Bilingual paraprofessionals in the second language acquisition classroom

ABSTRACT

This paper reports on a qualitative study of 13 bilingual paraprofessionals at a university in the USA enrolled in a second language acquisition class that was part of a professional development programme. Drawing on socio-cultural theory, the study focused on documenting how the paraprofessionals negotiated the academic demands of a hybrid online second language acquisition class. Data collection was conducted in 2017 and then again in 2019 following completion of the professional development programme. Data was gathered through classroom assignments, a professional journal, and semi-structured interviews. Findings detail the ways in which and the conditions necessary for bilingual paraprofessionals to connect their own professional and personal experiences learning and teaching a second language to professional development. Classroom activities which provide a space for students to pair personal experiences with the academic were key. Suggestions for practice during professional development are offered.

KEYWORDS:

• Paraprofessional
• socio-cultural theory
• teacher education

According to the National Centre for Education Statistics, five million K-12 students in the U.S. are categorised as English language learners (ELLs) (National Center for Education Statistics, 2019). In Nevada, the location for this research, the population of English language learners (ELLs) in 2020 is at 70,663 (15.3%), placing it third behind California (20.2%) and Texas (17.2%). To meet the needs of the population in Nevada and across the nation, schools have increasingly relied on bilingual paraprofessionals. While current research into the experiences of bilingual paraprofessional is still growing, researchers (Amos, 2013; Ernst-Slavit & Wenger, 2006) have found that the shared linguistic and cultural backgrounds of bilingual paraprofessionals give them unique insights into second language learning and educational experiences of students who are ELLs.

The academic home for documenting the experiences of paraprofessionals has been language teacher education (LTE) research. Seminal work by Freeman and Johnson (1998) in LTE drew on socio-cultural theory as an alternative to past research which had foregrounded the primacy of theory and research-based practice over knowledge of what teachers do and how they learn. Freeman and Johnson’s work was in recognition of the fact that much of what teachers know about teaching comes from their ‘memories as students, as language learners, and as “students of language teaching” (p. 401). Twenty-two years later, Johnson and Golombek (2020) updated the framework for teacher educators engaged in professional development.

This study draws on Johnson and Golombek’s (2020) framework for LTE to explore how bilingual paraprofessionals negotiate the academic demands of a hybrid online second language acquisition (SLA) class. The socio-cultural framework from Johnson and Golombek is used as an alternative theoretical framework to current research into bilingual paraprofessionals which has largely relied on critical or race theory. The purpose is to explore learning in a professional development setting through the socio-cultural framework discussed by Johnson and Golombek.

Bilingual paraprofessionals from a critical perspective

Over the last two decades, research into the teaching and professional development experiences of bilingual paraprofessionals has broadly included research into career-ladder and professional development programmes (Amos, 2013; Dalla, MoulikGupta, Lopez, & Jones, 2006; Valenciana, Morin, & Morales, 2005) and the strengths that bilingual paraprofessionals bring to the their teaching (Lenski, 2007) contrasted with the struggles that they face in their professional lives as paraprofessionals (Amos, 2016; Ernst-Slavit & Wenger, 2006). With few exceptions (Dalla et al., 2006), researchers have selected a critical lens to interpret their findings and forwarded an argument around the workings of race (Amos, 2013, 2016) or the low prestige associated with working as a bilingual paraprofessional (Dalla et al., 2006; Ernst-Slavit & Wenger, 2006). As such, inquiries are conducted with the purpose of uncovering racial inequities within the experiences of bilingual paraprofessionals engaged in professional development. Such research, while still growing, has offered valuable insights into the cultural and racial tensions found in professional development and pre-service teacher education programmes.

Topics have included the exploration of the linguistic and cultural assets that bilingual paraprofessionals bring to their teaching (Lenski, 2007) and are set in the background of the struggles that bilingual paraprofessionals face (Amos, 2013, 2016; Ernst-Slavit & Wenger, 2006). A recurring question has been how Spanish proficiency, the most common first language among bilingual paraprofessionals in this research, and a Latino heritage are construed in schools, professional development programmes and career-ladder programmes. Drawing on work by Garcia (2005), Lenski (2007) argues that the second language skills of bilingual paraprofessionals uniquely qualify them to work with families, often allowing them to serve as what Giroux (1997) termed, border crossers, which describes individuals who help newcomers to fit into the host culture. Lenski (2007) gives the example of a bilingual paraprofessional who often shares his experiences with students of working in Latin America as a veterinarian versus working in the USA as a bilingual paraprofessional.

Ernst-Slavit and Wenger (2006) similarly found that bilingual paraprofessionals served as cultural liaisons and advocates for English language learners (ELLs), but the bilingual paraprofessionals they described worked in a system which offered only marginal attention to the ELLs and the talents of the bilingual paraprofessionals. To illustrate, Ernst-Slavit and Wenger drew on photographs the bilingual paraprofessionals took of their workplaces. The pictures depicted instances in which bilingual paraprofessionals worked without a breakthrough lunch, used a remodelled closet as a tutoring space and assumed responsibility for many important tasks such as testing, record-keeping, and regular tutoring. Despite these difficult circumstances, the bilingual paraprofessionals explained that their intentions were to go above and beyond what was expected of them. They acted as advocates for the ELLs and their families and felt a sense of camaraderie with each other and their students as immigrants who were once newcomers to the USA themselves.

To tap into the cultural and linguistic capital that bilingual paraprofessionals bring to the schools, some educators have developed career-ladder or professional development programmes. These researchers (Amos, 2013; Dalla et al., 2006; Valenciana et al., 2005) have documented the clash between the personal and professional lives of bilingual paraprofessionals. For instance, Dalla et al. (2006) traced the experience of 26 bilingual paraprofessionals to attain teacher licensure in a five-year career-ladder programme. Their qualitative analysis revealed three points of contention for the bilingual paraprofessionals: 1) finances, 2) communication, and the 3) division of labour within the participants’ marriages. Of these three, Dalla et al. (2006) found that the division of labour within the household was the most relevant. All female participants reported that it was necessary to negotiate with their husbands to take on added responsibilities for childcare, housekeeping, or meal preparation, and some found that their efforts fell on deaf ears.

Amos (2013, 2016) drew on critical race theory to document the experiences of bilingual paraprofessionals who returned to school to earn certification in an existing teacher education programme. Amos documented multiple instances in which the bilingual paraprofessionals were subjected to racially based derogatory comments, discriminatory remarks, and micro-aggressions. The two participants in Amos’ (2013) study struggled without needed academic support, failed the ESL praxis exam, and never became teachers.

The research into the professional development experiences and professional lives of bilingual paraprofessionals suggests that they possess unique cultural and linguistic skills, but these skills have largely been ignored within the classroom. To date, researchers have not explored the specific learning processes that bilingual paraprofessionals engage in during professional development. This study finds its place in the research by proposing a socio-cultural framework to describe the interconnected processes that organise the learning experiences of bilingual paraprofessionals. A discussion of Johnson and Golombek (2020) framework is provided below and functions as the theoretical framework, guiding the analysis of the data in this research.

A socio-cultural framework on teacher education and professional development

While there are many contemporary definitions of sociocultural theory (e.g. Leonard, 2002; Nagel, 2012), Bates’ (2019) is most useful as it places sociocultural theory within the larger discussion of teachers. Bates defines sociocultural theory as “knowledge and interactions … constructed through social interactions with family, friends, teachers and peers” (p. 19). The most recent account of a sociocultural perspective on teacher education and English language learners (ELLs) is offered by Johnson and Golombek (2020). Johnson and Golombek (2020) centre their work on eight propositions that they would use to guide teacher-educators. Because a complete discussion of the article is beyond the scope of this manuscript, this manuscript focuses on the notion of responsive mediation and proposition four: “LTE pedagogy must create opportunities to externalize everyday concepts while internalizing relevant academic concepts through authentic, goal-directed activities of teaching” (Johnson & Golombek, 2020, p. 122).

Three ideas within the fourth proposition provide the organising concepts for the theoretical framework and the findings in this research. These include everyday concepts, academic concepts, and responsive mediation. Everyday concepts are experientially based explanations of teaching, learning and student behaviour that are informed by teachers’ experiences in the classroom with students, teachers, staff, and parents. While they may be erroneous, they provide an important starting point in teacher education and professional development that should not be ignored or seen as a deficit. Rather, everyday concepts form an opportunity in professional development to link experience to learning and finally academic concepts through responsive mediation, or what Vygotsky (1986) terms, mediational space. Academic concepts are “systematic and generalizable knowledge of entities and phenomenon in the world” (Johnson & Golombek, 2020, p. 122) – a concrete phenomenon and generalisation rooted in teaching practice. Finally, responsive mediation calls on teacher educators to engage in and view the work of teacher education and professional development as a process that functions dialectically. This involves seeing their students’ learning as part of a larger interplay between the workings of personal experiences, cognition, emotion, and professional knowledge.

Successful professional development provides opportunity for teacher educators to encourage students to challenge the assumptions and scattered experiences that inform everyday concepts. Ignoring the dialectical relationships among everyday concepts, academic concepts and mediational space can lead to a deficit-oriented approach to professional development that presses students into Vygotsky’s (1986) “parrot-like repetition” of content. For Vygotsky (1986), such deficit instruction “usually accomplishes nothing but empty verbalism, a parrot-like repetition of words by the child, simulating a knowledge of the corresponding concepts but actually covering up a vacuum” (p. 150).

Context of study

The study was part of a larger five-year federally funded grant titled, Northern Nevada English Learning Initiative (NNELI), aimed at increasing the number of pre-service teachers graduating with an endorsement to teach English language learners (ELLs) and providing professional development for in-service teachers and paraprofessionals. The paraprofessional component paid the tuition for bilingual paraprofessionals employed at nearby elementary schools to take a course in second language acquisition (SLA). In northern Nevada, bilingual paraprofessionals assist teachers in everyday tasks in the classroom. This can include but is not necessarily limited to grading assignments, tutoring students individually, teaching small groups, assisting the teacher in planning lessons and other tasks as assigned by the classroom teacher.

The SLA course is the setting for this study. Author one taught the course. She also was involved in data collection, a limited amount of data analysis and, consistent with Lincoln and Guba (1985), facilitated checks for trustworthiness. Authors two and three completed the data analysis. The course was 16 weeks long, with eight weeks focused exclusively on SLA (See appendix A). The bilingual paraprofessionals completed readings on the history of SLA, models of second language proficiency, culture and cultural capital and non-linguistic influences on second language development, e.g. personality. The remaining eight weeks of the class included readings on content-based instruction and World Class Instructional Design (WIDA). WIDA is a set of standards for instruction and assessment used by teachers of English language learners in 35 states. While data from the entire 16 weeks was taken into consideration during data collection and analysis, the findings report primarily on the first eight weeks of class, as they required students to reflect on their own experiences as language learners.

Participants

The participants in this research were 13 bilingual paraprofessionals currently working in 13 elementary schools across the city. All spoke Spanish as a native language, and all had immigrated to the USA. One came as a five-year-old and spoke English with no discernible accent. Two came as adults. The rest came as children. Three held a bachelor’s degree, and two of the three were currently enrolled in an alternative route to licensure programme. Another held an associate’s degree with a certificate in library sciences, and one had a master’s degree in science education from Mexico. Pseudonyms were used in place of actual names.Anna was the only paraeducator of the group who became a licenced teacher at the time that this study was concluded in 2019. As such, she was selected to participate in an additional interview.

Questions

1. What circumstances give rise to learning that encourage the development of academic concepts?

2. How do bilingual paraprofessionals construct personal, professional, and academic connections in the use of academic concepts?

3. Following professional development, how do bilingual paraprofessionals integrate responsive mediation into their own classroom instruction?

Data collection

Data collection was conducted over the course of the 2017 fall semester and then in 2019. There were three sources of data (See Table 1). The first source of data was eight reflective writing assignments collected from each student during the first eight weeks of the second language acquisition class.

Table 1. Data sources and timeline.

Question Addressed	Data Source One	Data Source Two	Data Source Three: Background Data	Timing
One and two	Weekly reflective writing assignments			2017
One and two		Group interview		2018
Two		Individual interview		2019
One and two			Classroom-related documents. Instructional journal kept by teacher	2017

This data documents the connections in professional development coursework in relationship to their own second language learning and teaching experiences as well as the changes in these experiences and connections during professional development. The minimum length of each assignment was 100 words, but the average length of response was approximately two pages. While the assignments varied in scope and complexity, each required the bilingual paraeducators to describe what they had learned in their own words from the week’s reading and reflect on their learning. In the reflection section, the bilingual paraprofessionals were encouraged to connect observations of their own students or descriptions of their own second language learning experiences to the week’s reading.

The second source of data was the interviews, one at the group level and one more with an individual bilingual paraprofessional. Participants were divided into two separate groups to ensure everyone had an opportunity to participate. Researchers two and three conducted these interviews. The interviews lasted approximately two hours, were recorded and transcribed. Questions were grouped into two categories. To address research question one, the first set of questions queried the bilingual paraprofessionals on the relationship between their learning processes and their own experiences as second language learners and teaching English language learners (ELLs). Specifically, the bilingual paraprofessionals were asked to describe their reasons for relying heavily on the text, their initial thoughts about the content of the course and their background in learning about second language acquisition (SLA). The second set of questions addressed research question two. The bilingual paraprofessionals identified activities and experiences from their professional development coursework which they felt brought changes in the way they learned and viewed the content. Follow-up questions encouraged the participants to relate their feelings or thoughts about such activities.

The individual interview was in 2019 with Anna. Anna was chosen to participate in the individual interview because she was the only participant who later became a licenced teacher. Data from her interview informed question three, as it gave insights into how her what aspects of professional development she retained and implemented into her own teaching after finishing the course and becoming a teacher. The questions asked Anna to describe the connections between her work as a classroom teacher, a second language learner and her learning experiences in the SLA class. During the interview, she reviewed her initial responses in 2018 to refresh her memory. Anna’s responses included multiple examples of her students’ work, stories of interactions with parents, her students, and people throughout the community.

The third source of data was a collection of classroom-related documents which were used as background information to contextualise the findings for both questions. This included all readings given out, responses to assignments made by the teacher, emails to students, class announcements and a record of her lesson plans to document all instruction which included her thoughts on the students’ progress and plans for the course. Each reflection was approximately one to two pages per lesson and was in the form of a reflective journal or diary. Because the journal was used as background data, specific goals were not specified in advance. Instead, she had two broad topics she wrote about. For the first, the instructor reflected on incidents which she believed that the bilingual paraprofessionals gained new insights. Second, she commented on the connections between her own instruction and the students’ reactions to the content.

Data analysis

Thematic analysis was used to guide data analysis. Braun and Clarke (2006) define thematic analysis as a set of analytical methods used to describe, analyse, identify, and report on data-driven themes in qualitative research. The analysis drew from the three data sources, with the intention of providing a data-driven account of the findings. As such, the orientation of the analysis was primarily inductive. However, the analysis was also informed by the researchers’ own academic expertise and Johnson and Golombek (2020) theoretical framework. This allowed the researchers to render themes not directly described by the participants that could be placed within the larger research related to bilingual paraprofessionals. Consistent with the description of thematic analysis by Nowell, Norris, White, and Moules (2017), data analysis moved through six stages: 1) familiarising yourself with the data, 2) generating initial codes, 3) searching for initial themes, 4) reviewing themes, 5) defining and naming themes, and 6) producing the report. The theoretical principles which guided data analysis and development of the themes are described below.

Following a review of the data, coding began. Phase two involves the researchers in simplifying and defining broad characteristics of the data (Morse & Richards, 2002). Codes act as labels for data (Attride-Stirling, 2001). They are inclusive of the selected data yet have clear boundaries to prevent overlap with other codes. A semantic approach to coding data, as opposed to a latent approach, was used. According to Braun and Clarke (2006), the emphasis in semantic coding is on examining data at face value rather than trying to interpret underlying assumptions. Researchers two and three worked independently on coding the data from an Excel spreadsheet which included all interview and written work produced by the bilingual paraprofessionals. This provided 20 highly descriptive codes which eventually were eventually used for interpretation.

The search and review of themes, stages three and four, was next. According to DeSantis and Ugarriza (2000), a theme is “an abstract entity that brings meaning and identity to a recurrent experience … As such, a theme captures and unifies the nature of basis of experience into a meaningful whole” (p. 362). Further, themes should make connections that unify the data and address the research questions (Braun & Clarke, 2006). Researchers worked together in several meetings to search for themes. Codes which, when clustered together, represent a large portion of the data used as the basis for developing themes. Approximately ten themes were developed during this stage.

While the data analysis was grounded in the data, Johnson and Golombek (2020) sociocultural framework played an important role in stage five, defining and naming themes. Of the ten themes that that were developed, three themes were selected for their potential to provide a complete picture of the data: 1) a parrot-like repetition and the text, 2) academic concepts, the personal, responsive mediation, 3) responsive mediation as daily practice. Of the remaining seven themes, three did not have enough data to represent themes and were discarded. Two were closely related to the parrot-like repetition and so were collapsed into theme one. The remaining two were merged into theme three. Use of constructs from the fourth proposition, parroting, every day and academic concepts and responsive mediation, allowed for a high level of specificity in the analysis that was based in a contemporary discussion of language teacher education while still not departing from the data-driven and inductive nature of thematic analysis.

An example of how a theme was created is informative. The second theme provides a good example, as it includes use of the terms responsive mediation, taken directly from Johnson and Golombek (2020) fourth proposition, as well as a reference to the personal which is derived from an inductive analysis of the data. Personal experience was defined as any reference to an individual experience connected to second language learning or teaching in relationship to the text or content of the course. Examples included the language learning experiences of students, friends, or the bilingual paraprofessionals as well as the language teaching experiences of the bilingual paraprofessionals. Responsive mediation was coded for by searching for data which indicated that the bilingual paraprofessionals were making connections across the content, their personal experience, emotion, and professional knowledge. Finally, academic concepts included examples which connected elements from the personal code, e.g. language learning and teaching experiences, with the content of the course. These codes were combined as a theme because, consistent with the discussion of themes by DeSantis and Ugarriza (2000), they gave “unity” and brought “meaning” to the recurring connections the bilingual paraprofessionals made across the professional development course.

Findings

Theme 1: a parrot-like repetition and the text

This section examines data collected in the first three weeks of the course and informs the first research question. The findings demonstrate that while the bilingual paraprofessionals entered the programme with a lifetime of language learning memories and experiences and despite the teacher’s prompting to include personal experience, more than half excluded these experiences in their discussion of the text and relied on the use of parroting and everyday concepts to communicate their understanding of the content. In short, they relied on the text as the sole authority when completing their assignments. The practice, according to Johnson and Golombek (2020), is called parroting and surfaces in the absence of responsive mediation.

In the first reflective writing assignment, students were given the following task: “Describe error analysis from your readings and give an example from your experience or from your classroom observations”. The first example is from a student named Rose, a native Spanish-speaker who holds an associate’s degree from the local community college and has many years of experience as a bilingual paraprofessional. Like all her classmates, this was the first course in second language acquisition (SLA) she had ever taken.

Her response follows the first week of online instruction which took the students through a brief history of SLA. Students reviewed the history of error analysis as it relates to behaviourism and the development of the idea of inter-language. Here, Rose comments on the concept of inter-language and error analysis. Her response is clinical and divorced from her years of experience in the elementary classroom.

Inter-language is the process of learning a person goes through as they are acquiring a language. Error Analysis is looking at mistakes and attempting to understand why they are making these mistakes (Data source #1: Reflective writing assignment #1)

The second is from Marie, a bilingual paraprofessional who was born and educated in Mexico. Like Rose, Marie has years of experience in the classroom. She describes her understanding of the affective filter from Krashen (1995) also with a high level of detail but without reference to her own experience.

Affective filter “is a mental block, caused by affective factors … that prevents input from reaching the language acquisition device” (Krashen, 1995, p. 100). First comes the comprehensible input then it is met with the Affective Filter. If the filter is high with nervousness, anxiousness, boredom, stress, or insecurity the language is prevented from reaching the desired language acquisition device. “The filter will be low when the learner is relaxed or motivated” (Data source #1: Reflective writing assignment # 2)

Every student completed the assignment. All paid strict attention to the content of the text, with many of them relying on citations of the work. When they did reference a personal teaching or learning experience, it was in a third person voice and in reference to a hypothetical student rather than their own. One copied the answer from another source and was confronted for plagiarism.

In the group interview, Anna explained that she “was at first scared to tell anything but the text … I had never taken such kind of class [in reference to SLA] … It’s not how I talk … The language is so different” (Group interview). While classes at the university were not new to Anna, as she had previously earned an undergraduate degree in early childhood education, the topic of SLA was. Approximately three weeks later, her classmates echoed her sentiments about the fear of receiving a low grade if they did not accurately recount the content in a brief discussion.

Theme 2: academic concepts, the personal, responsive mediation

Theme two focuses on how the bilingual paraprofessionals moved from relying on the parroting of the text to integrating their experiences teaching and learning a second language into their written work. This integration of experience and content is the formation of academic concepts. The impetus for the change was Ms. Blue’s decision to introduce her personal experiences living in China and learning Chinese. A discussion of the findings follows. First, a brief account of Ms. Blue’s introduction of experience in China is given to contextualise the findings. Next, the ways in which the bilingual paraprofessionals responded to Ms. Blue’s efforts and their connection to theme two is described.

Ms. Blue’s introduction of her second language learning experiences was in the third week of the course. In the class, she drew on her own personal experiences as a language learner in China, selected key ideas from cultural capital and second language acquisition to frame her experiences learning a new language, and used those to model how the bilingual paraeducators to do the same.

At first, she described cultural capital in terms of her own experiences.

When I was in China there was different forms of capital that I had … I had economic capital and so I had the luxury of studying and teaching abroad … because I was an American and I had a lot of chances to have conversation partners with Chinese (Data source #2: Reflective journal, Week 3).

From there, she began to tie the idea of cultural capital to the students’ experiences. She wanted them “to experience that in their own minds”. She carefully parsed how the concept of cultural capital expands the idea that learning a language is more than just mastering a set of grammatical forms. She wrote, “Their parents for instance, don’t have that kind of capital. They don’t know how to interact with the schools … This may or may not be because they can’t speak English … .But, it is definitely the case that they feel shy about talking to teachers or people at the school” (Data source #2: Reflective journal, Week 3).

In the weeks that followed, the work of the students shifted. Evidence supported the theme, academic concepts, the personal, responsive mediation. Copying work from the text and repetitions of the text disconnected from classroom experiences was replaced by responses which represented the integration of the personal experiences learning and teaching language with the course content, i.e. the formation of academic concepts. They wrote in first person, shared interesting accounts of language learning from their own lives and distinguished themselves as individuals and language learners.

As an example, they were asked to create a descriptive profile of a friend, a student, a family member or of themselves which illustrated the workings of cultural capital (Data source #2: Lesson plans). The example below was written by Evelyn, a bilingual paraprofessional at a local elementary school.

Monica had culture capital because her mother graduated from Stanford University and her father graduated from Berkley. Monica also worked very hard for things she never gave up. Monica was very motivated to use her social capital she is a very social person she did cross country in high school and, she volunteered a lot she motivated her younger siblings to work hard to get somewhere (Data source #1: Reflective Writing, Week 5).

What was also evident was that their learning had begun to take the shape of an academic concept. In the example below, the Anna readily opens a discussion of what she learned about recasting. Recasting is a technique that is used when a student makes an error during speaking. Following a student error, the teacher restates what the student says in a way which does not impede the progress of the conversation. Below, Anna explains her understanding of recasting as it presents itself within her own classroom.

I am working in a school where most of the students are second language acquisition learners. I am teacher aid in a kindergarten class, and I have 5 students who need SLA support … .[A student] had a great confidence with me because he did not speak English. He speaks Spanish. I am the only person to whom he has communication in his native language and so I do. I have learned about what that means in recasts … I can remember being in his shoes and trying to learn English (Data source 3: Group interview).

The knowledge of recasting gives Anna an academic lens to view and understand the students’ learning while her proficiency in Spanish helps to build a rapport with her student. Anna writes in first person about a student she teaches and readily integrates the recasting into her everyday teaching.

In the group interview, Anna recounted this in her paper below as she reflected on the times that Ms. Blue talked about her experiences in Japan in reference to Peirce’s (1995) work.

I almost cried one day when you were explaining an EL student, and I was like, Ohhh she’s just describing me and how I learn and how frustrated I am when I can’t understand something. Or how I can drop the ball because I’m not doing it because I don’t get it. It touched my heart because I understood myself better (Data source #3: Group interview).

Theme 3: responsive mediation as daily practice

The NNELI programme closed at the end of 2018. In 2019, Anna agreed to revisit her experiences as a student in NNELI. Anna was an immigrant who was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, with the dream of becoming a bilingual teacher. After completing some college work in Guadalajara, she immigrated to Los Angeles to pursue her dream. After one year of English language classes at a community college in southern California, she moved to Nevada to become a bilingual paraprofessional. She took additional English language classes at the local community college before transferring to a nearby university. She worked as a bilingual paraprofessional in the local school district for 15 years while also studying for her undergraduate degree in human development and family studies. During those 15 years, Anna taught at seven different elementary schools, each time for the opportunity to earn more money or attain better insurance. When she came to the NNELI programme in 2017, she was still working as a bilingual paraprofessional but on the path towards becoming a fully licenced teacher. In 2019, she enrolled in an alternative route to licensure programme and began teaching pre-school as a bilingual teacher.

The findings below inform question three. They demonstrate how the experience of the SLA class lead her to similarly infuse responsive mediation into her own work as a pre-school teacher. The data, as mentioned above, comes from the individual interview with Anna and a half-day visit to her classroom. She was now a pre-school teacher enrolled in an alternative route to licensure programme, and the problems that she and her students face as a part of the community in Nevada are many. The school has a population of English language learners that exceeds 50%, and all but two of her students come from homes where English is not the primary language. A recent report by Sugarman and Geary (2018) finds that just 12.7% of the ELLs will meet standards for reading by grade four.

Nevertheless, she explains that her teaching invokes the use of responsive mediation and the personal from the professional development class. As an example, to help the parents and students connect to learning in a personal way, parents are regular visitors to her classroom to read books to the children, help with classroom chores or eat lunch with the children. The music that they enjoy and the work that they do becomes a part of the curriculum.

Because these families are low income, and they feel shy. So, I welcome them and tell them, ‘Tell me what you want.’ So, I am teaching them songs that are from family and from their country. But I think that they feel welcome and they [their cultures] are a part of this country. This week I am inviting two moms to talk about their jobs. I want them to feel proud of how much they work (Data source #3, Individual interview).

She brings over 100 books to the class every two weeks for the children to read. They take the books home with a note asking the parents to read the books to their children. She explains, “I tell them that these books are yours … not to take home, but when you read to them, they are a part of you”. The students and parents are delighted. They see the experience of learning academically as deeply connected to the personal. Reading books and learning, as Anna explains, “live in your heart”.

Invoking the personal stories, she saw modelled in NNELI, she shares stories of her childhood. Below, she explains how she hopes to engender a sense of pride in where they live.

I teach them. I ask them, “What’s your address? [They will say], “Mexico’ (She laughs) They know the pledge of allegiance. We do it every morning. This is like loving the place where you live. We sing the state song and we sing the song. I make them feel part of the country. I show them the state. We draw it. We color it. So, I make them feel part of the country. We talk about the weather and the horses, the wild horses (Data source #3: Individual interview)

Moreover, “I push them”, she remarks. I ask what she means, and she begins to tell how within the NNELI programme the teacher in the SLA class told them that they could get their teaching licence.

Anna:

I couldn’t believe that I could do that, but she [Mrs. Blue] said we could

Researcher:

She pushed you.

Anna:

Yes, she shook us up.

Researcher:

Do you push the students? (Data source #3: Individual interview)

Anna laughed and said, “Yes, I am always pushing them, too … I tell them that if you are bilingual, it makes your brain stronger”. The story is simple, but, as she explains, it is related to what she learned about the second language acquisition (SLA) researcher named Stephen Krashen who argued that bilingualism builds cognition and made a powerful case for bilingual education. The simple comment for Anna is yet another powerful example of her efforts to infuse responsive mediation into her work as a classroom teacher.

Discussion and implications for practice

Overall, the findings suggest that forces outside of those explored by critical theorists are at work in the professional development experience of bilingual paraprofessionals. Bilingual paraprofessionals bring a wealth of personal and professional teaching and learning experiences to the classroom that can inform their learning, but it is incumbent upon the teacher educator to develop a personal space that allows these professional and personal experiences to grow. More specifically and consistent with Johnson and Golombek (2020), when paraeducators draw their own experiences as language learners during professional development, it allows bilingual paraprofessionals to move from viewing professional development as a series of isolated lessons disconnected from their own lives to seeing it as a web of connections across personal experience, cognition, emotion and professional knowledge. The following section provides implications for practice appropriate for teacher educators.

Implications for practice

First, content selection in the professional development for bilingual paraprofessionals should be rooted in their interest as professionals but also their experiences as individuals. It is perhaps surprising that bilingual paraprofessionals would respond so favourably to a course on SLA, given the extensive use of specialised language and data from experimental studies. Lin (2015) found that in-service teachers favoured coursework on teaching practice rather than the disciplinary knowledge around TESOL. The reasoning, according to Lin, was that teachers were most likely responding to the significant pressure in South Australia to raise test scores.

For teacher educators planning professional development coursework, the implications suggest a slightly different approach than what Lin (2014) offers. To be sure, the same pressure is present in the USA, particularly in Nevada where a record number of English learners are struggling to meet standards, but findings from this study would suggest that individual experience must be factored in. Selection of content for the course came from a recognition of the bilingual paraprofessionals as individuals with the shared experience of learning a second language in the host culture. While the content was quite challenging at times, it was not disconnected from their own personal experiences or professional interests and goals. They could see themselves reflected in the curriculum.

Finally, structural inequities among bilingual paraprofessionals are valuable sources in the planning of the programme. The findings from this study suggest that research into paraprofessionals can be used to identify and break down economic, social, and educational barriers. Through careful planning in the initial stages of writing the grant, the Northern Nevada English Language Learning Initiative (NNELI) grant programme gave students the opportunity to earn credit for their coursework and receive financial incentive when they completed the programme. Moreover, the online element was meant to be a flexible alternative to coming to a weekly class, as all the paraprofessionals were currently working full time.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Shawn G. Pennelle

Shawn Pennell has been in education for the past fifteen years. She has taught in K-12 and higher education as well as educational administration. Her work on educational grants in ELA, STEM, and educational technology have been transformative to both her and the community she serves. She is currently working on her Ph. D. In Educational Leadership.

R. E. Case

Rod E. Case is an associate professor of TESOL at the University of Nevada, Reno. His research interests are in second language acquisition and pragmatics as well as cognitive linguistics.

G. Williams

Gwendolyn Williams is an associate professor of TESOL at Auburn University. Her interests and research are in teacher education and content-based language instruction.

Appendix A

Module 1

Weeks 1 and 2

-Introduction to second language acquisition

–Error analysis, interlanguage

–Introduction to second language acquisition (Video)

Assignment: Summarise error analysis and reflect on your experience learning a second language and/or describe observations of your students as it relates to errors and learning.

Weeks 3 and 4

-Stephen Krashen and the monitor model: silent period, affective filter, monitor, acquisition, and learning

Assignment: Summarise Krashen’s work and reflect on your experience learning a second language and/or describe observations of your students

Weeks 5 and 6

-Cultural Capital and connections to EL students, e.g. acculturation, assimilation, accommodation, cultural capital, power, and privilege

Assignment: Create a cultural capital profile of yourself.

Weeks 7 and 8

-Language Learning and Power

Assignment: After being introduced to Peirce (1995), students are asked to reflect on the working of power and language learning in their own lives and/or observations of their students.