The Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (STEAM) and the English Language Development, Dual, and World Language teams at the Santa Clara County Office of Education (SCCOE) have prioritized improving math achievement among multilingual learners (MLs) in middle school. This is due to the wide and persistent gaps in mathematics assessment scores between MLs and their non-ML peers in Santa Clara County. Through coaching and an applied research project, REL West and SCCOE are supporting districts in the county to strengthen local professional learning for middle school math teachers of MLs and, in turn, expand the local implementation of evidence-based instructional practices that will improve MLs’ language proficiency and math content understanding.
Current Projects
This applied research study conducted as part of REL West’s partnership with the Santa Clara County Office of Education (SCCOE) will assess the effects of Math for English Language Development (MELD). MELD is composed of a set of instructional routines for grade six teachers to embed in their regular math curricula and is designed to improve math achievement and English language proficiency for multilingual learners.
Completed Projects
REL West partnered with the Santa Clara County Office of Education (SCCOE) to plan and facilitate two concurrent sets of professional learning opportunities, one for educators across grades 6–12 and one for educators specifically in grade 6. The professional learning focused on exploring evidence-based practices from the What Works Clearinghouse practice guides and helping educators understand the needs of secondary multilingual learner students. Educators used the information to build a repertoire of evidence-based practices to help multilingual students build content and academic vocabulary, math knowledge, and problem-solving skills to improve their language development and math achievement.