Okhee Lee wants to promote science among English language learners
The science of teaching

With statewide pressure mounting to improve test scores on the Florida Comprehension Assessment Test (FCAT), teachers in classrooms all over Miami-Dade County find themselves drilling students in the three Rs like never before.

But the overemphasis on teaching the basic skills may be cuasing elementary schools students to fall behind in other important subjects, wanrs a University of Miami School of Education professor.

"There should not only be a push to make sure that students are proficient in reading, writing, and arithmetic but also science," says professor of teaching and learning Okhee Lee. "Too often, science is ignored."

In Miami-Dade County the problem is compounded because of the school district's high number of students with limited English proficiency. Already inundated with the challenge of playing catch-up in English reading and writing skills, many of these students never get exposed to science material in the classroom.

Lee wants to change that. She and a team of University of Miami colleagues have been awarded a $4.7 million National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to conduct studies in promoting science among English language learners.

The solution, according to Lee, does not lie only in exposing these students to more science-related courses but also in making sure that their instructors are comfortable with teaching the subject.

"Most elementary school teachers are comfortable with teaching reading and writing, and they have to teach mathematics, whether they know enough about the subject or not, because it's required," says Lee, the grant's principal investigator. "But most of the time science is not being taught. Some elementary school teachers just aren't comfortable with teaching it."

Lee's five-year NSF study, a joint effort with Miami-Dade County Public Schools, seeks to examine and improve elementary school teachers' knowledge and practices of teaching science to English language learners.

In the study, third - through fifth grade teachers at 12 Miami-Dade elementary public schools will participate in science workshops and instructional courses. Half of the students enroll large numbers of Spanish-speaking students, with the other half enrolling large number of Haitian Creole-speaking students.

Lee and her colleagues will track the teachers' progress in using reform-oriented practices in a high-stakes testing environment in which students face the possibility of being held back because of low scores on the FCAT. The stakes will be even higher when science assessment is included in school accountability in the near future.

"There's all this testing of kids, and it really affects what teacher teach," says Walter Secada, UM professor of teaching and learning and the grant's co-principal investigator. "We give teachers a hard task to do. We tell them that they should understand how their kids do math and science, and we're demanding that they teach everything. The level of knowledge to do that can't be very daunting.

"But how much do teachers need to understand about their students' language background? Are there enough guideposts that we can create for them? The task of teaching kids solidly depends on what a teacher knows, and our research is focused on that," explains Secada.

Lee and Secada hope to demonstrate that by providing teachers with adequate resources and professional development opportunities, they will become better sicence instructors and their students will improve their science test scores.

Many people don't seem to know what it takes to prepare English language learners for science along with other subject areas," says Lee. "Our goal is to put science and English on equal footing for these students."

Article taken from University of Miami Veritas. Volume 47. Number 3. December 2004