S ooner or later, as schools move to implement the new Common Core and other forthcoming standards, almost every teacher in the United States will face the challenge of how to support students from homes where English is not the dominant language in meeting subject-matter academic expectations that require increasingly demanding uses of language and literacy in English. In this chapter, I review research that provides potential insights on how "mainstream" teachers might be prepared for responding to this challenge, both in preservice teacher preparation programs and throughout their careers. I argue that efforts to prepare teachers for working with English learners (ELs) 1 to engage with increasing language and literacy expectations across the curriculum requires development of pedagogical language knowledge (Galguera, 2011)-not to "teach English" in the way that most mainstream teachers may initially conceive of (and resist) the notion, but rather to purposefully enact opportunities for the development of language and literacy in and through teaching the core curricular content, understandings, and activities that teachers are responsible for (and, hopefully, excited about) teaching in the first place. I review recent literature that presents various approaches to what this knowledge might entail and how teacher preparation and development initiatives might go about fostering it. I conclude by proposing that, in an age of increasing linguistic demands associated with new academic expectations, building teachers' understanding of language as action (van Lier & Walqui, 2012) could serve as the foundation for preparing them to engage-and support-ELs in both challenging and meaningful academic tasks.As educators begin to navigate a new era of policy reform with new common standards at its heart, there are many uncertainties. As I write, teachers, school

This proof of concept study investigated a secondary science teacher preparation intervention in six university programs across Arizona, California, and Texas. Researchers and science method instructors (SMIs) collaboratively restructured respective science method courses to hold fidelity to an interrelated set of instructional practices that attend to science learning as envisioned in a Framework for K–12 Science Education, while also creating contextualized spaces for language and literacy development targeted to English learners (ELs), but also supportive of “mainstream” students. We observed the teaching of SMIs and preservice teachers (PSTs) with observation rubrics to gauge the fidelity to which they implemented practices. Across programs, SMIs provided opportunities for PSTs to experience the instructional practices as intended, although there was less opportunity for pedagogical development around them. The strongest evidence of PST fidelity to the intervention was found for two practices: “Increasing student interaction” and “Facilitating student talk.” Considerable variation was found across the programs for other practices including some evidence of negative effects. We discuss results in terms of promises for preparing novice secondary science teachers, as well as future directions to overcome challenges that researchers, SMIs, and novice teachers are likely to face when preparing novice science teachers.

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New demands of the Common Core State Standards imply instructional transformations for all classrooms in the United States, but teachers of students designated as English language learners (ELLs) are among those most likely to feel the impact in their daily professional lives. Language is an integral part of classroom learning in all subject areas, and this article addresses the new and special demands made by the English language arts Common Core Standards that are particularly relevant for the education of ELLs in mainstream and sheltered language arts and English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) classrooms. The authors propose three key reconceptualizations for teachers of ELLs in English language arts, outlining what is necessary to realize opportunities provided in the standards for these students' linguistic development and academic achievement. They illustrate these reconceptualizations with examples from an instructional unit that has been designed for linguistically diverse middle school Common Core classrooms and exemplifies subject‐specific instructional practices that meet the needs of ELLs.

In the United States, new common state standards in English language arts and disciplinary literacy require K-12 students to "read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently." Issues of text complexity have spurred debates in the mainstream literacy, educational practice, and policy communities. Issues raised for English learners (ELs)-and their teachers-are even more vexing. This article considers first language (L1) and second language (L2) reading theory and research to articulate challenges facing ELs as they engage with complex text and to evaluate instructional responses. Reviewing historical and contemporary perspectives on text complexity and reading comprehension, the authors argue that (a) the complexity involved in comprehending difficult text transcends textual features to include dimensions of the reader, task, and pedagogical support; and (b) the path to success for ELs will not be paved solely by attempting to match readers with "appropriate" texts or by modifying existing texts to meet perceived student reading levels. If what is "complex" about reading certain kinds of texts is the relationship among the text, its reader, the task the reader is being asked to perform, and the context in its multiple dimensions, then pedagogical responses for ELs must keep all of these in mind.

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