A sociocultural perspective: language arts framework, vocabulary activities and English language learners in a second grade mixed classroom.

Vocabulary acquisition is a critical component of academic language. This aspect of the school curriculum seems to be more difficult for language learners to acquire. This study therefore examines the language arts conceptual framework and the instructional activities for vocabulary development in a second grade mixed classroom with a view to evaluate how language learning conceptualization and instructional practices accommodate specific well-established theoretical, practical and pedagogical issues underpinning English language teaching/learning. Drawing on insights from the theories of the sociocultural approach and critical language pedagogy, I reviewed the Reading/Language Arts Framework for its provisions for language learners. In addition, I observed a vocabulary lesson in a second grade class. The study reveals that the conceptual framework sets the stage for vocabulary instruction to foster monolingual and monocultural American society despite the fact that second grade classrooms in Los Angeles metropolitan city contain learners of dynamic and sometimes conflicting identities, needs, preferences, interests and aspiration. Furthermore, the study shows that the tight control of the teacher on instructional activities and the structured nature of the lesson did not create a conducive atmosphere for language learners to appropriate other pupils" voices and identities.

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California State is the most populous and most diverse in the nation. In 2003/2004 school year 6,298,769 enrolled in public schools and out of this number, 1,598,535 were identified as "limited English proficient" (California Dept. of Educ. Educational Demographics Units) learners, that is, students who use another language other than English as their primary language. In 1997, the State Department of Education reports: "more than 100 languages (other than English) were found to be represented (in schools across the state)" (Reading Language Arts Framework for California Public Schools, p. 232). The framework further identifies the top four languages and the percentages of the LEP students as Spanish (81%), Vietnamese (3%), Hmong (2%) and Cantonese (2%). The document also notes that students come from "many ethnic groups, speak a variety of languages and dialects, varies in English proficiency, and come to school with a variety of experiences, academic and non-academic" (p. 232).

In responding to the diversity in school population and the perennial abysmal performance of students in public examinations, particularly the minority ethnic students, California State instituted reforms. First, the state legislature passed into law the "Teacher Preparation Is Changing" bill, popularly called the Senate Bill 2042. The bill overhauled The Teacher Preparation and Licensing Act of 1970 (Ryan Act) by setting a new standard for teacher preparation in California through the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CCTC). The purpose of the reform is that: "prospective teachers develop a strong understanding of the conceptual foundations of the subject as well as understanding of how knowledge is created and organized in the subject" (CCTC, P. 3). Specifically on language learning, the content of Language Development and Acquisition requires teachers-in-training to:

   apply knowledge of both the development
   of a first language and the
   acquisition of subsequent ones. They
   can describe the principal observable
   milestones in each domain, and identify
   the major theories that attempt to explain
   the processes of development and acquisition.
   Candidates demonstrate they
   understand the range of issues related
   to the interaction of first languages and
   other languages. They are able to recognize
   special features that may identify a
   pupil's language development as exceptional,
   distinguishing such features from
   interlanguage effect (p. A-3).

It is significant to note here that the document for preparing teachers to teach English learners is, at best, ambivalent about the issue at the heart of second language learning: the conceptualization of language learning as identity formation (Peirce 1995, MaKay and Wong 1996, Toohey 2003 and Pennycook 2004). The critical question the document does not address is: What is the connection between the languages (English and first language) and the different aspects of life such as nationhood, identity, power, social status, language attitude and policy (Lee and Ajayi, in progress)?

The failure to address this question continues to result in the inability of the state to meet the needs, desires, and aspirations of the language learners. For example, the 2000 California State report on the ranking of public schools based on the Academic Performance Index (API) scores: California's Lowest-Performing Schools: Who they are. the challenges they face, and how they're improving states:

   ... elementary schools as a whole, they
   faced slightly greater challenges. On
   average, they had either similar or even
   more challenging proportions of English
   learners and students living in poverty.
   School sizes are modestly large. The
   proportion of fully credentialed teachers
   is somewhat lower. And they do not
   differ, on average, when it comes to
   teacher experience levels (EdSource p.
   33 emphasis added).

The report recommends reforms that provide for

   ... school-wide adoptions of a unified,
   well-integrated curriculum and instructional
   approach. This school-wide focus
   means that all teachers are using the
   same books, have had the same training
   on how to use the curriculum effectively,
   share a common set of expectations for
   students performance, and use the same
   methods to assess student progress and
   help students who are having trouble
   (EdScource p. 34).

Equally consequential in the field of language teaching and learning is the state law--proposition 227 of 1996 which mandated English-only as a medium of instruction in schools. The proposition stipulates that:

   All children in California public schools
   shall be taught English by being taught in
   English. In particular, this shall require
   that all children be placed in English
   language classrooms. Children who
   are English learners shall be educated
   through shelter English immersion during
   a temporary transition period not
   normally intended to exceed one year ... Once
   English learners have acquired
   a good working knowledge of English,
   they shall be transferred to English
   language mainstream classrooms (California
   State Code of Regulation, 1998
   Article 2, p. 305).

The document does not define what constitutes "a good working knowledge of English" in the school contexts. Does this mean proficiency in academic language or social (face-to-face) communicative skills or both? These two aspects of English learning are not necessarily the same.

Furthermore, the assumption of the proposition that language learners can achieve "a good working knowledge of English" within a year seemed to have been based on political expediency rather than a sound pedagogical reasoning or theoretical framework. Cummins (1981) contends that "immigrant students arriving after age six take between six and seven years to approach grade norms in English academic skills" (p. 7). The researcher observes that pupils that are prematurely moved to the mainstream English-only class progressively fall behind in mastering grade norms in English academic skills. His conclusion is inevitable: misconceptions about what constitutes 'English proficiency' and how long it takes to acquire it operate to "impede the academic progress of language minority students" (p. 4). Table 1 below summarizes English language learners (ELL) overall proficiency level in K-5 in 2003/04 in California State.

For second grade, the focus of this study, the overall proficiency levels are 7.0%, 21.0%, 40.0%, 22.0% and 9.0% respectively for the five categories. LAUSD responded to learners' poor performance in English learning by adopting the Open-Court Language Arts Program (OCLAP) and by assigning ELL to the mainstream English class in second grade, among other steps.

The Open-Court Language Arts Program

The 2000 California State report ranked more than half of the 565 schools in LAUSD as "lowest performing." The report identifies the characteristics of the failing schools: "many but not all of them have high percentages of students who were English learners and/or Hispanic, a statistic that is highly correlated with student poverty" (EdSource p. 33). Thus OCLAP was designed to provide K--third grade a unified, well-integrated, and tightly structured curriculum approach for English teaching/learning as a necessary step to improving pupils' scores in school subjects. With the previous Success for All program, teachers had to choose from a variety of methods, including look-and-say, phonetic, alphabetic, phonics, and others (Samuels et al 1992, p. 125) for teaching beginning readers. With OCLAP, the phonic/fluency method gained prominence as the theory and assumptions of the new program were significantly shaped by this method.

Phonic instruction essentially teaches learners how to understand the relationship between the letters (graphemes) and the individual sound of a language (phonemes) and then use the relationship to read and write (National Institute for Literacy 2001, p. 4). The basic principle of the fluency reading approach is that reading "... consists of optical, perceptual, syntactic, and semantic cycles, each melting into the next as readers try to get meaning as effectively as possible using minimal time and energy" (Samuels et al, p. 126). The researchers explain the concept of fluency in the following way:

   During the initial reading, or decoding
   stage ... in grades 1 and 2--the
   students learn letter-sound correspondences,
   how to blend sound to form
   words, and how to use context as an aid
   in word recognition ... during decoding
   stage, the student learns the rudiments of
   how to convert the printed symbols on the
   page into their appropriate sound equivalences.
   During the next stage ... "fluency
   stage", the student continues to work on
   decoding skills to the point where he or
   she becomes "unglued" from the print
   (p. 127).

Joyce et al (1995) and Clark (1995) suggest Direct Instruction as the most effective method of teaching phonic-based instructional program in English. The researchers define direct instruction as a teaching with an "academic focus, a high degree of teacher direction and control, high expectations for pupils progress, a system for managing time, and atmosphere of relatively neutral effect" (p. 338). Joyce et al identify five stages of direct instructions as Orientation, Presentation, Structured Practice, Guided Practice and Independent Practice. For details of the stages, read Joyce et al (p. 339-342).

Innovation and Performance

As indicated earlier, LAUSD implemented such innovative measures as OCLAP with emphasis on phonics textbooks and class-size of twenty pupils in kindergarten through third grade. In addition, teachers were mandated to attend specific courses and workshops in reading instructions and attend school-organized professional development workshops, common planning meetings, district-sponsored workshops and seminars.

LAUSD reports that the school reforms have achieved some success as evident from the improvement in pupils' Stanford 9 Language Mean Percentiles for five consecutive years-1997-2002. I used the Stanford 9 test result because the California Achievement Tests (CAT/6) that replaced it is relatively new and therefore does not have enough data for this study. Graph 1 below shows students' performance in reading.

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Literature on Mixed Classrooms

As earlier noted, the school district assigned its language learners to the mainstream English class as a means of helping them to learn the target language. However, learners are given new identities and classifications such as 'advanced learners', 'intermediate learners', 'beginning learners' and so on, which all signal to the school communities that they are students who lack linguistic competence and therefore susceptible to subordination and "taking a less active and less powerful role in oral practices" (Toohey, 2003 p. 75).

Thus such students are denied full participation in social and learning activities because of the system of ranking and categorization, For example, a report by Hayasaki (2004) in Los Angeles Times, December 3, clearly illustrates how Hispanic-Americans in Southern California high school construct power hierarchy and privilege by using competence in English and their better economic and social status to position themselves as campus elites and position the other Hispanic immigrants English learners, classified as limited English proficient, as outsiders and thus disenfranchised them from participating in school activities. For instance, the immigrant English learners are teased for speaking English with an accent and pejoratively referred to as "paisas" (from paisano)--the term for countrymen. Merriam-Webster's Thesaurus lists the synonyms for 'countrymen' as including rural, rustic, peasant, pastoral, and meanings including lack of sophistication and cultivation. In addition, poor Economic conditions make it impossible for them to participate in their school's cheerleading teams as uniforms and other expenses cost as much as $1,200 per year. The school's freshman counselor reflects on the issue: "What is sad is immigrants come with really good skills, but they don't have the money; they can't afford it" (p. 36). It should not be a surprise then when the school bilingual facilitator acknowledges to the reporter: "Fitting into mainstream English class is sometimes hard for English learners" (p. 36).

In reaction, the language learners isolate themselves from the Hispanic-American students and in addition, many of them resent speaking English altogether. The experience of the students here is representative of the practices that collectively make language learners "become systematically excluded from just those conversations in which they might legitimately peripherally participate with child experts, English old-timers" (Toohey 2003, p. 93). The case of the ELL is therefore analogous to that of the special-need learners who through the practice of classification in the school system are usually subjected to isolation from social activities, mockery, ridicule and name-calling such as 'retarded' and 'special education'--making such learners to feel they do not belong in the school system. McDermott (1993) wonders about the cumulative effect of the school practices which assign different identities for pupils:

   How much and on what grounds a person
   is liable to degradation in the different
   settings? What is at stake here is appreciation
   of how much each setting
   organizes the search for and location
   of differential performances and how
   much that search further organizes the
   degradation of those found at the bottom
   of the pile (p. 286).

Classroom-based research (Peirce 1995, 1997, Toohey 2003, Chaudron 1988, Cummins 1981 and Laosa 1979) in mixed classrooms indicates that language learners have problems in learning the target language. For example, Chaudron finds that teachers show "apparent disparity in treatment" (p. 119) between ELL and English-only students. He further notes that a "mismatch between teachers and students' cultural norms results in a differential in teacher interactions with students in classroom" (p. 119). Laosa, in her study, concludes that teachers tend to be more negative of, less interactive with and more critical of ELL students in mixed classrooms.

Toohey (2003), in a study of the discursive practices in language learning classrooms, concludes that inadequate understanding of pupils leads to misleading categorization and social construction of pupils' identities in mixed classrooms, particularly in K through second grade. Toohey identifies five areas of competences as (1) Academic Competence, (2) Physical/presentation Competence, (3) Behavioral Competence, (4) Social Competence and (5) Language Competence. (For details, see Toohey 2003: 63-72). Examining the interrelated nature of, and the contribution of each aspect of the competency to the overall development of, and language learning capacity of learners, Toohey concludes that school practices produce different identities for pupils. He identifies the consequences: "Learners' identities have definite observable effects on what they can do in classroom, what kinds of positions as legitimate peripheral participants in classrooms they can occupy, and, therefore, how much they can 'learn'" (p. 74). Eisenhart (1995) puts the issue of identity formation in perspective: "It seems that we must find some way of understanding how individuals actively construct their own personal goals, beliefs about themselves, and images of self out of the cultural models and socialization processes to which they are exposed" (p. 5).

Norton and Toohey (2001), therefore call practitioners of SIA to confront the critical issue facing language learning in classrooms: the study of "how L2 learners are situated in specific social, historical, and cultural contexts and how learners resist or accept the positions those contexts offer them" (p. 310). Toohey (2003) suggests that teachers interview their pupils in order to "ascertain their understanding of their own (identities) and others' views on these matters ... (p. 77). In his contribution, Peirce (1995) calls for the need to "engage the social identities of students in ways that will improve their language learning" as a basic step towards helping them "understand how opportunities to speak are socially structured and how they might create possibilities for social interaction with the target language speaker" (p. 26).

Meaning-making in Language Learning Context

Starfield (2004) observes that ELL have limited repertoire of the Greco-Latin vocabulary, that is, academic language that facilitates effective participation in classroom learning activities. Thus in classroom discourses, they have serious problems in using English to express complex meanings relating to academic topics. The question for researchers therefore is: how does the vocabulary development practice enable learners to "expand their linguistic and discourse resources to make more complex meanings, build their arguments, and appear authoritative--to begin to develop identities as academic writers?" (Stein 2004 p. 150).

Toohey (2003), Norton (2003) and Stein (2004) contend that vocabulary lesson should be conceptualized as a social activity--where meaning-making is shaped by the complex sociocultural dynamics of the classroom: the personalities, histories, cultures, collective memories, desires, politics, and power relations (Morgan 2004). Implicit in this argument is the theoretical and practical implication that rather than emphasis on how ELL internalize and apply the rules of the language--phonological, grammatical and semantic rules--teachers should focus on how learners are "doing the complicated linguistic, social and psychological work of constructing 'voices' within a specific community and at the same time, constructing a point of view ..." (Toohey 2003, p. 14).

Therefore, a lesson in vocabulary should not be about meanings and appropriateness as prescribed by the dominant culture, rather it should be about helping learners to use their multicultural perspectives to make meaning. Stein (2004) posits that vocabulary lessons should help learners make choices from the various possibilities the classroom context offers and the choices signifying the interests of the makers (Stein 2004). Viewed from this perspective, vocabulary activities, therefore, become an opportunity for learners to negotiate individuals' identities, and the collective identities as members of the class reflect on their present conditions and future possibilities.

Justification for the study

There are three basic reasons for the study of vocabulary instruction aspect of the curriculum for teaching language learners in mixed classrooms. First, available literature in classroom research tends to focus on classroom practices without relating such to the framework teachers are handed to teacher. This gives a false impression that teachers can change classroom practices without first changing the framework they are asked to adhere to. Second, the fundamentals of the academic language are introduced at the second grade and failure to grasp them at this level may signal a poor performance in higher grades. Third, the vocabulary aspect of the curriculum constitutes a critical component of academic language which is much more difficult for language learners to acquire. For English learners, "a decline in word-meaning scores" (Reading/Language Arts, p.19) has always been a major factor in their poor performance in language learning. This is because pupils in second grade begin to use challenging texts that "use more difficult, abstract, specialized, and technical words" (Chall, Jacobs and Baldwin 1990, cited in Reading/Language Arts p. 19). Hence the choice of second grade is appropriate for this study.

Data collection

A mixed classroom of 20 students in second grade was observed for this study in the city of Los Angeles. There were fourteen English-only and six language learners. Two of the students were in the country for about six months while the remaining four had been in the country for about two years at the time of this observation. The classroom teacher was a young Mexican-American lady. She had been teaching for about five years and was in the masters program (elementary education) in one of the universities around Los Angeles. The teaching and observation lasted about an hour and fifteen minutes.

The topic of presentation was vocabulary development. The teacher's objective was that each student would be able to tell the meanings of certain words; use them in sentences and draw pictures to illustrate their meanings. The presentation was organized around teacher-fronted teaching, whole-class and small group activities with the teacher playing a dominant role in directing the activities.

I developed a class participation checklist to help me calculate the number of pupils who bid for teacher-initiated questions, student-initiated questions, pupils who volunteered to answer/ask questions and teacher selected pupils for sharing work with class. I wrote down the step-by-step presentation of the lesson, discussed the lesson and the teacher's one-page reflection on the lesson presentation the following day.

Statement of the Problem:

(1) to investigate whether the Reading/ Language Arts Framework conceptualizes language learning as a function of identity formation for learners, (2) to study whether vocabulary instructional activities will help learners to use language to explore their interest, values and expectations and (3) to investigate whether instructional practices allow for a multiplicity of activities so that learners can engage in different activities simultaneously.

Language Learning: An Activity Theory

At the core of Vygotskian sociocultural theory is the centrality of the human activities in language acquisition. This is a direct contradiction of Piaget's constructivist theory where cognitive development precedes language acquisition. Engestron (1986) with an extensive background in developmental psychology, in his contribution to the conception of the zone of proximal development defines child's development as a "series of transitions from one ontogenetically leading or dominant activity to another: from play to formal learning, from formal learning to peer activity, from peer activity to work" (p. 37).

Broadly defined then, an activity is doing something that is either motivated by a sociological need or a culturally constructed need (Lantolf, 2000). For example, language learners are motivated to learn the target language to acquire cultural capital (Peirce 1995) or what Bourdieu (1991) calls a symbolic capital, that is, learners' linguistic competence will serve as a linguistic capital that is capable of generating symbolic profit (e.g. the acquisition of academic language which enables learners to participate actively in classroom activities).

In an effective language development classroom, goal-directed activities (Auerbach 1996) become an important tool for mediating learning instructions and creative language use. The implication of this is that classroom must allow for multiple activities so that each student can decide on what activities to engage in the completion of the task at hand. Lantolf (2000) notes that "any given classroom setting (or any setting for that matter), not only can activities change from one moment to the next, but different activities might be underway at any given time, despite the fact that all of the participants display the same or similar overt behavior in a task" (p. 12). For example, a lesson based on the activity using charts to systematically collect and structure students' information about their lives and experiences may inevitably reshape into other activities such as group discussion, pair interviews, sharing, summary writing, jotting down important points, writing drafts, edit, proofreading, writing clean copies and so on. Corollary to the concept of goal-directed activities is learners' active collaboration in the design of learning activities they consider socially and culturally suitable for their learning preferences and how they engage in the activities.

Principle for Design and Practice of Activities

Following the works of Pennycook (2004, 1999) Kumaravadivelu (1999), Bourdieu (1991), Norton/Peirce (2000, 1995), Toohey (2003) and Kubota (2004) the following fundamental principles are developed to guide the design and practice of language learning activities:

1. Recognition of classroom discourse as a complex sociocultural activity in which meaning-making is a function of the social identity of learners.

2. Recognition of learners' critical role in the design and implementation of activities that are culturally and socially appropriate for language learning.

3. Language learning activities are representative of the diverse social and cultural background knowledge and experience of learners.

4. Teaching activities provoke learners to use language to explore and exploit their interest, values and expectations.

5. Language learning activities provide learners the opportunities to assess and negotiate knowledge, concepts and ideas in the light of their own sociocultural backgrounds.

6. Learning activities allow for a multiplicity of activities at any given time so that learners can decide which activities to engage in and how to engage in them.

These principles provide the basis for a critical examination of the provisions of the language arts framework and the classroom instructional activities for teaching vocabulary development in this study.

Summary of the provisions of the Language Arts Framework for Second Grade

Reading/Language Arts Framework states the goal of second grade level curriculum as: "help(ing) students learn phonemic awareness of words and knowledge of letter-sounds to build lexicons of familiar words; use knowledge of spelling patterns, prefixes, and suffixes; and increase sight vocabulary through extensive practice" (p. 64). The blueprint recommends that second grade curriculum and instruction extend the understanding of vocabulary in four primary ways: (1) knowledge and use of antonyms and synonyms, (2) use of individual words in compounds to predict meaning, (3) use of prefixes and suffixes to assist in word meaning and (4) learning multiple-meaning words The framework, in addition, stipulates the use of such vocabulary development strategies as (1) direct instruction of specific concepts and vocabulary essential to understand text; and (2) exposure to a broad and diverse vocabulary through listening to and reading stories and informational texts.

Specifically for English learners, the document notes that the "foremost problem (pupils face) can be the vocabulary used in stories" (p. 75) and thus directs teachers to help learners to "develop vocabulary through preteaching, providing vocabulary instruction; modeling the pronunciation of words; scaffolding (e.g. through summary sheets visuals, realia, and compare and contrast sheets); and encouraging students to use the vocabulary from the stories in class discussion and writing assignments" (p. 75). The document further requires teachers to select "texts that children of diverse cultures can relate to easily. Whenever possible the texts should be authentic" (p. 75).

The Content Standards for vocabulary development are: 1.7 understand and explain common antonyms and synonyms, 1.8 use knowledge of initial words in unknown compound words to predict their meaning, 1.9 know the meaning of simple prefixes and suffixes and 1.10 identify simple multiple-meaning words (p. 77).

The following preselected vocabulary activities are recommended for individual and/or group practices: scholastic spelling activities, vocabulary games, open court vocabulary worksheets, class dictionary, computer activities and teacher/student tool card. Others include creating vocabulary games for other students, add to word wall/living list, vocabulary worksheet--synonyms, antonyms, multiple meaning, affixes, root words, students generate and/or use anthology to add to lists of words. Others include matching words with meanings, manipulate selection vocabulary to retell story, word building game, and using spelling cards as flashcards.

Reading/Language Arts Framework "provides a blueprint for organizing (language) instruction" as it promises to "guide the implementation of the standards by specifying the design of instructional materials, curriculum, instruction and professional level ... and approaches for implementing instruction ... (p. 1). The blueprint spells out what to teach, how to teach and the expected outcomes. Similarly, time is allocated for instructional activities. For second grade, the document recommends: "a minimum of two and one-half hours of instructional time is allocated to language arts instruction daily. This time is given priority, and is protected from interruption" (p. 13, emphasis added)).

Critique.

While the Language Arts Framework appropriately recognizes the fact that learners come from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds and speak different languages and dialects, the blueprint, however, does not make provisions for integrating language learning and cognitive development with the contextual factors--the social, cultural and political contexts of learning. The goal of the document, as it appears, is to integrate language learners to the American mainstream language and culture, or what Wiley and Lukes (1996) and Banks (2004) call the ideology of English monolingualism and monoculturalism. The document advocates that instructional programs for English learners should ensure that "English-language proficiency progresses from the students' initial contact with formal instruction in English to the point at which their use of English compares with that of their native English-speaking peers" (p. 233, emphasis added). Implicit in this ideology is the assumption and expectation that "language minority students will acquire English and lose their native languages" (Wiley & Luke p. 514) and thus lose their social and cultural identities.

Furthermore, despite years of well documented role of first language in helping language learners achieve competency in the target language, the document prohibits the use of first language in the classroom as it prescribes that "... instructions for most language learners must be presented 'overwhelmingly in English'" (p. 233). Specifically for K--grade two, the document projects that "typically, primary students who are learning English can participate fully in classroom language arts instruction if provided appropriate reading and writing supports and instruction in oral language" (p. 233). The supports that learners are entitled to are basically "the preteaching of essential elements of lesson vocabulary and language structure, and additional assistance after the lesson during the school day and after school" (p. 233).

There are two assumptions here. First, it is assumed that since second grade learners are eight years old, they will naturally acquire English. Such an assumption is based on the critical period hypothesis, which states that children have natural ability to acquire new language before cerebral lateralization at about puberty or age twelve. Second, it is believed that if language learners are submerged in English-only classes without reference to their first language, such students are likely to master the target language faster in other to survive in the new culture. Popularly derided as "sink. or swim" approach, LAUSD has modified its submersion programs to incorporate remedial English components in English Language Development (ELD) classes for 45 to 60 minutes for teachers to "provide additional modeling and practice for those English learners who need further assistance" (p. 232) in the "essential elements of lesson vocabulary and language structure" (p. 233).

However, studies in multilingualism and multiculturalism in the last two decades have consistently proven that learners' level of competence in the first language is a mediating factor in their educational development and target language learning (Krashen 2001 and Cummins, 1981). That is, when language learners are thrust into the target language without sufficient mastery of the first language, such students "develop relatively low levels of academic proficiency in both languages" (Cummins p. 16).

In addition, there seems to be no empirical data to back the claim that "'typically students who are learning English can participate fully in classroom language arts instruction ..." On the contrary, studies in academic discourse at elementary school level have consistently reported "frequently inequitable social structure which are reproduced in day-to-day social interactions" (Peirce 1995, p. 13) in mixed classrooms and that the social practices create the atmosphere for marginalization of language learners because of their construction as language deficit learners--ones who do not have the symbolic capital (Bourdieu 1991) to participate in classroom discursive practices. McKay and Wong (1996) report: "unevenly distributed right to speak" (p. 578) between EP and ELL; and the pressure on ELL to "master and adjust him/herself to the rules of appropriateness in the target language" (p. 579). Bourdieu captures the dilemma of language learners: "Here again, social acceptability is not reducible to mere grammaticality. Speakers lacking the competence are de facto excluded from the social domains in which this competence is required, or are condemned to silence" (p. 55).

The issue of marginalization is further exacerbated by classroom teaching practices, as this document prescribes teachers as the arbiter of knowledge. Teachers' efforts are thus geared towards enforcing the acquisition of interested knowledge (Pennycook 1989), the knowledge of the American dominant culture. Cummins (1994) observes that "classroom interactions are not oriented to the expression, sharing and critical examination of students' experience nor to analysis of issues that pertain to the division of wealth and status within the specific society and the global context" (p. 34).

Finally, it is interesting to note that the 292-page document does not provide any guide on the role of identity formation, a critical concept in second language learning classroom, despite the fact that second grade classes contain pupils of multiple identities, needs, desires and interests. This is why Cummins (1981) argues that "the sociocultural determinants of minority students' school failure ... are more fundamental than linguistic factors" (p. 2). The framework, unfortunately, is a psycholinguistic document that treats language learning as an internal mental process (Long 1997) with emphasis on learners' cognition and personality factors like motivation, affectivity, aptitude, and so on, as it is obvious from the exclusive focus on the acquisition of vocabulary items and mastery of language structure. I note with dismay that the document does not discuss such concepts as heritage culture, power relations in and out the classroom, politics, language ideology, race relations, language and gender as facilitators or hindrances to language learning.

Classroom Teaching Practices

The salient features of the lesson are summarized below:

1. Introduction of Lesson: the teacher called the pupils to sit on the rug in front of the class. She introduced the lesson by giving an overview of the topic; explained the lesson agenda, objective and rubric for assessing students' work at the end of the lesson. In addition, she activated pupil's background knowledge by asking questions about the passage the students read the previous lesson.

2. Lesson Development: teacher explained the "keep-the-card" game activity. She demonstrated how to do the activity with the help of a student. The teacher selected two students to demonstrate the activity for the class. She wrote ten words, including "handsome", "family" and "excited" on the whiteboard (all words from the passage read the day before) for pupils to pronounce. She modeled the activity for pupils. Teacher and students jointly used the dictionary and glossary of terms to look up the meanings of "gutsy" and "homesick" "wimp", "swatted" and "creepy". Whoever first found the meaning of a word read it to the class and kept the card.

3. Application/Guided Practice: teacher broke up students into small groups. Teacher provided vocabulary sheet for pupils to write words, meanings and definitions and drawings representing the meanings. Pupils played the game. Teacher went around the groups to monitor the activity and provided corrective feedback.

4. Individual Practice: teacher explained the class assignment. Teacher went around the class to ensure that students stayed focus. In addition, she provided assistance for student who asked for help by helping them to check meanings in dictionaries. She called for student to volunteer to share their work with the class at the completion of the activity.

5. Evaluation: teacher wrote five new words on the whiteboard and explained the assignment. She instructed students to do the assignment independently--without assistance from other students. Teacher explained the rubric again and also monitored the activity. At the completion, teacher called on three students to stand in the front of the class and share their works with the class.

Extension: teacher explained the assignment; students were to choose five words from the passage read the previous day and complete new vocabulary sheets.

Comments

While the teacher seemed to have effectively mastered and followed the instructional plan for teaching vocabulary development in Open-Court program, the activities did not encourage learners to construct meanings based on their life experiences. Rather, fixed meanings from the dictionary, which itself is a compilation of the dominant belief system of the dominant culture, became the source of meanings. The teacher in this lesson did not conceptualize vocabulary instruction in the wider sociocutural context in which "meanings are also shaped by the dynamics of a classroom--its personalities, gestures, spaces, collective memories, and power relations (as the) ... interacting phenomena that collectively structured the range of meanings deemed permissible in the course of an activity" (Morgan 2004, p. 162).

The teacher's tight control of the activities and the structured nature of the lesson did not create the necessary relax, fun though engaging atmosphere for language learning. For example, the teacher instructed pupils that they could only talk to her, answer/ask questions from her, present their work to the class--under her watchful eyes. This suggested that pupils did not have the opportunity to transit from playing to learning, from formal learning to play, from academic discourse to informal conversation (Engestron, 1986). Thus, this practice of tight structured classroom instruction negates the fundamental rationale of the zone of proximal development which implies that learning settings should constitute "social situations or environments where instructional support is given to children, thus enabling children to acquire new skills in a new way, through joint problem solving and interaction" (Engestron 1986 p. 37).

The pedagogical structure, therefore, limits the opportunity for language learners to explore and exploit English language, including using it as a tool of social interaction. This is why Tomlinson (1998) concludes that textbooks, school cultures, teachers and publishers seem only anxious to provide for and reward learners who are primarily analytic. Tomlinson writes: "The learners who succeed in these cultures are those who can focus on discrete chunks of information, who can analyze and categorize, who can memorize and retrieve consciously, who are systematic and sequential in the ways they learn" (p. 337).

The tight structure of the lesson thus dictated who participate and who did not. In this highly competitive classroom, those who bid for questions from the teacher were predominantly pupils who had the symbolic capital, English language proficiency. For example, Jonathan (not his real name) was the only ELL who bid for two of the forty-seven teacher-initiated questions. Santa (not her real name), another ELL initiated one of the twenty three pupil-initiated questions. Of the eleven pupils the teacher called to share their work with the class, at different stages of the lesson, Jonathan was the only ELL called upon one time to share his work. Ana who had been in the class for only six months did not bid for questions, initiate questions or volunteer to answer questions. However, the teacher explained that Ana and seven other students were assigned to a daily forty five minutes additional lesson in English Language Development (ELD) program outside the regular Open-Court language arts program.

Summary of Observation.

1. Reading/Language Arts Framework, the blueprint for language learning in California State does not conceptualize language learning as a function of social and cultural identities of learners even though any classroom in Los Angeles metropolitan city contains pupils of diverse ethnic, linguistic, cultural, social and learning backgrounds and the consequent multiple identities, preferences, interests, needs and expectations.

2. The vocabulary instructional practices resulting from the blue print, as should be expected, does not teach learners to construct vocabulary meanings to reflect their life experiences, prior linguistic and educational backgrounds.

3. The instruction in vocabulary development in this study did not provide learners with multiple learning activities that could have significantly and positively influenced interaction among learners and provide more opportunities for language learning.

4. The tight structure of the lesson and teacher's strict control of the instructional activities did not create an enabling learning atmosphere where language learners can practice English and appropriate other pupils' voices.

5. The teaching/learning structure did not reflect the critically important, dynamic and social nature of language learning--that pupils learn together and create knowledge together (Toohey 2003).

Suggestions for Improving the Lesson

The lesson could have included additional activities such as asking pupils in small groups to use the new vocabulary items to create short stories about their lives. Also, the teacher could include non-text materials (e.g. the newspaper) and ask learners to engage in word-search activity (by finding the words in the material) and then contrast the meanings in the two different materials. In addition, such activities as students generating their own meanings, spelling exercises and matching words with meanings could have been added. Furthermore, student could have used the words in sentences to reflect their own way of understanding them. Next, such sentences could be put on the whiteboard to form new paragraphs or a new story. Students and teacher could then jointly examine the new meanings in the new context. For instance "homesick" would have probably yielded different meanings for different pupils. This would have brought to the surface the contradictions in learners' meanings and consequently force them to "negotiate their interests and change their social reality" (Stein 2004, p. 104).

The teacher could have enhanced the quality of the instruction by bring in visual materials from the internet or photographs showing images of pupils who are 'homesick', 'handsome', 'creepy', 'wimp' and so on. Of course, pupils would have disagreed about the interpretations of the visual images, but the ensuring discursions could have animated the class. In particular, the different mode of representation would have offered them incredible "opportunities to extend their abilities and opportunities to communicate" (Stein 2004, p. 106).

Furthermore, rather than asking all pupils to go through the same activities at the same time, the teacher could have encouraged pupils to engage in different activities concurrently and thus give them a choice in the activities they preferred or that closely aligned with the social and cultural learning behaviors they consider appropriate. In addition, working together in fun like and playful atmosphere like this creates greater opportunities for language learners and language proficient pupils to collectively learn together and create knowledge together. This is particularly important as Vygotsky (1978) and Engestron (1986) have demonstrated that learning is not a solitary activity, rather it is an integral part of the social practices of any community. In addition, this creates an ideal setting for language learners to "appropriate the voices of others and to 'bend' those voices to their own purposes ... (and also) appropriate the identity positions expressed by those voices, and to 'bend' those identities to their own purposes" (Toohey 2003, p. 94) without the fear of being accused of 'cheating.'

Conclusion

Those responsible for language learning policy and implementation of it have to come into term with the reality that learners are motivated to learn the target language in order to "acquire a wider range of symbolic and material resources" (Peirce, 1995, 9) to enhance their social identities. This means theorists, curriculum developers, teachers and policy makers have to design instructional curriculum that reflect learners' complex and dynamic social realities such as linguistic backgrounds, life experiences, concerns, needs, interests, learning goals and aspiration. Furthermore, vocabulary instruction should allow for a multiplicity of activities that can potentially offer learners more possibilities in activity choice and the manner to engage in them.

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Table 1
ELL Overall Proficiency Level (K-5) in 2003/04

Grade                 K      1       2       3       4       5

Overall proficiency   Number & % of students at each overall
                      proficiency level

Advance               315    11,750  12,328  7,094   18,110  27,416
                      5.0%   7.0%    7.0%    4.0%    12.0%   20.0%
Early Advanced        1,235  47,292  36,574  27,100  46,467  50,767
                      19.0%  28.0%   21.0%   17.0%   30.0%   37.0%
Intermediate          2,301  71,418  68,968  61.183  55,968  40,068
                      35.0%  43.0%   40.0%   38.0%   36.0%   29.0%
Early Intermediate    1,440  25,304  36,778  42,343  22,592  11,976
                      22.0%  15.0%   22.0%n  27.0%   15.0%   9.0%
Beginning             1,373  10,940  16,134  21,719  10,465  6,940
                      21.0%  7.0%n   9.0%    14.0%   7.0%    5.0%

Source: California Department of Education; Educational Demographics
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