Effects of Home and Classroom Practices on Language, Cognitive, and Social Development of Young Spanish-Speaking English Learners

Young English learners (ELs) living in poverty are at risk for later reading difficulties and are less likely than their peers to encounter the level of responsive, extended conversations in their homes and preschools needed for school readiness. Furthermore, many types of dual language programs in U.S. schools operate in ways that delay regular exposure to English until later grades, rather than systematically teaching in ways that build on students' knowledge of their home language to accelerate English proficiency. The purpose of this project is to evaluate a dual- language approach that (a) maintains and improves the home language of dual language learners (DLLs) who speak mostly Spanish in their homes via parent coaching and (b) simultaneously coaches teachers to use an explicit cross-language transfer approach in which sophisticated concepts are introduced in Spanish before English. The expected outcome of this project is increased understanding of effective classroom instruction and family engagement approaches for DLLs' at risk of later reading difficulties.