A vital question guiding my work at the Forum is not if all Illinois teachers and educational leaders should be prepared to meet the spectrum of linguistic and cultural diversity in their classrooms, but how to implement plans that improve their linguistic and cultural responsiveness. This question is motivated by two significant changes in education: newly minted intensified academic standards and a greatly changing student demographic.
The advent of the Common Core State Standards heightens the need for all students to master the academic language of the classroom. For the growing number of English language learners (ELLs), to achieve this requires a new level of expertise for educators on how to support and integrate... Continue Reading