Collaborative:GSE/RES: G-SPELL Gender and Science Proficiency for English Language Learners

Drexel University, Philadelphia PA

Investigators

Abstract

Intellectual Merit: This collaborative research proposal seeks to discover and describe the conditions and experiences that impact science learning for female and male language minority (LM) and English Language Learner (ELL) adolescent students in urban middle schools. LM students are students who live in homes where a language other than English is spoken. ELLs are language minorities who have been identified as having limited proficiency in spoken and written English. This study will explore the interactions among school administrators, teachers, parents, and adolescent LM/ELL students from ethnic/language subgroups in the context of science learning in urban middle schools through a gender lens. Because national data are rarely disaggregated by gender, race or ethnicity, little is known about the educational needs, achievements, or problems of LM/ELL students, and specifically, how the needs of female LM/ELL students may differ from their male peers. This research will focus on adolescent LM/ELL students in science highlighting the role of gender in the context of ethnicity and culture in grades 6-8 science classrooms. The study is designed as an exploratory, three-year, mixed-methods study to examine the experiences of female and male LM/ELL students from particular marginalized subgroups, including Latinas/os (Dominican, Puerto Rican, and Mexican) and Southeast Asians (Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Indonesian) and Chinese (Fujianese, Cantonese, and mainland). In exploring the science learning experiences of linguistically and ethnically diverse female and male adolescent students the researchers will develop case study examples that illustrate relationships and tensions between learning science, students' gender, ELL status, ethnicity and class. Specifically, the research will explore inter-categorical complexity and socio-cultural learning theories. Broader Impacts: The broader impact of this research will be the dissemination of findings to researchers,science teacher educators, K-12 educators, school administrators, and policymakers who can positively transform practices and policies to better support science learning for female and male LM and ELL students. Ultimately, these new understandings have the potential to increase male and female language minority students' participation in STEM fields, particularly females who are most significantly underrepresented in STEM majors and careers.