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Moving beyond ‘just good teaching’:ESL professional development for allteachersYe He a , Kathryn Prater a & Teneka Steed aa University of North Carolina at Greensboro, USAPublished online: 21 Dec 2009.

To cite this article: Ye He , Kathryn Prater & Teneka Steed (2011) Moving beyond ‘just goodteaching’: ESL professional development for all teachers, Professional Development in Education,37:1, 7-18, DOI: 10.1080/19415250903467199

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Professional Development in EducationVol. 37, No. 1, February 2011, pp. 7–18

ISSN 1941–5257 (print)/ISSN 1941–5265 (online)/11/010007–12© 2011 International Professional Development Association (IPDA)DOI: 10.1080/19415250903467199

Moving beyond ‘just good teaching’: ESL professional development for all teachersYe He*, Kathryn Prater and Teneka SteedUniversity of North Carolina at Greensboro, USATaylor and FrancisRJIE_A_447087.sgm10.1080/19415250903467199Journal of In-Service Education1367-4587 (print)/1747-5082 (online)Original Article2009Taylor & Francis0000000002009Dr YeHey_he@uncg.edu

In order to prepare all teachers for working with the increasing number of English-as-a-second-language (ESL) students in the US, researchers have explored what teachers need to know andpointed out that ‘just good teaching’ is not enough. In this article, we described our effort todesign and deliver professional development sessions based on key features of effective profes-sional development to facilitate teachers to move beyond ‘just good teaching’. In addition, weexamined the impact of the professional development on teachers and the ESL students in theschool district. The participants included 22 teachers from one school district in the US whoparticipated in 46 hours of professional development sessions over the course of one year. Find-ings indicated that the research-based, needs-oriented professional development provided teach-ers with useful strategies and resources. ESL student performance data also demonstrated theeffectiveness and impact of the professional development. Implications were drawn to furtherenhance the collaboration between university and school districts, and between ESL teachersand regular classroom teachers, for the achievement of all ESL students.

Introduction

Data from the most recent US Census indicate the number of people who speak alanguage other than English in the home doubled between 1980 and 2000 while theoverall population grew by one quarter during that same time (US Census, 2007).According to a recent report (Education Week, 2009), there were 4.5 million English-as-a-second-language (ESL) students in K12 settings during the 2005–2006academic year, which is an increase of 18% from 2000. In certain states, the growthof ESL students is especially worth noting. North Carolina, for example, has

*Corresponding author. Department of Teacher Education and Higher Education, School ofEducation, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC 27402-6170, USA.Email: y_he@uncg.edu

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experienced a 350% growth in the ESL student population between 1995 and 2005,and the population nearly doubled from 2002 to 2007 (Maxwell, 2009).

One of the biggest challenges all ESL students face is learning academic content inEnglish. While there are a growing number of ESL teachers hired in the US to provideservice for all ESL students and support their academic learning at the schools, itremains a challenge for ESL students to gain access to academic instruction in theirregular classrooms. In current US K12 schools, the majority of regular classroomteachers have not received bilingual or ESL courses as part of their professional train-ing (Menken & Antunez, 2001). Only three states (NY, AZ, FL) require ESL trainingfor all teachers, and no state requires ESL training for recertification (EducationWeek, 2009). Having more and more ESL students in their classrooms, increasingnumbers of regular classroom teachers have started to seek professional developmentopportunities to better prepare themselves for the linguistic and cultural diversity theyencounter in their day-to-day teaching.

In order to address this professional development need and better prepare ourteachers to serve all ESL students, we have worked closely with in-service teachers aspart of a five-year US Department of Education professional development granteffort. In this study, we describe the design and delivery of the professional develop-ment based on both research findings and needs assessment conducted at one of ourpartner school districts during the 2007–2008 academic year. In addition, we exam-ined the impact of the professional development based on participants’ feedback andESL student performance.

Professional development context

The one-year professional development program for in-service teachers reported inthis study was one of the foci of a five-year professional development project sponsoredby the US Department of Education. This funded project, called TESOL for ALL(Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages = Academic Achievement forLanguage Learners), was designed to address the language and achievement gapbetween ESL students and non-ESL students by providing comprehensive professionaldevelopment to teacher educators and in-service teachers in two local school districts,and by preparing ESL pre-service teachers. The two local school districts were selectedbased on the number of ESL student enrollment and the existing collaboration withthe university through pre-service teacher education programs. All the co-principalinvestigators (PIs) of the project participated in the planning, designing and deliveryof the professional development sessions. The evaluation of the professional develop-ment was conducted through an evaluation center affiliated with the university.

Participants in the professional development included ESL teachers and regularclassroom teachers from one school district in North Carolina. Based on the datafrom the National Center for Education Statistics (2007), there were 16 schools inthis district with 7521 students and 518 teachers during the 2005–2006 school year.Among the student population, 1069 were ESL students (14%). As an effort tosupport ESL professional development at this school district, a needs assessment

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Moving beyond ‘just good teaching’ 9

was conducted in fall 2007, and nine professional development sessions (46 hours)were provided by the co-PIs of the TESOL for ALL project to 26 teachers over the2007–2008 school year.

Professional development design and delivery

In the past decade, researchers have reviewed professional development for in-serviceteachers and reported consensus in their summary of key features for effective profes-sional development (Birman et al., 2000; Crawford et al., 2008; Wayne et al., 2008;Desimone, 2009). These key features include: content focus, coherence, duration,active learning, and collective participation (Birman et al., 2000; Desimone, 2009).In the design and delivery of our professional development, we incorporated all thesefeatures in collaboration with the school district.

Professional development design – content focus, coherence and duration

Both university teacher education programs and school professional developmentprograms have continued to provide theories, applications and good teaching prac-tices as examples to inform and support teachers in working with ESL students intheir own classrooms. However, a more systematic and cohesive professional devel-opment model beyond the simple extension of good practices is needed to coordinatethe efforts of both ESL and regular classroom teachers (de Jong & Harper, 2005;York-Barr et al., 2007; Nordmeyer, 2008).

Specific knowledge and applications of English language, linguistics, languageacquisition and cultural implications need to be stressed in the professional develop-ment for teachers working with ESL students (August & Hakuta, 1997; Olsen, 2000;Fillmore & Snow, 2002; Gandara et al., 2003; Freeman, 2004). Challenging theassumption that the professional development efforts addressing general multiculturaleducation issues can be easily extended to preparing teachers for ESL students, deJong and Harper (2005) highlighted the gap between ‘just good teaching’ and effectiveESL instruction. They proposed that regular classroom teachers need to enhance theirunderstanding of language and cultural domains in teaching and be equipped withskills to effectively integrate this knowledge into their daily interactions with ESLstudents. In addition, they highlighted teachers’ cultural roles in their model andconcurred with Nieto (2000) and Brisk (1998) in the importance of preparing teachersto embrace their roles as language teachers and cultural facilitators. Their proposedframework—which emphasized three dimensions of teachers’ understandings aboutlanguage and culture beyond effective practices and dispositions, including: (1)second language learning process; (2) language and culture as a medium of learning;and (3) language and culture as a goal of instruction—served as the foundation forthe design of our professional development in this study (de Jong & Harper, 2005).

With the intention of providing professional development that moves in-serviceteachers’ instruction with ESL students beyond ‘just good teaching’, we decided toincorporate content regarding language and culture and focused our discussions on

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teachers’ self-awareness of their cultural roles in addition to instructional practices.Instead of designing the professional development sessions purely based on ourknowledge as teacher educators and on research findings, we conducted a needsassessment to ensure that the professional development content was coherent andconsistent with other professional development efforts at the local school district.

Seventy-five teachers from the district completed the needs assessment in August2007. Based on the responses, 89% (N = 54) reported that they were interested inparticipating in the year-long professional development workshops. In terms ofparticipants’ backgrounds, 46 reported having training in the Sheltered InstructionObservation Protocol (SIOP) workshop (Echevarria et al., 2008); eight had ESL add-on certification; and five had graduate level courses in language acquisition. Based onparticipant ratings on the five-point Likert-scale items (‘1’ was ‘Novice’ and ‘5’ was‘Expert’), it was noted that most of the participants (>60%) rated themselves as ‘3’or lower in all the items, especially in terms of legal issues, current trends in ESLinstruction, research and theories related to language learning, and assessment issues.

The findings of the needs assessment echoed the research on what qualified teach-ers need to know about ESL teaching. The professional development sessions weredesigned to supplement the district’s effort in promoting the SIOP instruction inmainstream classrooms, with an emphasis on teachers’ understandings aboutlanguage and culture, effective practices, and teachers’ dispositions.

After discussions with the school district, the year-long professional developmentoutline was developed. The professional development contained nine sessions, withsix hours for the first session and five hours for each of the remaining sessions. A totalof 46 hours were required. For teachers who successfully completed all the requiredhours and assignments, the professional development could be counted as one of theelective courses toward their ESL add-on licensure program or MEd program at theuniversity. The content, applications and assignments for each professional develop-ment session reflected de Jong and Harper’s framework (2005). In addition toaddressing effective practices and teacher dispositions, we also focused on teachers’understanding of the second language learning process, the nature of language andculture as a medium of learning, and the importance of language and culture as a goalof instruction (see Appendix 1).

Professional development delivery—collective participation and active learning

To enhance ESL students’ academic performance, it is critical to establish and extendthe collaboration between ESL teachers and regular classroom teachers (August &Hakuta, 1997; Gandara et al., 2003; Varghese & Jenkins, 2005). Purposeful recruit-ment and grouping of teachers from the same school during the professional develop-ment could serve as a potential initiation of a school-based learning community tosustain professional development efforts. In collaboration with the school district,teams of teachers were recruited from participating schools to include at least oneESL teacher and one content area teacher working at the same grade level. Suchcollaboration allowed for the ‘powerful format of teacher learning’ (Desimone, 2009,

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Moving beyond ‘just good teaching’ 11

p. 184) and more opportunities for teachers to actively participate in the professionaldevelopment through meaningful interactions.

Further, in order to engage teachers in active learning through the professionaldevelopment sessions, we not only engaged teachers in discussions and applicationsof the content during the professional development, but extended the professionaldevelopment effort to encourage teachers’ learning from each other and from thecommunity as well (see Table 1). The cultural exploration project, for example,required teachers to participate in a social gathering in a language other than Englishor conduct a home/community visit with an ESL student they wanted to learn moreabout. These community experiences deepened teachers’ understanding of the ESLstudents and the community they serve and the follow-up sharing and discussionduring the professional development sessions further enriched our understanding ofcultural issues in ESL teaching.

Method

A total of 22 teachers participated in the year-long professional development deliv-ered at the professional development center at the local school district, including 9ESL teachers and 13 regular classroom teachers. The majority of the teacher partici-pants were white (68%).

Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected to complement each other inthe interpretation of the data and to expand our understanding of the project(Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998). Data collected from teacher participants used twoinstruments: a pre- and post-ESL knowledge inventory and feedback from each of thenine professional development sessions. The instruments included both Likert-scaleitems and open-ended questions. The pre inventory was administered in fall 2007before the professional development started. During the 2007–2008 year, profes-sional development feedback was collected in an on-going fashion for the professionaldevelopment developers to adjust the professional development content and bettermeet the needs of the participants. Finally, the post inventory and feedback form wereadministered at the end of spring 2008. In order to examine the impact of the profes-sional development on ESL students, English language proficiency test data fromspring 2007 and spring 2008 were also collected in this study.

SPSS and NVivo were used as data analysis software. Initially, the quantitative andqualitative data were analyzed separately to explore the patterns and themes. Toenhance the validity of the interpretation through data triangulation, both quantita-tive and qualitative results were converged to evaluate the impact and effectiveness ofthe professional development (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2007).

Results

The effectiveness and impact of the professional development were measured fromthree different aspects: (1) quality of the professional development sessions based onteacher feedback; (2) teacher understanding of working with ESL students; and (3)

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English language development of ESL students as is measured by district achieve-ment data.

Quality of professional development sessions

Feedback was collected after each session of the professional development. Overall,participants rated all training sessions as excellent or good (>90%) and consideredobjectives met for each session (100%). Participants provided 86 comment entries,74 (86%) were positive. When explaining their positive ratings, most participants’comments focused on the content of the professional development (39%) and thedelivery method (42%). In terms of the content, participants commented directly onthe information presented in the sessions. For example, after the second session, oneparticipant commented ‘I enjoyed the examples and explanations of models, defini-tions, legislation, etc’ (feedback form, 16 October 2007). Participants’ comments onthe delivery method include pacing, group interactions and activities designed tofacilitate the discussions. In addition to the discussion of theories and strategies, eachsession of the professional development was also purposefully designed to model theapplication of certain theories and strategies. For example, content and languageobjectives were introduced and reviewed at each session. Strategies such as anticipa-tion guides, graphic organizers, structured note taking and vocabulary developmentwere all integrated into the delivery of the professional development. Participantsnoted this feature in their feedback and commented that they liked ‘How interactivethe sessions were among the instructors and our colleagues. Also, I liked how weparticipated in various activities that we can use with our students’ (feedback form,28 May 2008).

In addition to content and the delivery method of the professional development,participants commented on the organization of the professional development (10%),and the impact of the professional development (8%). It was interesting to note thatmore teachers started to comment on the impact of the professional developmentduring the last several sessions. Most of the comments focused on how they wereusing the strategies in their classroom. For example, one teacher commented after theeighth professional development session: ‘It was explicit, specific to the classroom,and followed SIOP model. I’ll be a better teacher of reading comprehension becauseof this’ (feedback form, 24 March 2008).

The negative comments (N = 12, 14%) focused on the pacing of the professionaldevelopment (‘too fast and too much information’), and the connection betweentheories and practices (‘more examples and strategies for secondary teachers inspecific content area’).

Growth of teacher knowledge

In order to measure the growth of teachers’ knowledge in working with ESLstudents, we compared the results from teachers’ pre and post responses to the ESLknowledge inventory, and examined the areas of learning identified by participants

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in relationship with our focus on teachers’ understandings about language andculture, effective practices, and teachers’ dispositions (de Jong & Harper, 2005).

Comparing participants’ pre and post responses to the ESL knowledge inventory,no significant difference was noted in their quantitative scores on the inventory.Participants reported knowledge of more concrete and relevant strategies they can useto work with ESL students in the post inventory (such as vocabulary developmentstrategies, using cognates, etc) than in their pre inventory, where most participantslisted modified assignments and peer tutoring as the major strategies they would use.In addition, when asked about resources they can use to facilitate ESL instruction,participants were able to identify specific books, websites and community resourceson their post inventory responses compared to only referring to dictionaries and stan-dards as their major resources in the pre inventory.

When asked about what they had learned from each session, participantsprovided comments on what they had learned in terms of effective practices (57%),language development theories and cultural understandings (34%) and understand-ing of their roles and responsibilities as teachers working with ESL students (9%).Not surprisingly, the majority of the comments focused on effective practices andvery few teachers commented on their roles and responsibilities.

ESL student learning outcome

As one of the measures for the program evaluation, we also analyzed ESL studentperformance data provided by the district. Although we did not intend to establishany causal relationship between our professional development effort and ESL studentlanguage proficiency development, we included the data from the ESL students whomight be indirectly impacted.

A total of 235 ESL students were indirectly impacted through the 22 teachers whoparticipated in the professional development sessions. The majority of the students’first language is Spanish (97%) and most of the students are at the elementary level(48%). In addition to ESL services, 26 students (11%) also receive special educationservices at the schools. Comparing students’ English proficiency test scores based onthe IDEA Proficiency Test (IPT), the t-test results indicated that students’ scores onlistening, speaking and reading were significantly higher in 2008 compared to theirscores from 2007 (α≤.000). Over 70% of the ESL students reached superior andadvanced levels in listening (88%), speaking (72%) and reading (74%) based on theirIPT test scores (see Appendix 2).

Discussions and implications

Considering that projections indicate that in two decades ESL students will comprisemore than one-third of the student population in US public schools (Thomas &Collier, 2002), it is crucial for teacher educators, administrators and all teachers towork together to extend our own understandings of ESL teaching and learning andpromote sustainable efforts to support ESL students in both English learning and

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their learning in English (Nordmeyer, 2008). This study not only identified teachers’perceptions of areas of professional development needs and the effectiveness of theprofessional development sessions, but also provided a university-school collabora-tion model to encourage contextualized teaching and learning.

The positive feedback from teachers and enhancement in ESL student Englishproficiency test scores are encouraging results that indicate the effectiveness of thefirst-year professional development sessions. Several contextual and programfactors need to be recognized that promoted the successful delivery of theprofessional development. First, the district’s support ensured teachers’ participa-tion in our professional development sessions. In order to design the professionaldevelopment based on the district’s needs, we met with the administrators severaltimes during the summer to reach consensus as to the content and evaluation ofthe professional development. In addition, as is recognized in other professionaldevelopment studies, the number of contact hours (46 hours) provided adequateopportunities for teachers not only to receive information regarding linguistic andlanguage development theories, but also share their experiences and reflect ontheir own practices (Yoon et al., 2007). Having both regular classroom teachersand ESL teachers from the same schools further enabled active learning andcollaboration among teachers.

Recognizing the effectiveness of the professional development sessions, partici-pants also highlighted several challenges they face in implementing the theories andstrategies for ESL students in their schools. The majority of the participantsmentioned their concerns with applying the instructional strategies in content areainstruction, especially as is measured by standardized testing. As one teachercommented after the professional development, she would like to learn more about‘how this model [SIOP model] could help improve test scores for ELLs [Englishlanguage learners]’ (feedback form, 28 May 2008). Several participants commentedon the need for more regular classroom teachers to attend this type of professionaldevelopment and are concerned about ‘how to share this model with school faculty’(feedback form, 28 May 2008). Three regular classroom teachers also commented onthe need for more professional development in areas such as co-teaching or collabo-rative teaching models with ESL teachers.

While it is encouraging to know our participants feel it is their responsibility todisseminate the knowledge at their own schools, measure the impact on studentachievement test scores and conduct co-teaching in their daily instructions, we dorealize that continued professional development needs to be provided in those areasto follow-up and sustain the effort in preparing all teachers to better serve ESLstudents. Our participants, along with other ESL teacher professionalization efforts,recognized that one of the biggest challenges in ESL professional development is toimplement the theories and strategies across classrooms and schools because ESLteachers are not the only ones who work with our ESL students and are responsiblefor their academic success (Lewis-Mereno, 2007). In order to cultivate a schoolculture that fosters the shared responsibility among teachers, we need to engage allteachers at the school in our professional development and build capacity at the

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school and district levels to encourage teachers who have received the professionaldevelopment to be change agents and teacher leaders (Varghese & Jenkins, 2005).

Reflecting on de Jong & Harper’s (2005) framework for preparing mainstreamteachers for ESL students, we believe that as we move from ‘just good teaching’ topreparing all students—including ESL students—for academic success, all teachersworking with ESL students need to be equipped with not only knowledge of languageand culture, but also skills in collaboration, leadership and critical reflection, toengage all educators in the innovative process that leads to change in schools. Notonly do all teachers need to understand and embrace their roles as language teachersand cultural facilitators, but they need to take on the challenge of being an advocatefor ESL students and collaborating with other educators, parents and the communityin advancing our efforts to prepare ESL students for the twenty-first century.

Conclusion

In this study, we described the design, development and effectiveness of a one-yearESL professional development series at a local school district to prepare both ESLand regular classroom teachers for working with the growing number of ESL studentsin their classrooms. The identified professional development needs from our partnerschool district, feedback from participating teachers and challenges identified byparticipants might provide other educators who are engaged in such professionaldevelopment efforts with ideas for moving the preparation of teachers beyond ‘justgood teaching’. We hope that the collaborative process of the design of our profes-sional development inspires more educators to seek cooperation and collaborationbetween universities and schools to provide quality professional development for allteachers. Furthermore, we hope that through our examination of the developmentand evaluation of our professional development, other educators engaged in similarefforts may gain insights to face challenges in their practices.

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Birman, B. F., Desimone, L., Porter, A. C. & Garet, M. S. (2000) Designing professional develop-ment that works, Educational Leadership, 57(8), 28–33.

Crawford, L., Schmeister, M. & Biggs, A. (2008) Impact of intensive professional development onteachers’ use of sheltered instruction with students who are English language learners, Journalof In-service Education, 34(3), 327–342.

Cresswell, J. W. & Plano Clark, V. L. (2007) Designing and conducting mixed methods research(Thousand Oaks, CA, Sage).

de Jong, E. & Harper, C. A. (2005) Preparing mainstream teachers for English-language learners:is being a good teacher good enough?, Teacher Education Quarterly, 32, 101–124.

Desimone, L. M. (2009) Improving impact studies of teachers’ professional development: towardbetter conceptualizations and measures, Educational Researcher, 38(3), 181–199.

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Menken, K. & Antunez, B. (2001) An overview of the preparation and certification of teachers workingwith limited English proficiency (LEP) students (Washington, DC, National Clearinghouse forBilingual Education).

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Appendix 1. Professional development design

Session

Professional development content Application Assignment

Moving beyond ‘just good teaching’ (de Jong & Harper, 2005)

1. Professional development kick-off2. Legal and historical

issuesModels of ESL teachingSIOP overview

ESL teachers: facilitate the discussion and assignment

Select a unit lesson that you want to modify as a group

Importance of language and culture as a goal of instruction

3. ELD SCS and lesson planningTheories of language developmentSIOP lesson preparation

Modify content and language objectives of lesson plansESL teachers: facilitate the discussion and assignment

Finish writing content and language objectives for the unit lesson plan

Understanding of second language learning process

4. Cultural diversitySIOP – building background

Cultural exploration projectBuild on L1 and L2 cultural differences

Lesson plan modification – building background

Nature of language and culture as a medium of learning

5. Vocabulary building/SRESIOP – Comprehensible input assessment and ESLSIOP – review and assessment

Modify course materials for ESL studentsInterpreting assessment results

Modify assessment for the unit lesson planFinish modifying materials for the unit lesson plan

Integrate understandings of language and culture in instructionEffective ESL practicesTeachers’ dispositions

6. Literacy and ESL Integrate literacy and language development in content area instruction

Modify lesson plan to integrate literacy components

7. Literacy and ESLSIOP – strategies

Balance literacyIntegrate literacy strategies

Integrate literacy strategies in content area instruction

8. Literacy and ESLSIOP – interaction

Balance literacyMonitor language useInput and feedback

Strategies to enhance quality of interaction in class

9. SIOP – practice and lesson delivery

Teach the modified lesson

Share reflections

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Appendix 2. Students’ IDEA language proficiency test levels 2007-2008 (N = 235)

Subcategory Level Spring 2007 Spring 2008

Listening Superior 97 (41%) 159 (68%)Advanced 66 (28%) 47 (20%)Intermediate high 36 (15%) 13 (6%)Intermediate low 21 (9%) 10 (4%)Novice high 11 (5%) 6 (3%)Novice low 4 (2%) 0 (0%)

Reading Superior 40 (17%) 123 (52%)Advanced 43 (18%) 48 (20%)Intermediate high 58 (25%) 33 (14%)Intermediate low 56 (24%) 21 (9%)Novice high 29 (12%) 9 (4%)Novice low 8 (3%) 1 (0.4%)

Speaking Superior 42 (18%) 88 (37%)Advanced 89 (38%) 87 (37%)Intermediate high 61 (26%) 38 (16%)Intermediate low 27 (12%) 13 (6%)Novice high 4 (2%) 1 (0.4%)Novice low 12 (5%) 8 (3%)

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