RMECC 2015

1. Strategies to Support & Assess Dual
Language Learners’ Oral Language
Development
Sherry Taylor, PhD
Associate Professor
Literacy, Language & Culturally Responsive Teaching
University of Colorado, Denver
Isabelle Smith, MA
ECSE Pre-School Teacher, Boulder Valley School District
Lead Instructor in Early Literacy Certificate Program at University of Colorado Denver
RMECC Conference, April 17, 2015
Denver, CO

2. Welcome!
❏Young children & language: What does research say?
❏Young dual language learners
❏Language & culture go ‘hand in hand’
❏Reflecting on our language use in the classroom
❏Purposeful planning: Intentional structures to support
children’s language
❏Assessing language: What are we looking for?
❏Turn talk over to the children!

3. But first, let’s take a moment to find out a
little about YOU …
❏ Early childhood teachers? Early Childhood Special Education teachers?
❏ Early childhood paraprofessionals?
❏ Speech pathologists? Occupational therapists?
❏ K-3 teachers?
❏ Teacher Coaches? ELA Consultants?
❏ School-Family Liaison? Administrators?
❏ Teacher Educators?
❏ How many of you work with students who are acquiring English as an
additional language? Dual language learners (learning their home
language while they also learn English?)
❏ What languages are present in your classroom context?

4. Children and Oral Language
Children are language learners by virtue
of being born into human society.
(Golinkoff & Hirsh-Pasek, 1999; Halliday, 1975; Vygotsky, 1962)

5. Children construct knowledge about language as they use it to
engage with the people and objects in their environments.
Children use language to make sense of their surroundings.

6. Acquiring Oral Language
Acquiring one’s first language is not based on imitation; instead,
children work through linguistic rules and experiment with
using language forms that most adults never use, such as,
“I buyed you a present.”
“We went to the store yesternight.”
“I can’t find my jamamas!”
Most children learn the rules of their first language at an early age
without formal instruction.

7. Acquiring Oral Language
While language development & acquisition are not
completely predictable, children generally:
 say their first words between 12 and 18 months.
 begin to use complex sentences by the age of 4 to 4 ½
years.
 have acquired most of the fundamentals of their native
language by the time they begin kindergarten (e.g.,
language systems including phonology, semantics
morphology, syntax, pragmatics….).

8. Making Meaning with Oral Language
So, let’s think about the components that contribute to a complex,
fundamental language system that relate sounds to meaning:
Phonology: The rules for combining sounds.
Semantics: Using units of meaning (morphemes) and word parts that
contribute to making meaning as we craft sentences, including indicators of
‘plurals’ ‘possessives’ and ‘past tense’ to mention a few.
Morphology & Syntax: The rules that allow us to arrange units of
meaning (morphemes) to form a sentence or a question, for example,
“My cookies!”
“All gone cookies?”

9. Pragmatics:
Engaging successfully in conversation with others & adapting one’s
conversation for social & cultural contexts.
Children as young as five:
 begin to adjust their speech and gestures to accommodate for different social
situations as they engage in pretend play and role switching.
 make adjustments to their speech when the speaker and listener do not share
the same immediate physical context. In this case, children begin to try to
represent events beyond the ‘here and now.’

10. Thinking about
Oral Language

11. Do you AGREE or
DISAGREE?
1) All languages do not share linguistic universals.
2) Children learn language in the speech community
where they are raised with little or no direct
instruction.
3) Language is dynamic (not static).
4) Language speakers have a language competence
that may not always be reflected in their spoken
language.
5) Languages and dialects do not have regular
structure and a predictable grammar.
6) Children do not come to school knowing the
‘right way’ to interact, ask questions, and tell
stories according to the speech community
where they were raised.
ON YOUR OWN:
Think about the
statements.
Choose ONE
statement to talk
over with someone
sitting nearby.
What do you know?
What have you
observed?

12. Do you AGREE or
DISAGREE?
1) FALSE: All languages do not share linguistic
universals.
2) Children learn language in the speech community where they
are raised with little or no direct instruction.
3) Language is dynamic (not static).
4) Language speakers have a language competence that may not
always be reflected in their spoken language.
5) FALSE: Languages and dialects do not have regular structure
and a predictable grammar.
6) Children do not come to school knowing the ‘right way’ to
interact, ask questions, and tell stories according to the speech
community where they were raised.

13. What does research say?
1) All languages DO share linguistic universals.
2) Children learn language in the speech community where they are
raised with little or no direct instruction (sociocultural influences).
3) Language is dynamic & always changing (… Fracking, hashtag, selfie!)
1) Language speakers have a language competence that may not always
be reflected in their spoken language (competence vs
performance…what we know is correct, what comes out of our
mouths).
2) Languages & dialects DO have a regular structure & predictable
grammar (E.g., Appalachian English, African-American English).
3) Children DO come to school knowing the ‘right way’ to interact, ask
questions, and tell stories according to the speech community where
they were raised (where language was modeled & reinforced).

14. What do we know about
predictable
stages of
language development?
A quick review!

15. Typical English Language Development
(First Language)
42-48 months
∗ Understands approximately
1,500-2,000 words
∗ Responds to three step
directions
∗ Tells how common objects
are used
∗ Uses contractions
∗ Knows positional words (in
front, behind)
48-54 months
∗ Uses approximately 2,000-
2,500 words
∗ Says 1,500 words
∗ Uses possessives (boy’s,
dog’s)
∗ Identifies first, last and
middle
Voress & Pearson (2006) Early Childhood Development Chart

16. Typical English Language Development
(First Language)
54-60 months
∗ Understands approximately
2,500 - 2,800 words
∗ Knows concepts such as
heavy/ light, long/ short
∗ Says 2,000 words
∗ Generates complex
sentences
∗ Tells familiar stories without
picture cues
60-72 Months
∗ Understands approximately
13,000 words
∗ States similarities and
differences between objects
∗ Uses pronouns consistently
∗ Tells simple “jokes”
Voress & Pearson (2006) Early Childhood Development Chart

17. What about for those acquiring an
additional language?

18. Oral Language Development: DLL Children and
Children who are Monolingual Learners of English
 Baring developmental issues, all children are born with the ability to
learn language, process & store individual sounds & remember
grammar rules;
 Both DLLs and monolingual learners of English, learn English in fairly
predictable stages; AND, achieve developmental milestones at similar
times, including babbling, first words, first word combinations
(telegraphic speech);
 Young children’s oral language development supports their literacy
development whether the child is a DLL or monolingual learner.
(Byers-Heinlein, Burns & Werker, 2010; Paradis, Genesse & Crago, 2011)

19. Acquiring an additional language
Second-language acquisition assumes that the learner has a
foundation and solid knowledge of the first language.
Given such a solid foundation in the first language, the learner
moves through the process of learning an additional language,
including phonological components, vocabulary, grammatical
structures, and writing systems.
The process is not linear, it is more like a zig-zag process

20. Acquiring English as an additional
language
Learners of an additional
language move through similar
developmental stages as those
stages of first language
development thereby making
some of the same types of
errors in grammatical markers
and
picking up chunks of language
without knowing precisely what
each word means.
Learners of an additional
language rely on language
input and modifications from
proficient speakers who
support successful
conversational exchanges and
comprehension of the
additional language.

21. Stages
of
Second Language
Acquisition

22. Pre-
production
STAGE 1: The silent period;" when the student takes in the new
language but does not speak it. This period often lasts six weeks or
several months, depending on the individual.
Early
production
STAGE 2: The individual begins to speak using short words and
sentences; emphasis is still on listening and absorbing the new
language; many errors in this stage that can last 3 months or longer.
Speech
Emergent
STAGE 3: Speech becomes more frequent, words and sentences are
longer; student still relies heavily on context clues and familiar topics.
Vocabulary continues to increase in this stage that can last 6 months to
around 2 to 3 years; errors begin to decrease in common or repeated
interactions.
Beginning
Fluency
STAGE 4: Speech is fairly fluent in social situations with minimal
errors. New contexts and academic language are challenging; individual
struggles to express herself due to gaps in vocabulary and appropriate
phrases (2 to 3 years depending on the individual).

23. Intermediate
Fluency STAGE 5: Communicating in the second language is fluent,
especially in social language situations; individual is able to speak
almost fluently in new situations or in academic areas, but there will
be gaps in vocabulary knowledge and some unknown expressions;
fewer errors, and the individual is able to demonstrate higher order
thinking skills in the second language such as offering an opinion or
analyzing a problem (3 to 6 years depending on the individual).
Advanced
Fluency STAGE 6: The individual communicates fluently in most all contexts
and can maneuver successfully in new contexts and when exposed to
new academic information. At this stage, the individual may still have
an accent and use idiomatic expressions incorrectly, but the individual
is essentially fluent and comfortable communicating in the second
language (5 to 7 years or never depending on the individual).

24. Language Acquisition for Dual Language Learners
Learning English
Similarities
• Recognition of phonemes
follows the same pattern for
DLLs compared to monolingual
learners;
• DLLS produce first words at
about the same age as
monolingual learners [12-18
mos] (Genesee, 2003; Patterson &
Pearson, 2004).
• Distribution of lexical features is
similar for DLLs as compared to
monolingual learners (e.g., use
of nouns and verbs).
Differences
The ability to distinguish contrasting
phonemes:
• Vowels occur at 6-8 months for monolingual
learners of Engish and at 10-12 months for DLLs ;
and,
• Consonants occur at 8-10 months for monolinguals
of English and 14-21 months for bilingual learners.
DLLs can differentiate between two languages
with different rhythmic patterns by age 4-5
months indicating that they have two
phonological systems, the foundation for two
separate linguistic systems.
DLLs produce “translation equivalents” from the
time they begin to speak (words in each
language that have the same referential
meaning; same concept with 2 labels).
DLLs store two sets of: Sounds, grammar rules,
vocabulary, pragmatic rules & cultural behavior
rules.

25. By the time they enter kindergarten…
Most children are proficient in the oral language of their first
language, meaning they have mastered the basic structures of the
oral language and are fairly effective communicators.
(Vukelich, Christie, Enz, 2008)

26. Given the developmental period for language
is birth to 5 years……
Children in ECE programs and young kindergarteners are still
learning their first language
and need opportunities to develop it fully
as they begin learning English
as an additional language in school.
(Echevarria, Short & Peterson, 2011)

27. What stages of language acquisition tend to be
demonstrated by the young children
you support?
Look back at the 2
earlier slides.
On your own:
Reflect & check

28. What is the power of
oral language?
❏ Language is the primary symbol system through
which children learn about the world.
❏ Children use language to facilitate their thinking and
learning in all areas.
❏ Children jointly construct meaning and knowledge
with others.

29. Children’s talk provides us with a window
into their strategies
for acquiring a second language
Young children apply strategies similar to those used to
learn their first language:
• Listen carefully to distinguish sounds;
• Learn phonological rules;
• Learn to use grammar to construct meaning phrases & sentences to express
themselves.
They may also:
• Go through a silent period;
• Code-switch;
• Use formulaic expressions;
• Experiment with the academic terms used in class.

30. Children’ talk provides us with a
window into their thinking & their
knowledge…if…..when…
We create structures to support children’s
talk in a variety of contexts;
❏ We encourage & support children to engage
in talk with each other;
❏ We listen & observe with intention &
purpose.

31. When we listen with intention & purpose,
we gain insights into...
❏ children’s knowledge of language functions & forms across a
variety of different contexts;
❏ children’s interactional competencies;
❏ what children know about content areas & the world;
❏ how children’s TALK corresponds with their reading and
writing development.

32. What about
culture
and
language?

33. Language, Culture, and Context
go hand-in-hand
Children develop the capacity to use,
talk about, and
learn through language
- both oral & written language -
within the various contexts of their
lives….including the
socio - cultural contexts of their lives.

34. Language, Culture & Context
go hand-in-hand
….…for adults too!
Consider one day last week:
❏ Discuss the way you spoke and used written language with
your students, your colleagues, and your administrator.
❏ Discuss the ways you speak and use written language at
home, at play, in social media, and with family members.
❏ Adults’ language varies as the socio-cultural context varies.
TURN & TALK WITH SOMEONE NEARBY

35. Language use is influenced by the different
contexts we experience
THINK ABOUT IT:
❏ Are there particular contexts where your language use is
comfortable and proficient?
❏ Are there contexts where your words do not ‘flow’ as
comfortably? Where you may be somewhat self-conscious
or “tongue-tied”?
❏ This is true for young children too! Their language use excels
in different contexts too!