WIDA Spanish Language Development Standards
https://www.wida.us/standards/sld.aspx
English Proficiency Assessment for the 21st Century (ELPA21)
www.elpa21.org
Discussion Questions
1. Why do you think the balance and balloon picture theories of bilingualism and cognition were held so intuitively by many people?
Discuss how these theories, along with the contrasting dual iceberg
theory, compare with the findings of cognitive research about
bilingualism and the brain as presented in Chapter 7 .
2. Why is the construct of ‘academic language’ problematic? In what
ways have you seen students use less than perfect English to
accomplish academic tasks?
3. Some have argued that teachers only need simple theories of
language such as the BICS/CALP distinction and the four quadrants
model, because sophisticated and competing language, bilingualism,
and language learning theories are too complex to inform practice.
How does such an argument view teachers? And how are newer
understandings of language, bilingualism, and language learning
moving the field forward with more effective instructional practices?
