Biliteracy Lesson Planning Guidelines

Biliteracy Lesson Planning Guidelines


The format and components of these lesson plans are based on two Common Core State Standards documents: The Common Core en Español (CCEE) that articulated standards for English and Spanish language arts instruction and the CA 2012 ELD Standards three Modes of Communication (CIP Modes): Collaborative, Interpretive and Productive. The reason for the coordination and parallel use of these Common Core standards documents are as follows:

1) The Common Core en Español articulates standards for both English and Spanish that are parallel or transferable across languages and also specify language-specific language and literacy standards that apply uniquely to Spanish and are not transferable. The standards enable teachers to address Spanish language concepts of print, phonology, morphology, syntax and grammar that are foundational skills for developing Spanish literacy and for developing metalinguistic knowledge. The lesson clearly illustrates implementation and application of the CCEE standards indicated as the target of the lesson. The CCEE standard selected is identified and framed in terms of metalinguistic knowledge development.

2) The language teaching pedagogy of the CA 2012 ELD Standards is sound and effective and is an approach to language development and literacy teaching that applies to any new or second-language of English language learners, students with other-than-English home languages or who are learning Spanish as a new, second or heritage language. Using the same or parallel language and literacy pedagogy and structured learning activities through activities using the three Modes of Communication (CIP Modes) across languages in dual language program establishes the similarity of learning conditions that supports and enhances cross-linguistic transfer.

3) The progression of listening, speaking, reading and writing inherent in the CIP Modes duplicates the natural learning sequence and progression of second language acquisition, which allows teachers to effectively scaffold and support learning activities and tasks that are appropriately differentiated according to the linguistic demands of the task and the proficiency levels of students.


The lesson objectives clearly define what students will do to demonstrate their mastery of the language and/or literacy skills of the lesson, with a focus on Spanish as L1 or L2 development and enrichment. The lesson plan exhibits a competent knowledge of linguistics and the subsystems of language and demonstrates a pedagogically appropriate and sufficiently differentiated application of linguistics for the target student population according to their language proficiency and first or native language.

Language Objectives: Generally, lessons are based on at least three objectives: one for listening/speaking, one for reading and one for writing. The teacher may have more than three for additional learning outcomes in any of the four skills areas, LSRW.

Content Objectives: Generally, lessons are based on at least two content objectives. These will indicate the learning outcomes you expect from the lesson directly related to your content standard.


The first phase of the lesson introduces and frames the learning objectives that you have selected for the lesson through an Anticipatory Set that includes motivational elements to engage students’ interest in the topic and explain how they will apply the concept and/or skills that they learn. The lesson has an anticipatory set that introduces and frames the objectives and provides motivational elements to engage students. The presentation or direct instruction phase clearly frames, explains and illustrates the metalinguistic concepts and/or language skills, using relevant and sufficient examples through well-articulated steps or processes. How will the students’ interest and motivation to learn the topic be awakened? What do the students already know about the topic? What are the students interested in learning about the topic? How does what the students know and want to learn, match with what is covered in the textbook or story or novel that I have selected as the focal text? The second phase of framing is the Presentation direct instruction phase that is a step-by-step description and explanation of the concepts or skills that the students will apply and master in the lesson. How will I frame the concept or skill at the students’ level of language proficiency and cognitive or background knowledge and comprehension? In a Word Study or grammar and syntax lesson, what examples of the concept or skill will I present to illustrate the metalinguistic awareness and knowledge that students will acquire and apply? What vocabulary will I teach because it is most important to understanding the content and/or useful for enriching students’ conceptual level? How do I teach this vocabulary in context?


Each of the Communicative Modes (collaborative, interpretive, productive) are utilized in the lesson effectively to structure and guide high levels of interaction and language production from and among students to achieve the language and literacy skills objectives of the lesson. The purpose of function of each communicative mode is clearly articulated and appropriate to the task.


Audience and Collaborative Structure Who is the audience that the teacher-to-students and students-to-students address through the use of language in this lesson and in this collaborative activity: peers (one on one), peers in small group (one-to-group), or whole group (one-to-many)? What collaborative structure or cooperative grouping has the teacher selected to promote equal levels of student engagement and participation and contribution to group tasks? Does this structure utilize assigned roles or open-ended dialogue? What level of support will students need according to their level of language proficiency to accomplish the collaborative task?

Language Functions; What is the purpose or function of the language used in the collaborative activity to accomplish the task? Language functions can be either for personal, task-oriented interaction or to accomplish an academic purpose. If the purpose is personal or task oriented interaction, what elements of a classroom discourse structure such as negotiation, turn-taking, offering opinions, etc. require knowledge of specialized vocabulary or expressions? If the function of language is academic, what sentence frames (also called stems or language frames) will the teacher provide to facilitate students’ conversations and to practice academic language, such as for describing, explaining, comparing and contrasting, sequencing, etc.?

Text Type: Informational Text

All informational text has a pattern of exposition (also called discourse or text structure) that is used to lay out and develop the logic and reasoning of the text. What is the pattern of exposition used in the text that students will interact with in the collaboration? Is this pattern of exposition domain specific? Do students imitate or duplicate a text structure in their collaborative interactions? If so, how does the teacher frame or scaffold the text structure for them to apply in their peer group interactions? What visual structures or prompts are students provided, such as a graphic organizer or writing frame?

Text Type: Literary

Literary text Is the text type used in the collaborative activity or task from a specific literary genre? What elements of the genre that students will focus on in the collaborative activity (i.e., character, setting, plot development, etc.)? What interactional structures will students use to express their personal, experiential and aesthetic response or reaction to the literary work (e.g., preference rankings, art, or kinesthetic responses)?


Text Analysis Teachers will select a text (oral or written) for the interpretive mode of the ELD lesson based on a text analysis. What is the “match” between students’ language proficiency and the reading level of the text? What areas of challenge or difficulty does the teacher foresee for students to interpret the text, at the word, sentence, paragraph, discourse and text coherence levels? How will the teacher scaffold the text reading to overcome these challenges (e.g., outlining, paraphrasing, graphic organizers, pre-teaching unfamiliar or technical vocabulary)? Close Reading What is the purpose of close reading? What does the teacher want students to focus on and learn from the text? What listening activity precedes or accompanies close reading to provide ELL with oral language to scaffold the reading and to practice speaking for its own sake and to prepare them for the productive mode?


Oral Presentation How will the teacher structure an oral presentation as a product of students’ collaboration to demonstrate their use of academic language and their interpretation of texts? What role will each student perform in the presentation? Is each student’s role appropriate for his/her language proficiency level and the linguistic and cognitive demands of the performance task? How will students’ oral production and performance be assessed (e.g., the WIDA speaking or WIDA Writing rubric)? Writing Is the amount of writing production expected appropriate for the student’s language proficiency level? This assumes that the teacher has provided framing and scaffolding according to general guidelines:

Emerging level L2 Proficiency bilingual learner should produce at least a paragraph of 8-10 sentences in length as a written product. This can be based on a cloze procedure, sentence recombination or writing frames or writing prompts and may include the application/integration of sentence/language frames.

Expanding level L2 Proficiency bilingual learner should produce a narrative of one to two paragraphs of 10-12 sentences in length with more open-ended and original language, but framed and guided through the use of a format or structure such as a news story format or report writing frame.

Bridging level L2 Proficiency bilingual learner should be expected to produce 2-3 paragraphs of writing based on an outline, template or structured format, using a textbook or content area text reading as a resource for language for writing. This can include the application of sentence/language frames but with additional original language. How will students’ written production be assessed (e.g., the WIDA writing rubric)? How will students’ use of domain-specific academic language and vocabulary be assessed?