FACT: Teaching and learningare rooted in and are dependent upon acommon languagebetween teacher andstudent.

NAEP Fourth Grade Reading Performance

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

African American

White Hispanic Asian ELL/LEP

22

54

20

74

8

36

26

34

14

29

4220

46

12

63

Texas2008-2009

Proficient/Advanced Basic Below Basic

Source: National Center for Educational Statistics

African American English (noun): a nonstandard form of American English characteristically spoken by some African Americans in the United States.

Transforming Views

Then

“Pupils were made to scuff at the Negro dialect as some peculiar possession of the Negro which they should despise, rather than directed to study the background of this language as a broken down African tongue”.-Carter G. Woodson, 1933

Now

African American English has evolved to the point of dispelling the myth that African Americans are incapable of mastering Standard English and bound to a “language of illiteracy” (Christensen, 2008).

Language 101:

Language in Communicative Context

• Pragmatics

Language as a Meaning System

• Semantics

Language as a Structured Rule-Governed System

• Syntax

• Morphology

• Phonology

The Development of AAE

Deficit Perspective

Different Theories

DialectologistsView

Creolist Hypothesis

EthnolinguisticTheory

vs.

Ethnolinguist View

• Bambara

• Ewe

• Fanta

• Fon

• Fula

• Hausa

• Igbo

• Ibibio

• Kimbundu

• Longo

• Mandinka

• Mende

• Twi

• Umbundu

• Wolof

• Yoruba

Source: Turner, Lorenzo “Africanisms In The Gullah Dialect” 1973

Characteristic Phonological Features of AAE

Phonological Variables

Standard English African American English

Consonant Cluster desk, test, cold des, tes, col

/th/ sound this or mouth dis or mouf

/r/ sound sister sista

Stressed Syllables police police

Historic African American Legislation

The 13th

Amendment of the United States Constitution

Brown v. Board of Education

Martin Luther King Junior Elementary School Children et al., v. Ann Arbor School District

Ebonics Resolution of Oakland California

Improved Academic Performance for

African American Students

Multicultural Instructional

Practices

Current Educational

Theory & Practice

Sociolinguistics

Culturally

Linguistically

Responsive

Instruction

Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Environments

Developing Multicultural Classrooms

Tailoring Instruction

Family Involvement

School Environment

Teacher Development

Teacher Development

Teacher Development

Focus on providing professionaldevelopment on practices thatsupport culturally andlinguistically diverse learners.

School Environment

School Environment

Focus on developing sharedresponsibility for educating students in an environmentthat is steeped in the additiveview of culture and language.

Family Involvement

Family Involvement

Focus on establishing opencommunication with studentsand their families.

Tailoring Instruction

Focus on teaching specific skills,reteaching them utilizing significantlydifferent instructional approaches,employing informal and formalmethods to assess individual students’strengths and weaknesses.

Tailoring Instruction

Developing Multicultural Classrooms

Developing Multicultural ClassroomsFocus on implementing

instruction that optimizesstudent achievement andpositively reinforcing culturalidentity.