Preparing Content Teachers to Work with Multilingual Students

Abstract

It is well-documented that content teachers (e.g., math, science, social studies, etc.) have not been adequately prepared to address the increasing number of multilingual students in their classes (Freeman & Freeman, 2014; Lucas, 2011). While many teacher education programs strive to prepare teachers during initial licensure programs (e.g., de Oliveira & Yough, 2015; Freeman & 2014; Levine, & Moss, 2014) and recent work has focused on secondary teacher preparation at both pre-service and in-service levels (de Oliveira & Obenchain, 2018; de Oliveira, Obenchain, Kenney, & Oliveira, in press; de Oliveira Shoffner, 2016; de Oliveira & 2017), the existing conceptual and empirical knowledge-base for preparing pre- and in-service content teachers is still in its infancy. Faltis and Valdés (2016) argue that what is known—albeit inconclusively—does nevertheless provide helpful guidance upon which we can all build. This chapter seeks to provide a sense of the issues, research, and practices that shape what we know while identifying fruitful directions for deepening the knowledge-base for preparing K-12 content teachers for multilingual learners.