Integrating Science with Math and Literacy in an ELL-inclusive Classroom

Meredith Moncure, Lauren Wiener, and Megan Woodford

James Madison University

ELED 432 - Section 1

 Introduction

Try to imagine attempting a science experiment that is in a foreign language. All of the

complex vocabulary, multiple meanings, and conversions are hard even in one’s native language;

it would be even harder when it is not in one’s native language. As teachers here in Virginia, it

is important to keep this thought in our minds day in and day out. English language learners

(ELLs) are always going to be in our classrooms and whether it’s their sixth or their six

hundredth day in an American school system, it is important to have strategies to use to help

them succeed. Integrating subjects with the science field has many benefits to it and we believe

as future teachers, that it is necessary and vital for us to learn all of the strategies that will

enhance the school experience of English language learners in our classroom. We believe that in

order to provide all of our students with the most effective science instruction, we must research

the different strategies that can ensure that instruction. This is important to us not only so that

our ELL students can reach their full potential, but because we believe that those strategies that

help ELL students will also benefit a large majority of the rest of the diverse learners in our

classrooms.

Strategies to Incorporate Science in an Inclusive Classroom

The Importance of Classroom Environment

Classroom environment is an aspect important to all of teaching, especially for English

language learners, as it creates clear learning goals and intentions, opportunities to help the

students succeed, and a space that fosters the creation of social relationships. A successful

classroom environment is created through the inclusion of cultural diversity in all lesson

planning, encouraging acceptance of everyone, creating a community within the classroom, and
various other structures that support a safe and open classroom. To create lessons that support

ELLs, it is important to focus on having student-based lessons that give them control over their

learning, instead of the teacher being in complete control. Ardasheva calls this, “symmetric

power and trust relationships” in the article “Negotiation, Embeddedness, and Non-threatening

Learning Environments as Themes of Science and Language Convergence for English Language

Learners.” Allowing students the chance to have control over their own education helps them to

feel empowered doing their work and to put their best effort forward, as well as helping to create

a culturally diverse classroom, which leads to a space that ensures that all students feel

comfortable and an understanding that mistakes are welcomed and expected. While this is

important to consider with all lessons and class activities, it is more specifically important to

science. Science is a subject full of difficult topics and vocabulary; if students do not feel

comfortable making mistakes, they will not be willing to participate with these difficult lessons

and activities. This aligns with the idea that science is full of trial and error, most of the time

error. It is all about students learning from repeated trials and their mistakes in order to help

their learning. The most important way to help students feel comfortable is in encouraging

acceptance of all students and by fostering a community within the classroom. Students should

be encouraged to share their own cultures and life experiences with the class and see aspects of

their cultures in their lessons. To do this, it is important for the teacher to understand and learn

about the students’ backgrounds and cultures in order to accurately incorporate those cultures

into the lessons and classroom so that they feel more confident in what they are doing. Lastly, it

is important for the teacher to show ELLs to have confidence in themselves, demonstrating that

the classroom is a space where they will always be respected for who they are. Modeling is the
best way to teach them how to lessen their anxiety about making mistakes. They can see how to

take risks in learning new languages; for example, the teacher and students may attempt to learn

the students’ language and then have a sense of humor about it, teaching an understanding that it

is not easy to learn another language. As for showing confidence in ELLs’ abilities, as their

teacher, it is important to never look at a student’s lack of language as a lack of intelligence or

effort and to always keep in mind how hard it may be for a student to express exactly what they

want to say in a new language. Overall, all of these strategies are important in creating a

classroom environment that supports ELLs’ learning experience: an environment where ELL

students feel ready to conquer challenges and willing to take risks.

The Importance of Literacy in Science: The Use of Close Reading

Incorporating literacy into science helps students to have a comprehensive overview of

both subjects and allows the students to feel confident when asked to display their knowledge of

the subject. One strategy that is presented by research is the use of “close reading” in science

instruction. Close reading is a requirement of the Common Core State Standards and even in a

state like Virginia that does not follow the Common Core, there is pressure put on teachers to

abide by these guidelines as well as the state standards. Students are now expected to be able to

read at a college and career level upon high school graduation. This requirement is greatly aided

by close reading of texts across subject areas. To properly close read a science text, Lapp, Grant,

Moss, and Johnson say that teachers must begin by selecting “‘compact, short, self-contained

texts that can be read and reread deliberately and slowly’” (Coleman & Pimentel, 2012, p. 4).

Once the text has been selected, the teacher must identify the purpose of the reading.

Determining the purpose allows for students to be more successful in reading because they have
a specific focus while reading such as understanding the gist, identifying key ideas, inferring

author positions, or any other purpose that can be determined (Lapp, Grant, Moss, and Johnson,

2013).

Once the purpose has been established, the teacher must prepare the text for presentation

to the students. In order for the students to properly learn from the text, they must be able to

annotate and take notes about the text. Teachers are able to aid their students in the annotation

process by numbering lines, paragraphs, or stanzas of text to help with ease of reference.

Numbering the text is not enough because students often struggle to annotate notes properly,

especially if they have been taught using a highlighter which can cause students to lose focus.

Finally, teachers are instructed to write text-dependent questions that push students to analyze

the text further that the surface level. “Questions should ‘be answered by careful scrutiny of the

text... and [should] not require information or evidence from outside the text or texts’” (Coleman

& Pimentel, 2012, p. 5). Questions should require children to search, synthesize, infer, and make

text-supported judgments (Lapp, Grant, Moss, and Johnson, 2013).

In our future classrooms, we plan to use close reading and annotation while reading.

Teaching students how to analyze and read texts closely across subjects will help them to be

better students in all subjects because the skills will be applicable. Annotation and reading are

skills that can be used by all students when reading any text. The versatility of this strategy is

what appeals to us as future teachers. Learning to annotate a text is difficult because it involves

learning the basic and universally accepted symbols and their meanings, but that is not always

what works best for students. Allowing them to annotate with colors or a simple pencil creates a
learning environment which is all their own. This strategy lends itself well to an inclusive

classroom because it can easily be adapted to all students and their various needs.

Science Inquiry and Vocabulary

Science is a difficult subject for many students to grasp simply because of the extensive

vocabulary used to discuss it. Many students in an inclusive classroom would struggle to simply

learn scientific vocabulary by simply being told the word and its meaning. “Science language

includes technical words and discourse structures particular to the content area (Fang 2006; Yore

et al. 2004). For example, the word, “volume,” referring to loudness of sound, can also mean

how much space an object takes (Fang 2006). At the same time, discourse structures in science

require students to be able to make clear links between their claims and evidence (Yore et al.

2004). Science words and discourse are especially difficult for students, such as ELLs, who may

not be familiar with the academic language of science and who are trying to learn content in a

new language (Huerta and Spies, 2016). Students struggle to make links to concepts and ideas

that they have not actually been able to witness with their own eyes.

A strategy proposed by the researchers to help combat this problem of scientific jargon

being too difficult to understand is the use of science notebooks. “Science notebooks are spaces

in which students can record questions, investigations, procedures, reflections, and conclusions

about their scientific observations” (Huerta and Jackson 2010; Butler and Nesbit 2008; Nesbit et

al. 2004). Notebook entries can include pictures, schematics, labels, and diagrams as a way to

scaffold students’ acquisition of academic language and conceptual understanding (Huerta and

Spies, 2016). Allowing students to explore science on their own creates a domain that they can

take ownership of rather than the concepts being another miscellaneous fact to memorize. The
freedom that science notebooks allow for is incredible because the students feel free to explore

any subject that interests them. Encouraging open and free exploration in the classroom leads to

more on task behavior and less disruptions in the classroom.

Negative Aspects of Integrated Science and Literacy Content

Creating an inclusive and integrated classroom sounds like a fantastic idea, but it is

actually extremely hard to produce. There are many issues found in research about incorporating

literacy and science. One major issue that is found by teachers is the amount of time it takes to

plan an integrated lesson and how it takes time away from the promotion of a deeper

understanding of topics. This is an issue because students are required to have a deep knowledge

of all subjects and surface level content simply will not suffice. Integrating subjects together

while teaching is a relatively new trend in schools and therefore the materials needed to

effectively do so are lacking. There are few resources that are relevant or appropriate for

integrating literacy practice with science content learning. The lack of helpful resources deters

teachers from using this method because they do not have the time or money to create the

necessary resources while still teaching. Finally, educators struggle to create assessments to

properly capture the teaching and learning that is taking place in the classroom. Simple multiple

choice tests will not be a valid indicator of knowledge in this learning environment. Integration

of subjects in an inclusive classroom requires extensive planning and differentiation to

accommodate the needs of all students and it is seen as a struggle to complete this for every

lesson taught (Flushman, Parker, and Mendoza, 2016).

Enhancing Mathematics Knowledge Through Science Instruction

As noted above, mathematics and science, often lumped together into “STEM subjects,”

can be two of the most difficult content areas for ELLs to connect with and learn in a meaningful

way. Alonso and DelliCarpini write, “Given the achievement gap that exists between ELLs and

their native-speaking counterparts in STEM subjects, as well as the growing numbers of ELLs in

US schools, this [integration of mathematics and science] becomes a critical issue” (Alonso &

DelliCarpini, 2014, p. 155). As future educators, it is essential that we begin considering how

integrating mathematics into our science instruction could enhance ELLs’ mathematical

knowledge and skill sets. The two subjects use “analysis and synthesis to create elegant

solutions to complex challenges” (An, 2016, p. 239), providing teachers with the opportunity to

focus integrated instruction on problem solving and inquiry-based activities. Many teachers may

feel unprepared to integrate the two subjects consistently, while meeting all needs of ELLs; but,

teaching these two content areas together provides students with more exposure to the content, in

a multitude of contexts, through a variety of teaching methods.

Dr. Song A. An refers to the overlap between mathematics and science instruction as

Interdisciplinary Pedagogical Content Knowledge (IPCK), suggesting that effective instruction is

an equal blend of math and science content knowledge and math and science pedagogical

knowledge. He highlights the way in which math and science share common themes and how

teachers must focus their instruction on this “big idea” or main idea style of teaching. Teachers

may also prefer to find pedagogical methods that function successfully for both math and

science, finding ways to incorporate both subjects into one lesson (An, 2016, p. 239). His third

point in regards to IPCK refers to offering “interdisciplinary explorations” in the classroom (An,
2016, p. 239), perhaps suggesting that “experiments” should not be limited to science instruction.

Rather, both math and science share an “exploration” component that can be harnessed through

integrated experiments, inquiries, and investigations.

We found several of Dr. An’s astronomy-based examples of links in IPCK, from

discussion participants, to be interesting and attainable in the upper-elementary classroom. Two

noted examples were the integration of “Heating from the Sun in Space” with “Measurement:

Temperature” and the integration of “Projectile Motion in Space” with “Algebra: Function” (An,

2014, p. 240). We felt that growth and measurement are common areas of overlap between math

and science. Therefore, structuring activities that incorporate these math content areas with

science investigations or hands-on activities may help ELLs to see or understand the purpose of

measurement, for example. One example given in Dr. An’s work mentioned how plant growth

observation can involve both a scientific experiment and practical math practice via

measurement and change over time (An, 2014, p. 245). We could easily see ourselves, as future

elementary teachers, utilizing these integrated methods to better provide our ELLs with visual

and tactile opportunities to explore math and science.

There are three suggested criteria that perhaps demonstrate what effective IPCK should

include:

(a) provide[s] problem-based/inquiry-based activities for students to construct

knowledge, (b) represent(s) mathematics concepts with multiple forms including visually,

with words, with symbols, and with numbers, as well as other types of dynamic forms;

and (c) allow(s) students to solve mathematics problems by using a variety of

 problem-solving strategies that lead to a diversity of legitimate answers (An, 2014, p.

242).

Perhaps most notable, across all three criteria, is the variety of forms mentioned. ELLs need

exposure to new or complex content several times, in several different methods. For example,

one verbal explanation of a science topic will not be effective for all ELLs. Students, instead,

benefit from verbal explanations accompanied by a visual component (i.e. pictures, videos, etc.)

and followed by an opportunity for further discussion or hands-on exploration. These are three

criteria we would like to consider in our future classrooms when questioning whether our

integrated math and science lessons will be effective for all ELLs. Furthermore, prior to

designing lessons, Alonso and Dellicarpini discuss the design of course objectives. It is

important to ensure that these objectives, necessary for all grade levels, are written in an

ELL-friendly way (Alonso & DelliCarpini, 2014, p. 155). Many of the same goals a teacher may

wish or need to achieve in his or her classroom can be achieved with ELL students; however, the

teacher must be transparent with all students, ensuring that vocabulary and sentence structure can

be understood by all.

General Instructional Strategies for All ELLs

Moving beyond the utility and importance of integrated science instruction for ELLs, we

noted a series of general strategies for the inclusion of ELLs. We hope to utilize many of these

general strategies in our own future classrooms. As noted above, the classroom community

created by both the classroom teacher and the students plays an important role in an ELL’s

success. Therefore, teachers and students should work together to make ELLs feel like valued
members of the classroom community (​Olson, J. K., Levis, J. M., Vann, R., & Bruna, K. R.,

2009)​.

This inclusion involves learning how to pronounce all students names correctly and

avoiding any use of nicknames, especially those that are easier for the classroom teacher to

pronounce. Students should also be given a plethora of oral language opportunities, specifically

those in which they have the capacity to succeed. This involves teachers calling on ELLs during

discussions rather than avoiding them or treating them as inferior (​Olson, J. K., Levis, J. M.,

Vann, R., & Bruna, K. R., 2009)​. “Think-pair-share” is a common teaching method that we

envision being used in our classrooms, as it allows time for individual thought, a low-stakes

opportunity for sharing, and typically, a whole-group sharing opportunity. To enhance these

conversations, ELL-inclusive classrooms can be set up with a word wall, where both

frequently-used and new terms can be displayed. With consistent review and explanation of the

words, the wall can become a dependable resource for ELLs (​Olson, J. K., Levis, J. M., Vann,

R., & Bruna, K. R., 2009). Finally, we hope to consider the method(s) of assessment used in our

classrooms in regard to science instruction. Alternative assessments, those that are not simply

pencil and paper tests, are essential for more accurate feedback regarding students’ knowledge

(​Olson, J. K., Levis, J. M., Vann, R., & Bruna, K. R., 2009). For example, students may be

allowed to draw or speak to show what they know on an informal assessment. Additionally,

these informal assessments can scaffold ELL students in preparing for more formal assessments.

Conclusion

In conclusion, our investigation of methods of science integration with math and literacy

has informed us of both content-specific strategies and general strategies for ELL-inclusive
classrooms. We hope to make integration of these content areas a goal in our future teaching

settings. Some of us have learned, through observation this semester in ELL-inclusive

classrooms, about the effectiveness of both visuals and of integration across content areas. We

saw that giving students multiple opportunities for exposure to the content, in a variety of

settings and forms, was beneficial to a more solid grasp or understanding of the content. Use of

visuals, for example, is a teaching strategy that can be beneficial for all students. It never does

students a disservice to repetitively see and experience content visually, auditorily,

kinesthetically, etc. We hope to take this into account in the future, seeing how almost all

strategies observed, researched, and discussed could be beneficial for all students, not only

ELLs. With inclusivity as a primary goal in our future teaching, we are confident that use of our

literacy and math-specific integration strategies with science instruction will promote widespread

success in our future students.

 Works Cited

Alonso, O. B., & DelliCarpini, M. (2014). ​Teacher education that works: Preparing secondary

level math and science teachers for success with English language learners through

content based instruction. Global Education Review, 1 (4). 155-178.

An, S. A. (2016). Preservice teachers’ knowledge of interdisciplinary pedagogy: the case of

elementary mathematics–science integrated lessons. ​Zdm,​ ​49(​ 2), 237-248.

doi:10.1007/s11858-016-0821-9

Ardasheva, Y., Norton-Meier, L. & Hand, B. (2015) Negotiation,

embeddedness, and non-threatening learning environments as themes of science and

language convergence for English language learners, Studies in Science Education, 51:2,

201-249, DOI: 10.1080/03057267.2015.1078019

Flushman, T. R., Ph.D, Parker, M., & Mendoza, E. C. (2016). Reading and Writing to Learn:

Literacy and Science Integration in 4th Grade Classrooms. ​The California Reader,​ ​50​(1),

31-39.

Huerta, M., & Spies, T. G. (2016). Science inquiry and writing for ELLs: A gateway for building

understanding and academic language. Science Activities: Classroom Projects and

Curriculum Ideas, 53(1), 24-32. doi:10.1080/00368121.2015.1103693 Retrieved

December 4, 2017.

Lapp, D., Grant, M., Moss, B., & Johnson, K. (2013). Students' Close Reading of Science Texts.

The Reading Teacher, 67(2), 109-119. doi:10.1002/TRTR.1191

Olson, J. K., Levis, J. M., Vann, R., & Bruna, K. R. (2009). Enhancing Science for ELLs.

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http://lib.dr.iastate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1034&context=edu_pubs