explicit vocabulary teaching in a second grade dual
TRANSCRIPT
EXPLICIT VOCABULARY TEACHING IN A SECOND GRADE DUAL LANGUAGE CLASSROOM
By
JIAYI XU
A THESIS PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF
MASTER OF ARTS IN EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
2017
© 2017 Jiayi Xu
To my beloved parents and teachers
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I thank my parents who support my study in the United States during the past two
years, despite the far distance between us.
I want to express my gratitude to Dr. Ester de Jong as well, who is my advisor,
for her instructions and suggestions.
I also want to thank my peers and friends I meet in the University of Florida, for
their friendship and accompany.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS page
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................. 4
LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ 7
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................. 8
ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................... 9
CHAPTER
1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 10
2 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK ............................................................................... 11
What is Academic Language? ................................................................................ 11
What is Academic Vocabulary? .............................................................................. 16 Why Is Academic Vocabulary Important for ELLs ................................................... 17 Vocabulary Development ........................................................................................ 18
Vocabulary Instruction ............................................................................................ 19
3 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................... 22
4 DATA ANALYSIS .................................................................................................... 24
FFI - Pronunciation Input ........................................................................................ 26
FFI - Form Exemplification ...................................................................................... 26 MFI - Question Embedment .................................................................................... 27 MFI - Synonym & Antonym ..................................................................................... 28
UFI - Collocation ..................................................................................................... 28 UFI - Grammar Development .................................................................................. 29
5 RESULTS ............................................................................................................... 30
Textbook-Selected, Teacher-Selected, and Contingently Defined Vocabulary ....... 30
The Application of Form, Meaning, and Use Focused Input ................................... 33 Form Focused Input ................................................................................................ 34 Meaning Focused Input .......................................................................................... 35 Use Focused Input .................................................................................................. 36 Summary ................................................................................................................ 38
6 DISCUSSIONS ....................................................................................................... 41
7 CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS ................................................................... 44
APPENDIX: THE GREAT BALL GAME ........................................................................ 45
6
LIST OF REFERENCES ............................................................................................... 47
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ............................................................................................ 50
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LIST OF TABLES
Table page 1-1 School Navigational Language and Curriculum Content Language in Bailey &
Heritage, 2008. ................................................................................................... 13
1-2 What “knowing a word” means. .......................................................................... 18
5-1 Key vocabulary list and the definitions. ............................................................... 31
5-2 Frequency of the use of the target vocabulary.................................................... 31
5-3 Number of each input. ........................................................................................ 34
6-1 Functions of the key vocabulary in the text. ........................................................ 39
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
BICS Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills
CALP Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency
CCL Content Curriculum Language
ELL English Language Leaner
FFI Form Focused Input
MFI Meaning Focused Input
SNL Social Navigational Language
UFI Use Focused Input
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Abstract of Thesis Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in Education
EXPLICIT VOCABULARY TEACHING IN A SECOND GRADE DUAL LANGUAGE CLASSROOM
By
Jiayi Xu
May 2017
Chair: Ester de Jong Major: Curriculum and Instruction
Academic language instruction is always perceived as an important part of
academic success. Its base, vocabulary instruction, has a particular status in education.
This thesis investigates how textbook-selected, teacher-selected and contingently
defined vocabulary are taught. The data investigated comes from the transcripts of the
videos taped in a class of a two-way immersion program in North Florida, United States.
The use of the target vocabulary is selected from the transcripts of the teacher’s speech
and divided into 3 categories. The analysis of the data suggests that, 1) The use of
Question Embedment is dominant among all the strategies in teaching target
vocabulary, which might be a good and necessary strategy in vocabulary instruction. 2)
No evident difference is found in the instruction of textbook-selected, teacher-selected,
and contingently defined vocabulary. The findings might help teachers to refine their
vocabulary instruction strategies and thus improve the education of academic language
overall.
.
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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
In the United States, the number of English Language Learner (ELL) students
keeps growing. National Center for Education Statistics (2014) reports that in 2002-
2003, there were about 4.1 million ELL students in public schools, taking approximately
8.7 percentage of the total number. Beardsley (2015) follows the growth of the number
of ELL students in a large, urban district. The number of ELL students was 2153 in 2003
– 2004, and in 2013-2014, it became 4852. Ruiz-de-Velasco & Fix (2000) examine the
demographic change in several urban areas. They found that number of ELL students
had grown by 5 to 10 percent respectively, and the percent growth in California reached
35 percent by the year 2000. ELL students’ academic achievement “has lagged
significantly behind” compared with their peers whose first language is English
(Echevarria, Vogt & Short, 2004, p. 6). The educators in the global era need to develop
the educational programs and pedagogies, to accommodate the ELL students, so that
they will be able to achieve academic success.
Academic language proficiency has been identified as one key variable in
supporting ELLs’ success in school (Genesee, et al., 2005). The purpose of this study
was to examine the role of vocabulary development in the context of an English
language arts classroom. In the following sections, the literature review discusses
academic language is and how a vocabulary can be taught; the data analysis part
investigates how the transcripts in this study are categorized; the results of the analysis
are discussed and conclusions would be drawn from the discussion.
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CHAPTER 2 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
What is Academic Language?
Academic language is an important factor in the education system, and has been
emphasized in education for a long time. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB,
2001) mandates that all English Language Learners (ELLs) must be assessed every
year in not just content areas, but also their English language proficiency. The recently-
passed Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 (ESSA, 2015) makes further requirement
towards the teaching of English. It mandates that “each State plan shall demonstrate
that the State has adopted English language proficiency standards that—(1) are derived
from the 4 recognized domains of speaking, listening, reading, and writing; (2) address
the different proficiency levels of English learners; and (3) are aligned with the
challenging State academic standards” (p. 25).
Cummins (1980) initially proposes the concepts of Basic Interpersonal
Communication Skills (BICS) and Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP). In
later literature, BICS is often considered as social language, and CALP as the precursor
to academic language (Anstrom et al., 2010). The concept of academic language has
been defined by various studies from different perspectives, and placed under multiple
environments and situations. As Anstrom et al. (2010) describes, there are primarily
three difficulties in defining academic language. First, the understanding of the nature of
academic language varies from person by person. Researchers from different fields
often analyze academic language contexts with their own discipline, so that the
conclusion, categorization, or classification could differ tremendously. Another difficulty
is the complicated nature of academic language itself. With the growth of students’
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language proficiency and other linguistic knowledge, the language used in instruction
changes year by year. Take as an example the theories proposed by Bailey and
Heritage (2008). They note that the same phrase or vocabulary item could be classified
as either type of language depending on age or proficiency level. A simple question like
“What day is it today?” could be categorized as academic language for an English
learner in Grade 1, but as the student moves into higher grade, the question will be
more likely categorized as the social language. In addition, although the definitions are
still increasing from all the related fields, such as education, linguistics, and other social
sciences, few empirical works have provided a systematic construct of academic
language (Bailey & Huang, 2011).
Despite its difficulty of defining academic language precisely, many researchers
have built distinct frameworks to describe the nature of academic language as
completely as possible. Scarcella (2003) defines academic language as “a variety or a
register of English in professional books and characterized by the specific linguistic
features associated with academic disciplines” (p. 13). Scarcella later comments that as
English varies depending on multiple factors such as themes of dialogues, regional
variations, social class distinctions, ethnicity differences, and the change of time,
academic language also keeps changing in educational fields. Inspired by Kern (2000),
in which academic literacy is divided into three dimensions: linguistic, cognitive and
sociocultural/psychological, Scarcella creates a framework encompassing five
components of academic language. Five components include the phonological, lexical,
grammatical, sociolinguistic, and discourse one. The phonological component indicates
the knowledge that language learners need to know about stress intonation, and sound
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patterns. The lexical component refers to the knowledge of three categories: general
words used in everyday situations as well as all kinds of academic disciplines, technical
terms used in specific academic disciplines, and the nontechnical words used in
multiple academic discipline but not used often in everyday situations. The grammatical
component entails not just the grammar used in everyday English, but also additional
ones such as complex clauses, subjunctive mood, and passive voice. The
sociolinguistic component contains the knowledge of several language functions like
cause and effect, explaining, and arguing. The discourse component means the
knowledge of discourse features such transitional signals. Language learners need to
know these features and receive cognitive training, so that they could improve their
language proficiency in academic language.
Bailey and Heritage, on the other hand, divide academic language into two parts:
“School Navigational Language (SNL) and Curriculum Content Language (CCL)” (2008,
p.15). SNL refers to the language used by teachers and students to communicate at
schools in a broad sense; CCL refers to the language used to teach and learn academic
contents. The difference between SNL and CCL is showed in Table 1-1.
Table 1-1. School Navigational Language and Curriculum Content Language in Bailey & Heritage, 2008.
School Navigational Language Curriculum Content Language
Purpose To communicate to teachers and peers in a broad school setting (including classroom management).
To communicate to teachers and peers about the content of instruction (including lesson materials, textbooks, tests, etc.)
Formality Informal and formal. Combination of both contextualized and decontextualized language.
Formal. Precise use of language/terminology, complete and complex sentences, lexical diversity, decontextualized referents, variety of genres (narrative and expository).
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Table 1-1. Continued
School Navigational Language Curriculum Content Language
Context of use (setting)
School non-instructional time (including homeroom, lunch room, and playground). School instructional time (focused on classroom management; personal relationship).
School instructional time (focused on concept learning).
Context of acquisition
Largely acquired without explicit instruction, unless student is an ELL student.
Acquired with and without explicit instruction. ELL students, especially, may need instruction.
Modality Predominantly oral language. Both oral and written language.
Teacher expectations
Students will readily learn language skills unless the student is an ELL (English Language Learner) student.
All students will need to acquire linguistic and pragmatic skills for both general use (cutting across disciplines) and specialized within a discipline/ Some teachers will hold students accountable for use of “precise” CCL; others and even the same teachers at different times will allow informal/imprecise uses.
Grade level expectations
More sophisticated uses of language. Teachers assume prior grades have prepared student to acquire the language (including reading and writing) necessary to take notes, read directions, etc. Redesignated ELL students are expected to be able to manage language demands of the classroom interaction.
More sophisticated uses of language. Higher graders rely on students having learned CCL of prior grades and rely on their reading ability to access and engage with the curriculum and on their writing ability to display or assess their learning. Redesignated ELL students are expected to be able to manage language demands of instruction.
Based on the division of SNL and CCL, Bailey and Huang (2011) further divide
academic language into three levels: word, sentence, and discourse within each
context. Bailey pointed out that with these three levels, it is easier for researchers to tell
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the differences inside academic English of “lexical, grammatical, and discourse
features,” and thus differentiate “the academic disciplines, grade levels, and proficiency
levels” (p. 9).
At the word level, language learners need to make their knowledge of language
broader and deeper by connecting meaning with lexical items, and relating new lexical
items with those they have already known such as antonyms and synonyms. Bailey and
Huang identified three kinds of academic words that language learners would study in
an academic environment. The first one is general academic vocabulary, which is used
across multiple academic fields, such as “explore,” and “demonstrate.” The second one
is context-specific academic vocabulary, of which the meaning differs from those in a
daily context, such as “diamond” in geometry referring to a shape instead of a kind of
jewel. The final one is specialized academic words, which only belong to specific
discipline, such as “vertebral” in biology.
In the level of sentence, language learners are required to pay more attention on
linguistic features like word order, parts of speech, morphology, and grammar.
Furthermore, the ability to decode complex sentence structures is needed to understand
the academic contexts which contains comparison, preposition structures, and logical
transitions. Bailey et al. (2007) also finds that among subjects, the knowledge of
sentences is not evenly required. For example, passive voices tend to be more frequent
in science and social studies compared with mathematics.
In the level of discourse, language learners should be able to combine sentences
orally or in writing to make logical and meaningful discourses to express their ideas,
such as an argument, a point, an explanation, or other knowledge. The discourses of
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the same function could be organized in vastly different in social or academic context.
Take explaining as an example. While explaining to friends, people tend to use shorter
sentence and common words; while explaining the same idea in an academic
environment, longer sentences and noun phrases would be applied more often. So how
to organize a discourse is also an important part of evaluate a language learner’s
proficiency.
These linguistic features vary according to the discipline. Each subject has its
own demand on language skills. In science, for example, students need to develop their
skill of theorizing, concluding, and defining to meet the requirement of making scientific
proposals. In social studies, the skills of interpreting, comparing and contrasting, and
enumerating are often required for students to exploit cases and then express what they
have learned. As a result, the content in which academic English happen should be
taken into consideration.
What is Academic Vocabulary?
As one important component of academic language, academic vocabulary is
often discussed in the literature that investigates the nature of academic language. In
Anstorm et al. (2010), academic vocabulary is defined as “words students must
comprehend in order to access the concepts associated with a particular discipline, and
also use in order to display their acquisition of these concepts” (p. 24). One method that
is often adapted to conceptualize academic vocabulary is to categorize words into
several tiers. Similar to Bailey’s framework, Beck, McKeown, and Kucan (2002) propose
a word tier system that is widely accepted in which words are divided into three tiers.
The words of the first tier are non-academic vocabulary. They are widely used in daily
conversations such as “eat”, and “food.” The words of the second tier are general
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academic vocabulary, such as “exemplify,” and “illustration.” The words of the third tier
are content-specific, technical vocabulary, such as “hydroxide,” and “friction.”
Why Is Academic Vocabulary Important for ELLs
Academic vocabulary is an essential part to understand academic contents. Tier
3 words are often terms that describe a thing or a concept in a particular branch of
study. To study anatomy, students have to command the vocabulary of human bodies
like “tibia,” and “varicosity.” Meanwhile, Tier 2 words are often paid less attention to by
researchers (Calderón et al., 2005). People often neglect them because they are
general, but being general also means that they are used across disciplines. Learning
general academic vocabulary could help students to understand the concepts over all
kinds of academic contents, and express their own ideas in an academic way. The
benefits of studying academic vocabulary are the same for both English-only students
and ELLs.
However, researchers find that ELL students usually have a slower vocabulary
development compared with their English-only peers (August et al., 2005; Uccelli, &
Páez, 2007). To find a better way to help ELL students, Calderón (2007) records a
study in Texas to find out how academic vocabulary instruction affects ELLs’ academic
vocabulary proficiency. The ELL students in this study received instruction of academic
vocabulary specifically for thirty minutes every day. Compared with those ELL students
who received regular instruction on vocabulary, the students who received focused
instruction had much higher scores in language tests. The study suggests that
academic vocabulary instruction could have a positive influence on academic language
proficiency, and then improve the performance in academic contents overall.
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Vocabulary Development
For teachers, knowing a word often means different things (Schmitt, 2008). Some
may think knowing to pronounce and write a word equals knowing it; some may think
knowing its pragmatic use is also one essential part. Nations (2001) discusses what
knowing a word means from form, meaning, and use. He also makes differentiation in
receiving (R) and producing (P) skills, which makes the theory more comprehensive
(Table 1-2).
Table 1-2. What “knowing a word” means.
Form: Spoken R What does the word sound like? P How is the word pronounced?
Written R What does the word look like? P How is the word written and spelled?
Word parts R What parts are recognizable in this word? P What word parts are needed to express this meaning?
Meaning: Form and meaning R What meaning does this word form signal? P What word form can be used to express this meaning?
Concept and referents
R What is included in the concept? P What items can the concept refer to?
Associations R What other words does this make us think of? P What other words could we use instead of this one?
Use: Grammatical functions
R In what patterns does the word occur? P In what patterns must we use this word?
Collocations R What words or types of words occur with this one? P What words or types of words must we use with this one?
Constraints on use
(register,
frequency…)
R Where, when and how often would we expect to meet this word? P Where, when and how often can we use this word?
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The frame gives teachers implications from many lens. For example, to help
students fully understand the Collocations of a word, it might be not enough to study the
word in textbooks. Introducing extra readings with the use of target vocabulary could
expand students’ lexicons to know more about the vocabulary. The repeated approach
to the target words and their synonyms or similarly constructed words might also be
necessary to meet the requirement of investigating form and meaning, and use.
Vocabulary Instruction
Vocabulary instruction and study is always a challenge for both teachers and
students (Mukoroli, 2011). Diamond & Gutlohn (2006) and Kame’enui & Baumann
(2012) both specify the instruction of vocabulary into three parts: teaching specific
vocabulary, word-learning strategies, and word consciousness. It is indicated in
research that direct instruction in vocabulary can increase vocabulary learning and
comprehension. To practice direct vocabulary instruction, teachers need to select words
to teach. Diamond & Gutlohn resort to the three-tier system developed by Beck and
McKeown (1985) and propose several questions to help teachers to determine which
words in each tier needs specific instruction. The questions include, tier one question “is
it a basic word whose meaning students are likely to know?”, tier two question “can the
meaning of the word be explained in everyday language, using words, and concepts
that are familiar to students?”, tier three question “is it the word specific to a particular
content area or subject matter?” Kame’enui & Baumann also propose two questions for
selecting words: “can the terms known to students explain the word?” and “will students
be able to find the use for the words in their everyday life?”
As for word-learning strategies, both Diamond & Gutlohn (2006) and Kame’enui
& Baumann (2012) agree that to teach vocabulary, the instruction of the prefix, suffix,
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and root is necessary. The knowledge of the morphemes could help students to analyze
new words with previous experience. However, Diamond & Gutlohn remind that
sometimes the existed knowledge could lead to an incorrect understand like the
knowledge of “-less” in “priceless” and “valueless.” Contextual analysis is also a strategy
recommended in both works. Kame’enui & Baumann specify two context clues that
teachers should pay attention to: syntactic and semantic clues. Syntactic clues provide
information through word order. It is especially important in English because English is a
positional language. Semantic clues could help students to infer the word meaning that
they do not know yet. Differently, Diamond & Gutlohn list more specific clues, such as
definition, synonym, antonym, example, and general features of the target vocabulary.
Word consciousness means the interest in and awareness of words (Anderson
and Nagy 1992). Both works consider word consciousness is one of the key factors that
enable students to study vocabulary passionately for a long term. Diamond & Gutlohn
enumerate several strategies to cultivate students’ word consciousness, like telling the
stories of word origins, or make word maps that link related words together. Kame’enui
& Baumann suggest teachers could talk about the good use of words by excellent
authors and let students to experiment words with the examples of those authors. By
establishing word consciousness, students might discover motivations in vocabulary
learning, and thus get higher achievements.
In Schmitt (2008), the engagement with vocabulary is believed quite important in
vocabulary instruction. It is common to learn a word faster with more engagement.
Engagement refers to the active interaction between students and the vocabulary.
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In a classroom, students always face various engagement with the words that
they are going to learn. So how to make the engagement more effective and efficient
becomes one of researchers’ concerns. Several ways to improve the engagement are
listed by Schmitt (2008). First is to maximize the engagement. Teachers shall try as
many approaches as possible to increase the engagement like using the Internet data
search activities with the target vocabulary as the key word, or creating notebooks that
record the information of vocabulary. Second, teachers need to make sure there are
enough engagement of repetition. Webb (2007) suggests that repetition could have a
positive effect on vocabulary learning. Schmitt takes de Groot (2006) for instance, in
which after six 10-second exposures to translation pairs and three receptive tests,
Dutch students learned from 43% to 70% of the target words on a one-week delayed
test. The study indicates that even short and brief repetition could have a positive effect
on vocabulary learning.
Furthermore, many researchers and practitioners realize that the development of
vocabulary is not just a part of language classes, but an essential part of all kinds of
subjects as well. Harmon et al. (2005) discusses about the vocabulary instruction in
content subjects like nature science, mathematics, etc. They suggest that by connecting
new vocabulary with existed knowledge, students could get a chance to review previous
knowledge and infer the meaning of the new words. Repetition is also needed to enable
students to have enough access to the target vocabulary. Teachers should differentiate
the difficulty of the tasks that involve the using of the new vocabulary to help students
command the vocabulary gradually.
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CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY
This study was based on extant data collected in a dual-language program in a
K-5 elementary school in urban area in Northern Florida. There were over 1200
students in the school with 40% white students, 35% African American students, 15%
Hispanic students, and 10% students of other races. The study particularly examined
the two-way immersion program, which was stranded within the school. The medium of
instruction included Spanish and English. The distribution of each language in the
program was about 50 to 50.
In the class observed, there were 16 students, in which 7 were girls and 9 were
boys. Six students had a bilingual background of Spanish and English. Five students
were African American and four were Euro-American. The English teacher had been in
the program since it was established. It was her fourth year in this two-way immersion
program by the time when the study was conducted. In the past 20 years, the teacher
worked in multiple contexts, including special education. She also held the ESOL
endorsement in the district.
The research group set several cameras in the classroom of the two-way
immersion program, and recorded the Language Arts classes on both morning and
afternoon in four days, twice – once in the Fall and once in the Spring (from March 11th
to March 14th, 2013). This analysis focuses on the data collected in the Spring.
Approximately 12.5 hours of the Language Arts class were transcribed and then
analyzed. The focus of the class was a text from the basal reader, called The Great Ball
Game (see Appendix A). The theme of the unit is settling arguments. Students are
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expected to share good ways to settle an argument or disagreement after studying the
story.
The class on Day 1 was an overview of the whole story. The teacher asked three
questions about how students felt about the reason of the argument; the necessity of
the game; the important part of the game. The students later were divided into small
groups and shared their answers. The teacher walked around, listened to each group’s
discussion, and gave her own comment or hint. In the end of the activity, the students
would tell the rest of the class what they got through discussion.
The class on Day 2 focused on vocabulary instruction. The students first
rehearsed the words, meaning that they needed to say the word, spell it, and explain its
meaning to the other student. Then they analyzed the words by telling the part of
speech of the words and their syllables. At last the students drew pictures to depict the
meaning of the words with images. The students later shared their pictures and made a
sentence with one key vocabulary.
The class on Day 3 aimed to make deeper analysis of the text. The students
discussed different questions set by the teacher or found by themselves. The
relationship of problem-solution was the theme in the discussion. The class on Day 4
was a summary and review of the classes during the week.
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CHAPTER 4 DATA ANALYSIS
This study focused on how textbook-selected, teacher-selected, and contingently
defined vocabulary are taught. Textbook-selected vocabulary refers to the vocabulary
that is labeled as key vocabulary in the textbook. They are purposefully instructed by
the teacher according to the guide of text designers. Teachers are aware that these
words are required to be taught to help students understand some key concepts in
textbooks. Teacher-selected vocabulary refers to the vocabulary that is chosen by the
teachers, and is not part of the design of the textbook. Teachers explicitly choose these
words as part of the unit of study. These words are selected because teachers consider
them to be too difficult for the students depending on teachers’ understanding of
students’ language proficiency. Contingently defined vocabulary refers to the vocabulary
that is taught in the course of the lesson as the teacher notices student confusion or not
understanding of particular words. Different from the textbook-selected and teacher-
selected vocabulary, the contingently defined vocabulary is not considered to be part of
the lesson plan but occurs spontaneously during instruction. The contingent instruction
could happen any time during the class and the teacher usually does not have
preparations.
The transcripts to be analyzed in this thesis are every word transcribed from the
teacher’s speech in recorded videos. All the transcripts of the teacher’s speech are
considered to be part of academic language, especially Content Curriculum Language,
as they fit Bailey’s definition, “considered to be Curriculum Content Language, because
they are “the language used in the process of teaching and learning content material”
(Bailey & Heritage, 2008, p. 15).
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This thesis uses framework in Nation (2001) for reference, and categorizes the
transcripts that involves the textbook-selected, teacher-selected, and contingently
defined vocabulary into three kinds: Form Focused Input (FFI), Meaning Focused Input
(MFI) and Use Focused Input (UFI), to investigate the research question. Form Focused
Input strategies concentrate on the instructions of the sound, pronunciation, written
form, and the structure of the target vocabulary. Form Focused Input can be further
divided into two parts: Pronunciation Input and Form Exemplification. Pronunciation
Input is a sound without the input of meaning. Form Exemplification is the
exemplification with the form feature of the target word. Meaning Focused Input
concentrates on the instructions of the meaning as well as the concepts contained in the
target vocabulary, and how the target vocabulary links with the contexts. In Meaning
Focused Input, the transcripts are classified into two sub-categories, namely, Question
Embedment, and Synonym & Antonym. Question Embedment means the use of the
target vocabulary in a question, and the question could be understood with the
knowledge of the meaning of the word. Synonym & Antonym means explaining the
target vocabulary with its synonym or antonym. Use Focused Input concentrates on the
instructions of grammatical functions, morpheme changes, collocations (what words are
used together with the target vocabulary), and the constraints on use. Use Focused
Input is further categorized into two parts: Collocation and Grammar Development.
Collocation means using the target vocabulary with other words to form a phrase or
correct modification relationship. Grammar Development means developing grammar
knowledge with the help of the target word.
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Each of these categories as it was used in this analysis is explained below with
an example.
FFI - Pronunciation Input
The target vocabulary is used in the teacher’s speech, but the word is not used to
teach students its meaning, or explain the context.
Example:
(T = teacher; S = student)
T: Okay. Third word.
S: Penalty.
T: Penalty.
(From March 13th Transcript)
The reason why target word “penalty” is mentioned in this example is to remind
the students of the key vocabulary list. To answer the question, the students did not
need to understand the meaning of “penalty”. What they needed was just to memorize
the sounds of the key vocabulary. The word was not further explained by the teacher as
well. In fact, answering argument, or accept would not make the context different. The
example hence is categorized into Form Focused Input.
FFI - Form Exemplification
Teachers put target words into a category, but does not categorize the words
according to meanings. The categorization could be based on the frequency that the
words are used, the length of the words, the sound of the words, etc.
Example:
T: Quarrel. And that’s when you’re – that’s what we call, when we start thinking of another word that’s an even better word than the word you used, that’s called juicy words.
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(From March 13th Transcript)
The description “better” and “juicy” in the example might be interpreted as “more
academic,” or “more advanced.” Here the categorization is based on the property of
“quarrel” instead of its meaning. Likewise, when we categorize the word “extraordinary”
as “long words,” the readers who see the categorization gain the information of the
length of the word, which is one of its property. But the meaning of the word remains
unknown.
MFI - Question Embedment
Question Embedment refers to the context in which the target vocabulary is
embedded in questions. Students are expected to answer the questions with the target
vocabulary, or other words associated with the target vocabulary, such as synonyms
and definitions.
Example:
T: Quarrel. And remember we said that was a very different word. Okay let’s see… (Student’s name), what is a quarrel?
S: A quarrel means like an argument.
(From March 12th Transcript)
The teacher asked a question about the definition of the target word, “quarrel”.
As expected, the student answered the question with a synonym of “quarrel”,
“argument”. Although the teacher did not give any input of the definition of the word, the
question proposed aroused students memory about the word which was introduced
before. The function of this kind of questions is called “Elicit” in Tsui (1985). By asking
this kind of questions, students are required to display their knowledge.
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MFI - Synonym & Antonym
The target vocabulary is explained with their synonyms or antonyms, so that
students will be able to extend their vocabulary as well as understand the pluralism of
some concepts, such as “accept” & “reject”.
Example:
T: Well you take it if somebody’s doing what? Giving it to you. You will accept it. Reject is the one that is when you don’t accept it. I reject it. I don’t want it. In the game did they accept a gift?
(From March 12th Transcript)
The target word “accept” is explained from two sides in this context. The teacher
first gave the students a word that might be more familiar to them, “take”, and set a
situation in which the meaning of “take” is similar to “accept”. The students thus were
able to connect the target word with its synonym, and get a clearer picture of the word.
On the other hand, an antonym, “reject”, was also proposed and defined with a
sentence, “I don’t want it.” This kind of input does not only help students recognize the
meaning of the target words, but also expand their vocabulary.
UFI - Collocation
The target vocabulary is combined with other words and make a phrase, a
grammatically and semantically correct “verb – object” expression, or a modification
relationship.
Example:
T: No. That’s one person working and somebody else just sitting there taking advantage of them, right? Different meaning for advantage. (From March 12th Transcript)
T: Why did the birds and the animals have a big argument? Nathaniel? You’re talking before you write.
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(From March 12th Transcript)
In the first example, the target word “advantage” serves as a part of a complete
phrase “take advantage of,” and in the second example, the target word “argument”
follows the verb “have” and adjective “big”. The use of the combination of words in both
examples gives students a hint about how to use the target word in a context and with
other words. Therefore, the students would not use the expression “take argument of,”
or “take an argument,” which are not common in academic language.
UFI - Grammar Development
The target vocabulary is used in the instruction of certain grammar rules. The
targets words in this context only serves as a carrier of morphemes, such as “-ed,” “-s,”
etc.
Example:
T: They quarreled. You’re not gonna put they had- it’s past tense. They quarreled. Is she gonna get everybody else?
(From March 13th Transcript)
The teacher used “quarrel” in this example to show the students how they could
turn a verb into its past form by adding “-ed” at the end of the word. The students did not
need to associate “quarrel” with “A type of disagreement” to understand the grammar
instruction.
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CHAPTER 5 RESULTS
Textbook-Selected, Teacher-Selected, and Contingently Defined Vocabulary
In the class of Day 1, the teacher selected 9 words as key vocabulary and
explained them in detail. The vocabulary list contains “accept”, “advantage”, “argument”,
“penalty”, “quarrel”, “jeer”, “pity”, “swift(ly)”, and “horizon”. The first 5 words were
explicitly stated as “key vocabulary” in the textbook. The teacher guide book suggests
that these words are important to support the key concept of the text. The teacher knew
she needed to teach these 5 particular words to the students before the class, and
introduced them at the beginning of the class. Thus, the five textbook-selected words
are “accept”, “advantage”, “argument”, “penalty”, and “quarrel”. The latter 4 words were
chosen as complementary vocabulary because the teacher believed that the students
might have not understood them completely after the introduction of the text. Hence, the
teacher-selected words are “jeer”, “pity”, “swift(ly)”, and “horizon”. There is an exception
among all the vocabulary that was introduced during the class, “moral”. When the
teacher was explaining the theme of the text, she used “moral” to refer to what we could
learn from the story. The word “moral” is not listed in the key vocabulary chosen by the
text designers, nor prepared by the teacher before the instruction. As it does not belong
to either category, it is thus categorized as “contingently defined vocabulary” to
distinguish it from other vocabulary taught during the classes. The vocabulary and
definitions are listed in Table 5-1.
Table 5-2 shows the frequency of the use of each target vocabulary. Due to the
absence of related transcripts, the introduction of these words cannot be further
analyzed. The use of every word in the data analysis is based on the fact that the
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students have already informed of the importance of the vocabulary and known the
basic meaning of them. Therefore, the use of some words is 0 on Day 1 as shown in
Table 5-2, but that does not mean the words were not introduced and explained at the
beginning of the class on Day 1. The zeroes on Day 1 refer that the teacher did not
further used or explained these 7 words after her first explanation in the class.
Table 5-1. Key vocabulary list and the definitions.
Vocabulary Definition
Textbook selected vocabulary
Accept To agree to Advantage Something that gives a benefit; something helpful Argument A disagreement Penalty A punishment for breaking rules Quarrel A type of disagreement
Teacher selected vocabulary
Jeer Laugh, being means, teasing Pity Sigh, feel sorry Swift(ly) Faster, smooth, graceful Horizon (Students connect this word to the beach and
different colors in the sky.) Contingently Defined Vocabulary
Moral The reason; “What could you say about this story?”
Table 5-2. Frequency of the use of the target vocabulary.
Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Total
Accept 0 14 3 0 17 Advantage 1 8 1 0 10 Argument 4 10 13 1 28 Penalty 0 16 10 5 31 Quarrel 0 9 8 1 18 Jeer 0 0 1 0 1 Pity 0 0 0 0 0 Swift(ly) 0 0 1 0 1 Horizon 0 0 0 0 0 Moral 26 0 0 0 26 The number of words of the teacher’s talk
2136 7852 9786 1370 21144
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Because of different class settings and objectives on each day, the number of the
use of the target words in the teacher’s speech varies greatly. As shown in Table 5-2,
the use of the target vocabulary mainly falls on Day 2 and Day 3. Day 2 focuses on
vocabulary development, while Day 3 focuses on the understanding of the text. The
main tasks on Day 1 and Day 4 are respectively the introduction to the text as well the
target vocabulary, and conclude what have been learned during these days. As the
concentration deviates from vocabulary and text instruction, the input on Day 1 and Day
4 sharply decreases compared with that in two other days.
The use of words, “argument” and “penalty,” is also worth notice. These two
words have much more appearances in the teacher’s speech. The reason is probably
the theme of the text. The Great Ball Game is a story about animals and birds arguing
with each other over who is better. The birds lost in the game so they have to fly to the
south every year as their penalty. When the teacher tried to clarify the theme and plot of
the story, these two words are mentioned inevitably to ask the reason why animals and
birds have a game, and the result of the game.
By contrast, the use of “jeer”, “pity”, “swift(ly)”, and “horizon” is much fewer. “Pity”
and “horizon” are not mentioned again after they are explained at the beginning of the
class of the week. Although the teacher has been aware that these words might be an
obstacle for her students to read the text smoothly, the way that these four words are
related with the theme and plot of the story decides that they would not be often
discussed during the instruction. “Jeer”, “pity”, and “swift(ly)” are applied to describe the
characters’ expression, action, or emotion. All of them are the details that enrich the
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description of the characters, instead of the key words that connect the preceding and
following texts together.
As for the word “moral”, it appeared in the class where the teacher was trying to
lead the students to find out what lesson they could learn from the story. The teacher
realized that “moral” might be a word that the students did not understand or were not
familiar with, so she introduced the definition of “moral”. Then “moral” was used to
conclude the reason of the study. The students were required to write down “moral” on
their worksheets and further elaborate what moral was for them. For example, one girl
said that the moral she found in the story was “never judge.” In the later instruction, the
word was mentioned for several times to guide the students to finish their writing and
sharing about the moral of the story. In the following days, this section of the text
instruction was not conducted again, so the word moral was also not mentioned.
The Application of Form, Meaning, and Use Focused Input
Table 5-3 shows the frequency of each input is applied in further use and
explanation. The total number of the use is higher than the times that the words are
mentioned because in some cases, a word is used with two kinds of input at the same
time. For example, when the teacher asked, “Who accepted a penalty?” the target
words, accept and penalty, are used in both Question Embedment and Collocation.
As shown in the Table 5-3, Form Focused Input happens 20 times in total;
Meaning Focused Input takes 63 times; Use Focused Input happens 26 times. The
difference between three kinds of input could the consequence of the focus of the
classes. When the teacher was analyzing the theme and plot of the story, it is natural to
include the key vocabulary as a part of text explanation. The absence of Grammar
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Development and Form Exemplification for most words also reflects the little input of
linguistic knowledge.
Table 5-3. Number of each input.
Form Focused Input Meaning Focused Input
Use Focused Input
Pronunciation Input
Form Exemplification
Synonym & Antonym
Question Embedment
Grammar Development
Collocation
Accept 4 0 2 10 0 1 Advantage
2 0 0 3 0 5
Argument
2 0 3 14 0 9
Penalty 2 0 1 23 0 5 Quarrel 6 2 3 4 2 4 Jeer 1 0 0 0 0 0 Pity 0 0 0 0 0 0 Swift(ly) 1 0 0 0 0 0 Horizon 0 0 0 0 0 0 Moral 18 0 0 6 0 7 Total 36 2 9 60 2 31
Form Focused Input
Form Focused Input is mainly Pronunciation Input. The class is a part of a two-
way immersion program, so the comparison of English and Spanish is also an important
part of the class. However, such comparison only happened once. The teacher
distinguished the English word “accept” from its Spanish version “aceptar” in the
following way,
“Right, but cognate means just- cognates are great for me, being an English speaker because when I see the two words it helps me understand that this is the word accept in Spanish, Matthew, because they look almost alike. There might be a different letter. A couple of letters. There might be an accent mark, but I can tell that both words mean accept, Okay?”
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“Jeer” and “swift(ly)” are used differently. The two words were repeated by the
teacher after one of the students said them when reading. The rest of the Pronunciation
Input is the reminder of the words in the key vocabulary list like “First word? Quarrel.”
The use of Pronunciation Input of “moral” is higher than any other words because
“moral” is the only word with the transcripts that involve the contexts before the word
was introduced to the students. The teacher repeated the word in 4 sentences for 6
times including the spelling of the word:
“If you’re full on the front, turn over to the back and write the word ‘moral.’ M-O-
R-A-L.”
The following 20 times of mention all happen in this section of the instruction of
the moral of the story of about 570 words. However, in the next 3 days, the word was
not mentioned again. For the students, the word “moral” was just a sound that they
could not associate with its meaning when they heard the word for the first time. Even
during their early approach, the meaning of the word could be vague, so many
transcripts including “moral” are categorized as a part of Pronunciation Input.
Meaning Focused Input
Among all kinds of uses, Question Embedment is applied most often. Like what
is mentioned in the analysis of total appearance, key vocabulary “argument” and
“penalty” carry the theme, and help the plot development in the form of questions. As
the cause of the great ball game, “argument” is mentioned about in several questions,
including the questions that ask the students about their opinions towards the cause,
like “How did you feel about the argument?” and the questions that re-emphasize the
cause of the story, like “Why did the birds have an argument with the animals?” By
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asking the questions, the teacher required the students to review the outline of the story
and think about the relationship between cause and effect.
Similarly, the word “penalty”, as the result of the game, is also mentioned in the
form of question for multiple times. The questions are mainly of two kinds: the questions
asking the content of the penalty, which is also the ending of the story, like “the penalty
is for the birds to do what?” and “who accepted a penalty?” In the cases of both words,
when the students heard the questions that involved “argument” and “penalty”, they
need to find the definition in their memory, and then associate the definition with the
content of the story, so that they could answer the question. Sometimes they need to
add their own opinion and attitude into the answer to finish the task. In the process, the
use of the words is reviewed in the students’ minds, and thus roots in their memory.
There is one interesting example pertaining to the transcripts of Synonym &
Antonym. When the teacher reviewed the vocabulary for the students, she said, “Alright
so we’ve already said an argument. We can say it’s pretty much like a quarrel, right?”
The key vocabulary quarrel and argument are already two synonyms in this context.
The teacher chose to link the two key words together, and show the similar part in their
meanings to the students. The students were then able to understand the connection
between synonyms.
Use Focused Input
The number of Collocation in Table 5-3 might suggests that the teacher applied
many word combinations when using the target vocabulary. In addition to “take
advantage of,” most of the phrases possess the structure of “have – Noun,” such as
“have an argument,” “have a quarrel.” The word “penalty” has the most various
combinations, including “accept the penalty,” “have a penalty,” and “put the penalty.”
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The rest of the phrases possess the structure of “Adjective – Noun.” The main adjective
adapted is “big”, which modifies “argument” and “quarrel”. No evidence shows that the
teacher put “argument” and “quarrel” in similar linguistic environment purposefully, but
the identical Collocation provide the students with more implication of the relationship
between two synonyms.
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Summary
As shown in Table 5-3, the number of Pronunciation Input is much higher than
Form Exemplification. Form Exemplification actually is only used twice in the instruction
of the word “quarrel”. The students might have an adequate input of the sound of the
words, but lack the input of the knowledge of word forms.
Among three kinds of input, Meaning Focused Input is considered to be as
important as the explicit vocabulary instruction in fully understand a word (Schmitt,
2008). Form Focused Input provides the physical properties of a word, and Use
Focused Input provides how a word is used with others. Meaning focused input helps
students know what a word really means. The teacher in this study frequently applied
Question Embedment in Meaning Focused Input to remind the students of the meaning
of the vocabulary and their relationship with the text.
Among all the textbook defined vocabulary, “argument” and “penalty” are used
much higher than other words. The analysis of Meaning Focused Input has shown that
due to the close link between the word “argument”, “penalty”, and the story, these two
words were often applied to ask the questions regarding the reason why animals and
birds have a game, and the result that the birds have to accept. Such relationship
decides that the questions about the reason and the result cannot avoid the use of
“argument”, and “penalty”. In other words, the role that a word plays in a context could
affect how and how often a teacher would use it in his/her instruction. The function of
other words in the text is referred in Table 6-1.
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Table 6-1. Functions of the key vocabulary in the text.
Vocabulary Function
Accept The action that the birds did to the result of the game. Advantage Something that birds have in the game.
Quarrel Similar to “argument,” the reason of the game. Jeer The action that birds did. Pity Something that animals have to the bat.
Swift(ly) The description of some animals and birds. Horizon Something related to the time of the game.
In Table 6-1, most of the key vocabulary is actually the descriptions of details
such as “jeer” and “swift(ly)”. Even deleting these words would not influence the theme
of the story. In other words, their interaction with the context is less than the words like
“argument” and “penalty” that lead the development of the story. Therefore, the
questions involving the words less associated with the context would be fewer than the
questions involving those words closely related to the context as listed in Table 5-3.
The words “argument” and “penalty” are close to the plot of the story, so they
were often mentioned in questions, but the words like “jeer” and “swift(ly)” are less likely
to be used in a question because they are not relevant with the plot or the theme of the
story. The disparity of the use of Question Embedment might make the students
command some words more quickly, and overlook some words at the same time.
Ellis (1997, p.10) states, “speaking natively is speaking idiomatically using
frequent and familiar collocations, and the job of the language learner is to learn these
familiar word sequences.” Collocation is always a difficult part of language learning for
ELL students. Many combinations of words do not follow a certain rule, and collocations
are often used in spoken languages, not textbooks (Butler, 1995). For example, the
expression “long time no see” follows no grammar rules or word combinations taught in
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textbooks, as it comes from Native Americans or Chinese immigrants’ Pidgin English.
Therefore, teachers’ oral instruction is a great source of students’ Collocation input.
In this case, the teacher applied different forms of Collocation, such as “Verb +
Noun,” “Adjective + Noun,” “Preposition + Noun.” As most of the vocabulary taught in
the class is noun, the multiple style of input could give students rich insight of how to
combine words together.
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CHAPTER 6 DISCUSSIONS
This study tried to analyze how textbook-selected, teacher-selected, and
contingently defined vocabulary is taught in a dual language second grade classroom.
The data from the transcripts of the video taken in the classes of an elementary school
in Florida were divided into three parts, Form Focused Input, Meaning Focused Input,
and Use Focused Input. The number of each use and how each use was applied were
compared and analyzed to answer the research question. Through comparison,
Question Embedment in MFI is applied most over other strategies in the vocabulary
instruction, and the strategies used for each kind of input follow the same pattern:
Pronunciation Input for FFI, Question Embedment for MFI, and Collocation for UFI.
From Table 5-3, we can see that the most applied strategy to teach textbook-
selected, teacher-selected, and contingently defined vocabulary is Question
Embedment. The teacher asked 60 questions that involve the use of the meaning of the
target words in 4 days. Different from Pronunciation Input, which 50% of the input is
moral, Question Embedment has a rather even distribution among all words. The high
use of Question Embedment is quite normal in instructions. Early in 1960s, Gall (1970)
has conducted research that indicates questions are essential tools for teachers to help
students recall or memorize knowledge. Recent research also has similar conclusions.
Cotton (2001) suggests that the instruction including posing questions during lessons is
more likely to produce achievements; students could perform better in tests if they have
met similar questions before; oral questions might be more effective than written
questions; the questions focusing on key elements of the class could help students with
their comprehension. The questions proposed in this case gave students implications
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that they should pay attention to the answers as well as the vocabulary in the questions.
The students got the semantic and syntactic knowledge of the key vocabulary through
the input of the questions. The knowledge could help them perform better when they
meet new academic vocabulary in the future or answer questions in standard tests.
Table 5-3 also indicates that the pattern of the strategies used to teach textbook-
selected, teacher-selected and contingently defined vocabulary is similar. Pronunciation
Input is used for FFI; Question Embedment is used for MFI; Collocation is used for UFI.
The pattern could be applied for both textbook-selected and contingently defined
vocabulary (The sample of teacher-selected vocabulary is too few to be analyzed.). It is
not a surprise because for most educators, teaching a word often means the same
thing: teaching its form, meaning, and use. Little research has differentiated the
instructions for the vocabulary with different sources. Hulstijn (2001) tries to differentiate
the incidental and intentional vocabulary learning in second language acquisition, and
still suggests several strategies that work for both situations in the end. Most research
only differentiate the instruction of vocabulary based on its complexity or difficulty like
the three-tier system (Anstorm, 2010; Diamond & Gutlohn, 2006), or whether students
are going to use the vocabulary in daily life or study (Kame’enui & Baumann, 2012). It
remains a question how we can differentiate the instruction of the vocabulary with
different sources, or even whether it is necessary to differentiate the instruction.
The small scale of data is the main limitation of this study. For example, there are
only 57 uses of the target vocabulary in the vocabulary instruction on Day 2 with the
total input of 7852 words, and 37 uses in the text analysis on Day 3 with the total input
of 9786 words.
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The few samples of some uses like Synonym & Antonym, Grammar
Development, and Form Exemplification also give us little insight of how the teacher
applies these instructions. The samples of Question Embedment, which take a large
proportion in the entire data, are too repetitive by asking the content of the text. But as
the thesis was intended to analyze the vocabulary instruction in 4 days, the problem of
data scale is inevitable essentially.
The coding of this study is conducted by the author alone, so the categorization
might be not precise based on the opinion of one person. As this study is based on the
transcripts of videos, observation paradox is also a part of the limitations. The teachers
and students might not behave as they do during daily regular instruction.
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CHAPTER 7 CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
This thesis aims to investigate how textbook-selected, teacher-selected, and
contingently defined vocabulary are taught in a two-way immersion program class over
4 days. The transcripts from the video of the class are coded with three categories,
Form Focused Input (Pronunciation Input, Form Exemplification), Meaning Focused
Input (Question Embedment, Synonym & Antonym), and Use Focused Input
(Collocation and Grammar Development). Through coding, it is found that in each kind
of input, Pronunciation Input, Question Embedment, and Collocation are most applied in
the teacher’s talk. The further examination of these three inputs suggests that:
1. The use of Question Embedment is dominant among all the strategies in teaching target vocabulary, which might be a good and necessary strategy in vocabulary instruction.
2. No evident difference is found in the instruction of textbook-selected, teacher-selected, and contingently defined vocabulary.
This thesis may contribute to the instruction of academic language by informing
teachers of the advantage and disadvantage in an authentic case. Teachers may pay
attention to those words less related with the theme and plot of the text, so that students
could have more chances to practice them. Researchers could have an investigation
about whether the different sources of the vocabulary influence the instruction
strategies.
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APPENDIX THE GREAT BALL GAME
The Great Ballgame. Long ago, the birds and the animals had a great argument.
We who have wings are greater than you said the birds. No that is not true the animals
said. We have teeth. The two started to argue back and forth their quarrel went on and
on until it seemed like they would go to war because of it. The Crane, the leader of the
birds, and Bear the leader of the animals had an idea for who would win the argument.
This idea is good, said Bear. The side that loses will accept the penalty given by
the other side. So they walked and flew to a field and there they divided into two teams.
One side was all of those who had wings. They were the birds. The other side went
those with teeth. They were the animals. But when the teams were formed, one
creature was left out. Bat. He had wings and teeth. He flew back and forth between the
two sides. First he went to the animals. I have teeth, he said. Can I be on your side? But
the bear shook his head. It would not be fair, he said. You have wings. You must be a
bird. So Bat flew to the other side. Take me, he said to the birds. You see I have wings.
The birds laughed at him. You are too little to help us. We don’t want you, they jeered.
Bat went back to the animals. Let me join your team he begged. Then he begged them.
The birds laughed at me and would not accept me so Bear took pity on the little bat.
You are not very big, said Bear, but sometimes even the small ones can help. We will
accept you as an animal, but you must hold back and let the bigger animals play first.
Two poles were set up as the goal posts at each end of the field, then the game
began. Each team played hard. On the animal side fox and deer were swift runners and
they cleared the way for them as they played. Crane and Hawk were even swifter and
they stole the ball each time before the animals could reach their goal. Soon it became
46
clear that the birds had an advantage whenever they got to the ball. They could fly up
into the air and the animals could not reach them. The animals growled. Their goal well
but they grew tired as the sun began to set.
Just as the sun set sank below the horizon, Crane took the ball toward the pole.
Bear tried to stop him but stumbled in the dim light and fell. It seemed as if the bird
would surely win. Suddenly a small dark shape flew on to the field and stole the ball
from Crane just as he was about to reach the goals. It was Bat. He darted from side to
side across the field for he did not need light to find the way. None of the birds could
catch him or block him. Holding the ball Bat flew right into the pole at the other end. This
is how Bat came to be accepted as an animal. He was allowed to set the penalty for the
birds. You birds, Bat said, must leave this land for half of each year
So it is that the birds fly south each winter and every day at dusk the bat still
comes flying to see if the animals need him to play ball. That’s the end.
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
The author, Jiayi Xu, was born in Shanghai, China. His elementary and middle
school education was finished in the small town he lived in for years. In 2010, he was
admitted in East China University of Science and Technology as a freshman of English
Major. Since then, his interests in the language itself and the culture carried by English
grow day by day.
In 2015, Xu started pursuing his master’s degree at the College of Education of
the University of Florida. His focus was teaching English as a second/foreign language.
With the research interests in language education of English, he joined in the project
conducted by Dr. Ester de Jong investigating a two-way immersion program in an
elementary school in an urban area in Florida by the end of his master’s study.