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Unlocking Academic Language Session 2: Feb 2026

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Unlocking Academic Language Session 2: Feb 2026

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The big idea: Teach students to crack the code of complex texts — separating the Bricks (vocabulary) from the Mortar (the syntax and connectors that hold academic meaning together) — so our Multilingual Learners can access content in every subject.

What clicked for our team

Identify the purpose first. Determining a text's Key Language Use — Narrate, Inform, Explain, or Argue — gives students a clear reason for reading and writing.

Language is more than vocabulary. Sentence frames, syntax, and "language keys" deserve to be taught explicitly, not assumed. As one colleague put it, "this is not mere vocabularies."

Mentor texts as a blueprint. Showing students what "good" looks like before they write reduces guesswork and cognitive load.

The Teaching and Learning Cycle (TLC). Deconstruct a text together before asking students to write independently.

Don't flood learners with vocabulary. Break texts down step by step and weave literacy into Science and Social Studies.

Teach the pattern once. Crack the code of an "explanation" in Science, and that same code transfers to Math and History.

How colleagues plan to apply it

Designing more targeted, specific sentence frames and modeling them regularly.

Using mentor texts in Science to bridge understanding scientific ideas and writing about them.

Applying language keys and vocabulary practice in FTI Khmer lessons.

Identifying the key language use in upcoming units and aligning instruction, connectors, and complex sentence structures to that purpose.

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Moving Beyond 'One Teach, One Assist': Translanguaging & Collaboration (Must Watch)

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Moving Beyond 'One Teach, One Assist': Translanguaging & Collaboration (Must Watch)

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This discussion features Dr. Andrea Honigsfeld, a leading expert in MLL co-teaching. She addresses the most common pitfall in co-taught classrooms: the "One Teach, One Assist" model.

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Dr. Andrea Honigsfeld discusses CO-TEACHING and ESL INSTRUCTION: The Challenges & Strategies #tesol

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'In collaborating, teachers share responsibility for all learners when programs shift from an isolated and fragmented pull-out model to an inclusive and integrated in-class support model' (Nordmeyer & Honigsfeld, 2020)

How does teacher collaboration impact student outcomes here at CIA FIRST?

In what ways can we co-plan to support integrated content and language development for our emerging multlingual learners?

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Unlocking Academic Language for Tier 1 Instruction

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Unlocking Academic Language for Tier 1 Instruction

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This presentation is designed to support your planning and instruction with multilingual learners. It introduces the Six Cs framework and code-breaking strategies that help make academic language visible and accessible—without lowering rigor.

Use it to:

Explore examples of how language shows up in real content tasks

Try out practical scaffolding moves for Social Studies, Science, and Math

Reflect on how to support all students in cracking the “code” of academic texts

Revisit key visuals (like the Teaching and Learning Cycle (TLC) or Six Cs Framework) when planning lessons

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Unlocking Academic Language for Tier 1 Instruction

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Fill in this form if you want a teacher account created for MLRC School Network Hub

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Phonics and Vocabulary instructional strategies for MLLs

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Phonics and Vocabulary instructional strategies for MLLs

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Use phonics in meaningful contexts, not isolation

Try dictogloss activities: read a short academic paragraph aloud, learners jot down key words, then reconstruct the text in pairs.

This builds phoneme awareness within authentic language use.

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Phonics and Vocabulary: Practical Ways to Support Multilingual Readers

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What Multilingual Learners Really Need: Practical Support for Phonics and VocabularyIn classrooms today, the question "Can they read?" often feels too simple. For multilingual learners still developing English, reading is a rich, multi-layered process - and understanding it through this lens is key to supporting learners' success.Reading isn't a single skill.

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Interpretative and Expressive language charts aligned with the 2020 ELD Framework and broken into grade level clusters which can be used for co-planning, curriculum instruction, and classroom

assessment

K

G1

G2-3

G4-5

G6-8

G9-12

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Aligning and Amplifying Content with the WIDA ELD Framework 

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Aligning and Amplifying Content with the WIDA ELD Framework 

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WIDA FB - Genre-Based Approach to Curricular Development Using the Curriculum Amplification Guide

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Expanding Reading Instruction with Multilingual Learners

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Expanding Reading Instruction with Multilingual Learners

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Interactive Learning Activities with MLLs Across Content Areas 

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Interactive Learning Activities with MLLs Across Content Areas 

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Language Loss and Translanguaging: A Path to Preservation

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Language Loss and Translanguaging: A Path to Preservation

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ELLSA Conference 2025 resource

Translanguaging builds metalinguistic awareness by building bridges between students' heritage language (L1) and target language vocabulary (L2)

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Empowering Students through Co-Constructed Student Success Criteria

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Empowering Students through Co-Constructed Student Success Criteria

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ELLSA 2025 Conference Resource highlighting the importance of the feedback cycle with a bank of instructional strategies that can be embedded into lessons to support students in becoming more engaged with their own learning.

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Comprehension Planning for Reading Activities

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Comprehension Planning for Reading Activities

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Supporting Our Developing Writers: Steps to Success

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Supporting Our Developing Writers: Steps to Success

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Supporting Writers at the Sentence and Paragraph Level Grades 3-8 

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Supporting Writers at the Sentence and Paragraph Level Grades 3-8 

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EKC Conference Workshop resources with Cailin Minor

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Beyond "Said": Unlocking Character Voice with Saying Verbs

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Beyond "Said": Unlocking Character Voice with Saying Verbs

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Key Strategies for Your Writing Instruction:

The "Saying Verbs Megaphone": A brilliant scaffolding activity where students rank verbs by intensity (e.g., whispered → stated → bellowed), perfect for helping MLLs understand graduation of meaning.

Character Diagnostics: How to use texts like Peter's Chair to show students that how a character speaks reveals who they are (e.g., muttered = grumpy/resistant).

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Today a teacher reached out to me with a question about an entry point into language features in narratives. I asked her what goals she had for her lesson which was to develop character interactions. In this short blog, I'll answer her question as well as provide some background on how verbs are viewed from a functional perspective.

When it comes to life, verbs are more than a regular/irregular, modal, auxiliary stuff we learned in grammar books, but they represent physical/material, mental/sensing worlds we inhabit corresponding to various life activities in categories such as Relational, Verbal, Mental, Behavioral, Material, Existential (Figure 1). My favorite part of the wheel in Figure 1 is the three worlds inside: verbs represent three worlds: the world of abstract relations (BEING processes), the world of consciousness (SENSING), and the physical world (DOING processes). I love this wheel because it truly brings the processes we engage in daily and the grammar together. This should satisfy my geeky readers. In this blog, I'll just focus on the green fragment of the Transitivity "wheel". If I lost you already, please scroll down but don't leave yet. The practical classroom-level stuff is coming.

When it comes to narratives, there are Actions, Reactions, Interactions, and Descriptions (Humphrey, 2017). The ARID blog is coming soon. The ARID phases of simple narratives require saying, sensing, doing, relating, feeling verbs/processes. Let's take a look at the saying verbs (Figure 2).

You could try some of the following classroom activities:

1. BE INTENTIONAL ABOUT THE GENRE. Argument saying verbs (more precisely, reporting verbs) will be different. A quick google search brought up this result. The saying verbs illustrated in this blog are for building interactions between characters in narratives.

2. Do A SAYING VERBS SCAVENGER HUNT. Bring students favorite stories they know and love. Ask them to focus only on the saying verbs and have them write them on posted it notes. This will help focus on one thing only and it will tune their eyes to zoom in on one language feature critical for creating character interactions. They could group those verbs by the characters.

3. SAYING VERBS MEGAPHONE: Tell the kids to take all those verbs from a scavenger hunt (have them pick 6 of their favorite ones) and have them put them on post it notes. Then they can arrange them from softest to loudest. My image below is a graphic representation done Napkin AI, and I had to rotate it because for some reason, it creates vertical funnels and not horizontal.

However, don't stop with only lining up verbs but discuss how those "shades of meaning" contribute to the character development. In other words, don't only teach students how to identify the shade of meaning, but ask the very important question WHY? Why did the author make that choice over the other myriad of choices? What will it do to my character if I choose "announced" versus "said"?

3. CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT THROUGH SAYING VERBS. Did you know that character development happens through verbs in stories? difference of use "yell" v "whisper" reveals the character's dispositions, feelings, etc. For practice, take a look at the famous children's book Peter's Chair by Jack Keats. I'm only focusing on a few select saying verbs that belong to Peter.

"It's my high chair," Peter whispered.

Whispered

Quiet tone, Peter saying it to himself.

He saw his crib and muttered, "My crib. It's painted pink too,"

Grumpy tone, showing Peter feeling upset.

Peter shouted, "It's too small!"

Shouted

Loud and emotional tone, emphasizing frustration or strong feelings.

"Daddy," said Peter, "let's paint the little chair pink for Susie".

Said

Neutral and calm showing Peter made peace with the fact that his chair going to his sister.

This table highlights how the different saying verbs influence the tone and mood of the dialogue in the story.

4. After this, teach students when repeating "said" is appropriate (as my writer husband says it's the invisible verb) and when it should be replaced with a synonym and what effect it has on what it says about the character. Some examples are in Figure 4.

I'd love to see pictures of the megaphones with saying verbs your students make.

At your service,

Ruslana

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Today a teacher reached out to me with a question about an entry point into language features in narratives. I asked her what goals she had for her lesson which was to develop character interactions. In this short blog, I'll answer her question as well as provide some background on how verbs are viewed from...

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UFLI Passages

The Measured Mom - Fiction and Non-Fiction

Engage NY - Decodables

Starfall

Flyleaf Publishing

Open Source Phonics

Beyond Decodables

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Next Generation Word Mapping and Vocabulary Routines

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Next Generation Word Mapping and Vocabulary Routines

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Excellent workshop resource from Dr. Katie Cunningham, author at The Six Shifts

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When to use Heritage Languages in the Multilingual Classroom

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When to use Heritage Languages in the Multilingual Classroom

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How to Effectively Incorporate Home Languages into Your Classroom

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Learn translanguaging definitions, examples, and strategies for classroom implemention for teachers in K-12 education.

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Classroom Protocols In Action: Using Interactive Wordwalls

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Classroom Protocols In Action: Using Interactive Wordwalls

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Classroom Protocols in Action: Using an Interactive Word Wall

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Co-teaching partnerships: Tips and Strategies for Success

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Co-teaching partnerships: Tips and Strategies for Success

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Workshop slides can be found on SSS website linked here

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5 types of scaffolding - CIA  Tan Huynh .mp4

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Webinar: Inspiring Higher-Level Thinking in Young Children

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To Help Students Read and Write, Shower Some Love on the Sentence

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To Help Students Read and Write, Shower Some Love on the Sentence

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To Help Students Read and Write, Shower Some Love on the Sentence

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The complex syntax of written language is often a stumbling block.

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To Teach Vocabulary, Let Students Be Thespians

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To Teach Vocabulary, Let Students Be Thespians

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To Teach Vocabulary, Let Students Be Thespians

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Metaphors We Live By: George Lakoff and Mark Johnson

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Portraits of Collaboration - ELLSA 2024 workshop slides

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Portraits of Collaboration - ELLSA 2024 workshop slides

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What do diverse multilingual learners need for their reading and literacy development?

Excellent snapshot provided by WIDA with 5 core practices to support multlinguals on their literacy journey.

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Check out this link for other languages and subject strands.

https://steinhardt.nyu.edu/metrocenter/language-rbern/resources/bilingual-glossaries-and-cognates

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A useful lesson plan tool for increasing fluency

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A useful lesson plan tool for increasing fluency

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Teaching Meta-cognitive skills to ELs who have plateaued in their Academic  language acquisition

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Teaching Meta-cognitive skills to ELs who have plateaued in their Academic  language acquisition

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#99. A strategy to support long-term ELs? - TanKHuynh

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Learn how to teach long-term ELs to develop independence and metacognitive learning strategies so propel their language development.

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Short Ebook by Tomlinson on differentiation 

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Short Ebook by Tomlinson on differentiation 

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Scaffolding checklists, when to and where to 

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Scaffolding checklists, when to and where to 

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A look into Math instruction for MLL and strategies to Scaffold up

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Lessons learned from task-based instructional approach

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Lessons learned from task-based instructional approach

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Using teaching approaches that blends task-based teaching with assessment.

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The importance of self reflection in the learning process

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The importance of self reflection in the learning process

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Nice wee reminder here to give our students time to reflect upon what they are learning and how they are learning in order to meet their goals.

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The Role of Reflection in Language Learning: Encouraging Learner Autonomy

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Photo by Motion Array. The standard, rigid focus on structured lessons, direct instruction, and guided practice can often feel sterile. While these are essential components of language acquisition,…

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Supporting Multilingual Learners in Reading Fluency - Language Magazine

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Kate Kinsella offers evidence-aligned strategies to build reading fluency within dedicated ELD and content-area coursework

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Excellent article with a treasure trove of links to Tier 1 resource banks and strategies to support learners using MTSS from SCRED Life Skills

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Nurturing Psychological Safety in Classrooms | The International Educator (TIE Online)

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Psychological safety, co-regulation, and routines create trust, reduce anxiety, and promote learning in supportive classrooms…

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CCSS Text Types with WIDA KLUs and example language features

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CCSS Text Types with WIDA KLUs and example language features

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This chart is a quick-reference guide that connects CCSS text types, WIDA Key Language Uses, and the genres, purposes, stages, and language features students are expected to work with across content areas.

Teachers can use it to:

• Identify the language demands of a task or text

• Plan targeted code‑breaking support for multilingual learners

• Understand how different genres (reports, explanations, arguments, narratives) are structured

• See examples of the verbs, connectors, participants, and sentence patterns typical of each genre

• Strengthen alignment between content goals and language goals

It’s especially helpful when planning writing tasks, analyzing mentor texts, or designing scaffolds that make academic language visible and accessible

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CCSS Text Types, WIDA Key Language Uses, Example Genres, Purposes, Stages, Language Features, and Examples