Enacting the Work of Language Instruction, Vol. 2

INTRODUCTION

When I wrote the introduction to the first volume of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction: High-Leverage Teaching Practices in 2016, I had just taught a methods course for K-16 teachers of various languages for the first time in over a decade. In preparing that course, the concept of praxis—or the dialogic relationship between what teachers know (i.e., research-based principles) and what they are able to do (i.e., classroom practice)—was foundational to my thinking (Lantolf & Poehner, 2014). Since then, praxis has come to define much of what I do as a teacher-scholar: It is reflected in the projects, resources, and professional development carried out at the Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA); it undergirds my research into teacher understandings and implementation of multiliteracies pedagogy; and it frames the courses I teach, both those for undergraduate students of French and those for graduate student teacher-learners.

In 2018, I had the opportunity to teach methods again, this time for new graduate students in French, German, and Spanish at the University of Minnesota. The course provided these teacher-learners with their first look into the science of teaching and how it is manifested in lower-level postsecondary language classrooms. Praxis therefore played an essential role in the design and implementation of this methods course, as well. Indeed, the high-leverage teaching practices (HLTPs) introduced in Volume I of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction provided praxis-based grounding for the research studied in the course. Specifically, students read about these practices in relation to key pedagogical and theoretical concepts from communicative and multiliteracies approaches (Paesani, Allen, & Dupuy, 2016; Shrum & Glisan, 2016); deconstructed each practice; brainstormed ways to apply practices in their classrooms; and reported back to the class. This enactment sequence, which was mediated by methods course activities, tools presented in the readings, and follow-up discussions, demonstrates the flexibility of the cycle suggested in both volumes of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction, which can be adapted to fit the affordances and constraints of various teacher education contexts.

Given the integration of HLTPs into the methods course, I was thrilled when the authors invited me to write this introduction to Volume II of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction. I was eager to discover the new practices and to consider how they might fit into the next iteration of the methods course. As I began reading the manuscript, it was immediately evident how these four practices could be used to support additional theoretical and pedagogical concepts introduced in the methods course, including backward design, student learning outcomes, and genre-based writing instruction. Also striking was the interconnectedness of the HLTPs introduced in both books: The study and enactment of one practice, such as establishing a meaningful and purposeful context for language instruction (HLTP #7, Volume II), supports the study and enactment of another, such as facilitating target language comprehensibility (HLTP #1, Volume I). Finally, because each of these practices is centered on those tasks and activities that are essential for skillful beginning teachers to understand, take responsibility for, and be prepared to carry out in order to enact their core instructional responsibilities (Ball & Forzani, 2009, p. 504), rather than on a specific method or approach, HLTPs from Volumes I and II complement the communicative- and multiliteracies-oriented curriculum of my methods course. Indeed, this is the beauty of the HLTPs presented in Enacting the Work of Language Instruction: They can be mixed, matched, and introduced in any order that makes sense for teacher education programs, regardless of its pedagogical or theoretical orientation.

Volume II of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction fills an important void in HLTP scholarship by introducing four additional core practices, grounded in current research on second language acquisition, language pedagogy, and teacher development. Yet since the publication of Volume I, surprisingly little research investigating HLTPs in K-12 and postsecondary language learning contexts has been published, despite multiple calls for this work (e.g., Davin & Troyan, 2015; Hlas & Hlas, 2012; Kearney, 2015; Paesani, Allen, Donato, & Kearney, 2017). Research emerging over the past four years has focused on defining language-specific HLTPs (e.g., Goldman, 2019; Neri, Lozano, Chang, & Herman, 2017; Zhai, 2019) and on preparing language teachers to use HLTPs (e.g. Peercy, Varghese, & Dubetz, 2019; Troyan & Peercy, 2016). The current book, which provides a more robust set of teaching practices, creates an opportunity for increased and innovative research into HLTPs in language education. Investigating how these practices are enacted in K-12 and postsecondary classrooms will help us better understand teacher practice and its impact on student learning, and will help determine the sub-practices that are most salient for each HLTP. In addition, studying how educators mediate teachers’ understanding and enactment of HLTPs will contribute to current research on teacher conceptual development, in general, and on responsive mediation, in particular (e.g., Johnson & Golombek, 2016, 2020). Longitudinal research on HLTP enactment and mediation is also needed, not only for deeper understandings of teacher learning, but also for the creation of additional tools and resources to support teachers and teacher educators in implementing and refining practices essential to carrying out praxis-based language instruction. An example is the podcast series, presented in the form of TedEd lessons, created by the National Foreign Language Resource Center (NFLRC) at the University of Hawai’i. This tool enhances the chapters in Enacting the Work of Language Instruction by providing insights into and additional resources for each HLTP presented in Volume I (NFLRC, 2019).

An important focus of the body of work on HLTPs has been on novice teachers and what they need to know and be able to do to teach successfully in K-12 and postsecondary language classrooms. Yet in this book’s preliminary chapter, the authors are careful to emphasize that the HLTPs they introduce represent the minimum expectations for both novice and experienced language teachers. Moving forward, it will be important to consider this latter group more deliberately. Not only is there much to learn from their classroom experiences, but experienced teachers also require continued support as they hone their practices and deepen their conceptual understandings. Moreover, in postsecondary language departments, as well as in Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate programs at the secondary level, these more experienced instructors are often teaching courses grounded in literary-cultural content. Understanding which HLTPs are relevant for such courses and how those HLTPs are applied in them will be key to supporting this group of teachers. For instance, in an advanced methods course focused on how best to teach literary-cultural content, teacher-learners might explore in greater depth HLTP #3, guiding learners to interpret and discuss authentic texts (Volume I) and HLTP #9, engaging learners in purposeful written communication (Volume II). In studying practices and pedagogies that prioritize critical engagement with target language texts and development of advanced language functions such as communicating in paragraph-length discourse across time frames (ACTFL, 2012), these two HLTPs can be put into dialogue with one another in ways that go beyond the minimum expectations for effective language teaching.

Attention to experienced teachers also provides opportunities to more fully understand and encourage teachers’ adaptive expertise as it develops over time. In Chapter 5 below the authors define ‘adaptive expertise’ as the ability to modify and extend the instructional moves previously deconstructed in order to address novel instructional situations and learner needs. Longitudinal observation of how more experienced teachers (i.e., those who have likely internalized the routines associated with a given HLTP) exercise the decision making, agency, creativity, and experimentation needed to modify HLTPs for use in a range of contexts can inform the ways we might support less experienced teachers in becoming adaptive experts. Furthermore, providing novice and experienced instructors with praxis-based resources, tools, and professional development experiences that support specific HLTPs creates an optimal environment for fostering adaptive expertise. CARLA’s Summer Institute Program provides an interesting testing ground for cultivating this expertise. Our audience is comprised of novice and experienced instructors who are eager to fine-tune their current practices and appropriate new knowledge and techniques. In my own summer institute on foreign language literacies development, for instance, teachers represent contexts ranging from middle school English as a second language (ESL) to post-secondary Chinese culture, and experience levels ranging from one to over 20 years in the classroom. An important objective of this institute is to create literacies-oriented lessons that foster deep engagement with target language texts and reflect theoretical and pedagogical concepts explored through readings and class discussions. The tools presented in Chapter 1 for establishing a meaningful and purposeful context for language instruction will help teachers meet this learning objective, develop routine expertise, and adapt what they have learned for their specific context and learner needs. I am thus eager to experiment with this and other HLTPs from Volume II of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction in my summer institute and beyond to foster teachers’ agency and creativity and support them as they develop students’ interpersonal, interpretive, and presentational communication through engagement with target language texts.

Kate Paesani

Director, Center for Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA)

University of Minnesota

References

ACTFL. (2012). ACTFL proficiency guidelines 2012. Alexandria, VA: Author.

Ball, D. L., & Forzani, F. M. (2009). The work of teaching and the challenge of teacher education. Journal of Teacher Education, 60, 497-511.

Davin, K. J., & Troyan, F. J. (2015). The implementation of high-leverage teaching practices: From the university classroom to the field site. Foreign Language Annals, 48, 124-142.

Goldman, J. (2019). Six high-leverage writing practices for teaching English language learners in English language arts. In L. de Oliveira, K. Obenchain, R. Kenney, & A. Oliveira (Eds.), Teaching the content areas to English language learners in secondary schools. English language education, Volume 17 (pp. 65-84). Basel, Switzerland: Springer.

Hlas, A. C., & Hlas, C. S. (2012). A review of high-leverage teaching practices: Making connections between mathematics and foreign languages. Foreign Language Annals, 45(S1), S76-S97.

Johnson, K. E., & Golombek, P. R. (2016). Mindful L2 teacher education: A sociocultural perspective on cultivating teachers’ professional development. New York: Routledge.

Johnson, K. E., & Golombek, P. R. (2020). Informing and transforming language teacher education pedagogy. Language Teaching Research, 24, 116-127.

Kearney, E. (2015). A high-leverage language teaching practice: Leading an open-ended group discussion. Foreign Language Annals, 48, 100-123.

Lantolf, J. P., & Poehner, M. E. (2014). Sociocultural theory and the pedagogical imperative in L2 education: Vygotskian praxis and the research/practice divide. New York: Routledge.

Neri, R., Lozano, M., Chang, S., & Herman, J. (2017). High-leverage principles of effective instruction for English learners. From college and career ready standards to teaching and learning in the classroom: A series of resources for teachers. Los Angeles: The Regents of the University of California.

NFLRC. (2019). High-leverage teaching practices. Retrieved from https://nflrc.hawaii.edu/events/view/120/

Paesani, K., Allen, H. W., Donato, R., & Kearney, E. (2017, February). Perspectives on high-leverage teaching practices. Panel presentation at the 10th International Conference on Language Teacher Education, University of California, Los Angeles.

Paesani, K., Allen, H. W., & Dupuy, B. (2016). A multiliteracies framework for collegiate foreign language teaching. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Peercy, M. M., Varghese, M., & Dubetz, N. (2019). Critically examining practice-based teacher education for teachers of language minoritized youth. TESOL Quarterly, 53, 1173-1185.

Shrum, J. L., & Glisan, E. W. (2016). Teacher’s handbook: Contextualized language instruction (5th ed.). Boston: Cengage.

Troyan, F. J., & Peercy, M. M. (2016). Novice teachers’ perspectives on learning in lesson rehearsals in second language teacher preparation. International Multilingual Research Journal, 10(3), 188-200.

Zhai, L. (2019). Illuminating the enactment of high-leverage teaching practices in an exemplary world language teaching video library. American Educational Research Journal, 56(5), 1681-1717. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831218824289

PRELIMINARY CHAPTER

Completing the Set of High-Leverage Teaching Practices for Language Instruction

The field of teacher education is currently in the midst of an evolution that situates practice at the center of teacher education with a focus on preparing teachers to enact the work of teaching. In fact, in recent years, the notion of engaging prospective teachers in doing teaching rather than simply talking about it has begun to take root, largely as a result of research and professional dialogue in the area of high-leverage teaching practices (HLTPs) (Hlas & Hlas, 2012; Sleep, 2009). HLTPs are the tasks and activities that are essential for skillful beginning teachers to understand, take responsibility for, and be prepared to carry out in order to enact their core instructional responsibilities (Ball & Forzani, 2009, p. 504). Professional discussion has centered on the identification of specific high-leverage teaching practices, often called core practices, across disciplines and levels of instruction that are essential for novices to control before they are permitted to assume independent responsibility for a classroom (Forzani, 2014, p. 357). Although the concept of HLTP is directed specifically to what is necessary to become an accomplished novice teacher, these practices have also been found to be critical to the work of all teachers and therefore not exclusively relevant to only those newly initiated into the profession (Zhai, 2019).

The first volume of Enacting the Work of Language Instruction: High-Leverage Teaching Practices introduced foreign language educators to the concept of HLTPs and presented a set of six practices that are essential for teachers, both novice and experienced, to enact in their classrooms to support second language learning and development. The book was designed to assist language teachers in enacting these six practices by deconstructing and practicing them within a broader ‘Cycle of Enactment’ that also features rehearsal, coaching, and self-assessment (Grossman & McDonald, 2008; Lampert et al., 2013; Lampert & Graziani, 2009). Presented in the first volume were the following six HLTPs, selected because they are learnable in initial teacher preparation programs, have been shown to be developmentally appropriate for novices, represent fundamental skills of language teaching, are interconnected and mutually support each other (i.e., one builds on the other), and are key to supporting students’ language learning (Glisan & Donato, 2017, p. 11):

HLTP#1:   Facilitating Target Language Comprehensibility

HLTP#2:   Building a Classroom Discourse Community

HLTP#3:   Guiding Learners to Interpret and Discuss Authentic Texts

HLTP#4:   Focusing on Form in a Dialogic Context Through PACE

HLTP#5:   Focusing on Cultural Products, Practices, and Perspectives in a Dialogic Context

HLTP#6:   Providing Oral Corrective Feedback to Improve Learner Performance

It is important to note four caveats regarding these six HLTPs. First, these practices are complex inasmuch as they consist of a set of ‘instructional moves’ that are not always visible to an observer (Ball & Forzani, 2009; Lewis, 2007). Thus, modeling alone is insufficient for teaching a novice how to carry out these fundamental practices of language instruction. Second, they are necessary for teachers to engage in ‘ambitious teaching’—that is, instructional experiences that support students in carrying out cognitively demanding tasks (Troyan, Davin, & Donato, 2013, p. 174). Third, these six HLTPs represent minimum expectations for both novices and more experienced teachers alike and therefore do not represent the maximum scope of what a language teacher should be able to do in the classroom. Finally, as stated in the first volume, these practices are not the only HLTPs that …teachers should know, and there are others (Glisan & Donato, 2017, p. 11; see also Zhai, 2009).

This second volume continues the discussion of HLTPs as they apply to the field of foreign language instruction and presents four additional practices that all language teachers should be able to perform in the classroom. The inclusion of these practices in this volume completes the set of 10 HLTPs that language teachers should be expected to enact, as a minimum, in their classrooms in order to bring about language development and learning on the part of their learners. These four practices, which will be explained, deconstructed, and detailed, form the focus of this volume:

HLTP#7:   Establishing a Meaningful and Purposeful Context for Language Instruction

HLTP#8:   Planning for Instruction Using an Iterative Process for Backward Design

HLTP#9:   Engaging Learners in Purposeful Written Communication

HLTP#10: Developing Contextualized Performance Assessments

Rationale for Inclusion of the Final Four HLTPs

The first set of six practices addressed how to make target language use comprehensible; how to build a classroom discourse community; how to guide learners to interpret and discuss authentic texts; how to focus on form as well as on cultural products, practices, and perspectives in a dialogic context; and how to provide oral corrective feedback. These HLTPs feature a primary focus on oral interpersonal communication, which is undeniably paramount in the language classroom. However, there are four additional practices that teachers should be able to enact as a minimum in order to address the fuller picture of language learning and classroom practice while providing further support for oral and written communication. As was the case with the six HLTPs introduced in the first volume, these four practices should be familiar to a language professional as part of a teacher preparation program. Consequently, teachers should recognize their usefulness for teaching and facilitating language learning. While these four practices are equally challenging, they do, however, share two characteristics that set them apart from the initial six HLTPs:

1. The theoretical basis for these practices emanated from more general educational theory, research, and practice dealing with issues in learning and development. That is, this research was done outside of foreign language education or second language acquisition and then applied to our field. Thus, enactment