) the experienced social studies teacher focussed on the cognitive aspects of knowledge structures in relation to the social studies curriculum; whereas the LEP teacher had a broader focus of developing LEP students' language for a variety of content area subjects, (d) The LEP students used the framework implicitly in a variety of speaking, reading and writing tasks. The two LEP students from the experienced KF classroom used the framework explicitly when writing essays, identifying knowledge structures in text, and summarizing text using student designed key visuals. Implications arise regarding the role of experience, collaboration and student development (how to assist LEP students master knowledge structure skills).

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