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John Hilliard
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Margo Gottlieb
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Our vision for curriculum design is one that is “reflective” of the assets that multilingual learners bring to learning, both inside and outside the classroom. In essence, curriculum centers around the multiplicity of languages, cultures, genres, and modalities present in any given sociocultural context. These curricular components, critical to linguistic and cultural sustainability of classrooms and schools (Paris, 2012), have historically been absent or peripheral to instructional units and lessons.
In this article, we articulate a curricular framework to empower teachers in individualizing learning for multilingual learners that reflects the students’ lived experiences. In doing so, this framework creates more accessible learning pathways for multilingual learners who do not identify with nor see themselves in traditional content learning. It also opens authentic spaces for students to have agency to contribute to and evaluate their own learning.
Embedded Language Expectations for Systemic Planning, Enacting, and Justifying Outcomes (EL ESPEJO) framework exemplifies the interaction among content, language, and culture in classrooms, schools, and districts with multilingual learners. Embedded in assessment as, for, and of learning (Gottlieb, 2021), it is a parallel set of mirrored unit (1a,1b, 1c) and lesson (2a, 2b, 2c) components. This aligned, coherent, and comprehensive curriculum framework (abbreviated in Figure 1), when unpacked through professional learning, serves as an advocacy tool for educators for multilingual learners.
Figure 1. EL ESPEJO Curriculum Framework: Abbreviated Version
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1. Unit Planning Inclusive of Multiple Languages and Perspectives:
Planning for Learning Around a Compelling Question, Theme, or Issue |
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1a Sociocultural Context: Community & Environmental Resources for Learning (Funds of Knowledge & Social Justice) |
1b. Language Focus on Genre(s) Anchored in Coordinated Content and Language Standards |
1c. Integrated Learning Goals for Content and Language including Translinguistic and Transcultural
Considerations |
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Classroom Assessment as, for, (Formative) and of (Summative) Learning |
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2a. Sociocultural Context: Student & Family Resources for Learning (Funds of Identity & Equity) |
2b. Language Focus on Related Sentences/ Phrases/ Words Based on Coordinated Content and Language Standards |
2c. Integrated Targets/ Objectives for Content and Language including
Translinguistic/ Transcultural Targets/ Objectives |
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2. Lesson Planning Inclusive of Multiple Languages and Perspectives:
Moving Learning Forward Based on Feedback |
Adapted from Gottlieb & Hilliard, 2019
The framework highlights the strengths and resources of multilingual learners and prompts a multilingual turn by educators across K-12 educational contexts. Its language and cultural components, vetted by educators from across the country, have been identified as the most impactful on the initial design or redesign of curriculum and instruction for multilingual learners in one or more languages, irrespective of the instructional setting.
To facilitate the process of infusing linguistic and cultural assets into extant curriculum , a brief description of the components of EL ESPEJO follows.
UNIT LEVEL COMPONENTS
- 1a. Sociocultural Context for Learning: Community & Environmental Resources- the cultural and linguistic experiences that multilingual learners bring to units of learning, including references to social justice issues and students’ collections of knowledge that build connections among communities, families, and schools, their ‘funds of knowledge’ (González, Moll, & Amanti, 2005). 1b. Language Focus: Genre Dimension-socially-agreed upon written or spoken categories that facilitate the integration of language and content during classroom activities. Based on State Academic Content & Language Development Standards- grade-level or grade-level cluster expectations for learning that ground curriculum, instruction, and assessment.
- 1c. Integrated Learning Goals for Content and Language with Translinguistic and Transcultural Considerations (including Student, Family and Community Resources)- combining content and language learning, recognizing translanguaging as a valued resource of multilingual learners and for highlighting student identity, voice, perspectives, and insights.
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CLASSROOM ASSESSMENT
Assessment of learning- what multilingual learners do in one or more languages- long-term performances, products, or projects along with criteria for success- to show evidence for meeting content and language goals/standards.
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Assessment for Learning- what multilingual learners do in one or more languages- activities and tasks, along with feedback- to demonstrate meeting content and language targets/objectives.
Assessment as Learning- the actions multilingual learners take, using one or more languages, based on self-reflection and interaction with peers in becoming agents of their own learning
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LESSON LEVEL COMPONENTS
- 2a. Sociocultural Context for Learning: Student & Family Resources- the cultural and linguistic assets of multilingual learners, including references to their funds of identity (Esteban-Guitart & Moll, 2014)- historically accumulated, culturally developed resources that are essential for a person’s self-definition, self-expression, and self-understanding.
- 2b. Language Focus: Sentence and Word/Phrase Dimension based on State Academic Content & Language Development Standards-(see description for component 1b as it applies to sentence and word/phrase dimensions)
- 2c. Integrated Learning Targets/ Objectives for Content and Language- specific expectations of multilingual learners’ language, conceptual, and social-emotional development based in one or more languages with Translinguistic/Transcultural Considerations/ Applications- overall outcomes for student learning across linguistic and cultural features.
The following is a consolidated Kindergarten example that focuses on the EL ESPEJO components. It is intended to be an illustrative summary rather than a complete unit of learning.
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Theme1: Needs and Wants
Overview:The purpose of this unit is to identify the difference between needs and wants. |
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1a. |
Sociocultural Context for Learning (Funds of Knowledge & Social Justice):
Students may have experienced a scarcity of resources and goods that limit the types of choices they make about their lifestyle, wellbeing, and survival. They may or may not have participated in a consumer society where goods are manufactured for a mass market and distributed nationally. Their understanding of a need vs. a want may be different from that understanding for someone who has grown up in US society. |
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1b. |
Language Focus (Genre): Explanation through- Interviews, Personal Narratives, Basic Household Budgets, Wish Lists, Grocery Lists |
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State Academic Content Standards & Language Development Standards
Content:
EC.1.K: Explain that choices are made because of scarcity (i.e. because we cannot have everything that we want).
G.2.K: Identify and explain how people and goods move from place to place.
Language Arts (Literacy):
RL.K.10 Actively engage in group reading activities with purpose and understanding.
RI.K.9 With prompting and support, identify the reasons the author gives to support points in texts.
Language Development:
ELD 1: English language learners communicate for social and instructional purposes.
ELD 2 & 4: English language learners communicate information, ideas and concepts necessary for academic success in the content area of language arts and social studies. |
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1c. |
Integrated Learning Goals with Translinguistic/Transcultural Considerations:
Goal(s): Distinguish between mass produced goods and handmade ones and explain how either one is produced.
Translinguistic and Transcultural Considerations:
Multilingual students will:
● develop an awareness of and engage in contrastive analysis (in English/Spanish or English/Arabic) of the language for explanation with reference to the concepts of abundance, scarcity, needs, and wants |
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Assessment
Of learning: Students visit a local market with family members or virtually draw/ list/ take photos of foods; they divide goods into needs vs. wants and with partners, sort by categories (e.g., fruits, vegetables, sweets)
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For learning: Students collect and share sales announcements in multiple languages with peers according to criteria for success
As learning: Students self-reflect on everyday activities related to needs v. wants in their journals using the language of their choice
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2a. |
Sociocultural Context: Student and Family Resources (Funds of identity & Equity):
During gift giving holidays and celebrations in the US, there is often an overabundance of purchased goods considered “wants”, whereas in some students' home countries, they primarily receive homemade gifts to meet their needs. |
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2b. |
Language Focus (Sentence, Phrase/Word):
Coordinated Content and Language Standards: (see unit level 1b for standards)
Sample Sentences:
What are basic human needs?
We have to ---------,---------, and ------------ to survive
How do people meet their needs for food, clothing, and shelter?
People can -------------------.
It is important not to -----------------.
What is something you may want, but not need?
I may want a --------------- but I don’t need it because ---------------.
Words/Phrases: ● Spanish Cognates
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ENGLISH |
SPANISH |
ARABIC |
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shelter |
refugio |
مأوى |
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author |
●autor |
مؤلف |
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title page |
página de título |
صفحة عنوان الكتاب |
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product |
●producto |
منتج | |
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2c. |
Integrated Targets/Objectives with Translinguistic/Transcultural Target(s):
Integrated Targets:
● Identify how people and goods move from place to place and narrate how it happens.
● Classify needs and wants and describe how they are different.
Translinguistic/Transcultural Target(s)/Objectives:
Sentence: Explain how sentences and graphics in sales announcements (in print and other media) attract customers in different language and culture communities.
Word/Phrase: Identify cognates and false cognates and explain how they may help or confuse shoppers in a multilingual grocery store. |
EL ELPEJO curriculum framework highlights a strong relationship between unit and lesson organization in multiple languages within sociocultural contexts, making for a more coordinated and aligned system to support teaching and learning of multilingual learners. In it, we envision translanguaging and transculturalism as pedagogical strategies (García, Ibarra-Johnson, & Seltzer, 2017). In short, EL ESPEJO is a mirror that makes visible instruction and assessment of multilingual learners as expressions and enactment of linguistic and cultural sustainable curriculum.
1This example is adapted from a unit of study created by a cohort of educators in a midwestern school district with large numbers of multilingual learners.
References
Esteban-Guitart, M., & Moll, L. C. (2014). Funds of identity: A new concept based on the Funds of Knowledge approach. Culture & Psychology, 20 (1), 31-48.
García. O., Johnson, S. I., & Seltzer, K. (2017). The translanguaging classroom: Leveraging student bilingualism for learning. Philadelphia, PA: Caslon.
González, N., Moll, L. C., & Amanti, C. (Eds.). (2005). Funds of knowledge: Theorizing practices in households, communities, and classrooms. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Gottlieb, M. (2021). Classroom assessment in multiple languages: A handbook for teachers.
Thousand Oaks: CA: Corwin.
Paris, D. (2012). Culturally sustaining pedagogy: A needed change in stance, terminology, and practice. Educational Researcher, 41(3), 93–97. http://dx.doi.org/10.3102/0013189X12441244
Margo Gottlieb, Ph.D., is co-founder and lead developer for WIDA at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She enjoys writing books on assessment and collaborating with John on curriculum design for multilingual learners. John Hilliard's career has spanned a range of roles from an award-winning bilingual teacher, to university professor, to his current position as a national professional developer recognized for his innovative approaches in the education of language minoritized students. |
