Language plays a crucial role in remembering, storing, maintaining, accessing, and sharing of memories. This evidence comes from the disciplines of psychoanalysis (Javier et al., 1993; Schwaneberg, 2010), developmental psychology (Fivush, 2011; Nelson, 2004), and bilingual memory (Larsen et al., 2002; Marian & Neisser, 2000). Some of the most telling examples come from bilingual psychotherapy where therapist switch to the patient’s native language in order to access childhood memories (e.g., Aragno & Schlacher, 1996). The loss of language, therefore, may have a detrimental effect on memory storage and recall. Until now, however, this possibility has not been tested. The purpose of the present study is to address this gap by investigating autobiographical memory in speakers undergoing L1 attrition. The study is grounded in the dual-coding theoretical framework (Paivio, 1971; 2014). According to the dual-coding theory, memories that are encoded with multiple memory traces (audio, visual, etc.) are remembered better and a weakening of a memory trace due to its inactivation might lead to forgetting. Therefore, memories that were encoded in a language that is no longer available might show signs of deterioration. Twelve non-attriters ages 18-28 (M=22.08; SD=3.73), 13 moderate attriters ages 18-33 (M=24.29; SD=5.43), and 10 advanced attriters ages 18-30 (M=23.1; SD=3.7) shared autobiographical memories with the help of free recall and cued-recall procedures (Marian & Neisser, 2000; Schrauf & Rubin, 2000). The pool of 420 free recall memories were analyzed for amount of detail (Levine et al., 2002) and the set of 1,988 cued recall memories were analyzed for phenomenological properties of vividness, significance, emotionality, and confidence in the event (Schrauf, 2009; Schrauf & Rubin, 2004). The results revealed that moderate attriters who had vague L1 Russian memories recalled memories with lower confidence rating in comparison to non-attriters, which suggests a negative L1 attrition effect on bilingual autobiographical memory. However, the advanced attriters were able to recall vivid and detailed L1 Russian memories. The aforementioned finding did not support the study’s hypothesis that memories might be forgotten if the language of encoding is no longer available. This can be explained by the following observation. Advanced attriters recalled their L1 Russian memories very frequently which insured a preservation of these memories. This rehearsing of L1 memories in their dominant L2 English also caused re-encoding of these memories into the dominant language. This was observed qualitatively (participants commenting on how L1 Russian memories were coming to them with L2 English words) and quantitatively (L1 Russian memories were reported to be accompanied by L2 English words). These findings have several theoretical implications for the discipline of bilingualism. L1 attrition may have a negative effect on bilingual autobiographical memory, at least as far as the phenomenological properties are concerned. However, this negative effect can be reversed by frequent rehearsing of memories that were encoded in an attrited language. Rehearsing may lead to re-encoding of L1 memories into the L2 which suggests that memories may be malleable. This demonstrates flexibility of bilingual mind and how it can adjust to L1 attrition. / Applied Linguistics

The focus of this dissertation is on the induction and mentoring experiences of new English as a Second Language (ESL) and bilingual teachers. Included in the dissertation are three manuscripts: a systematic literature review of the experiences of and supports for new ESL/bilingual teachers, a descriptive analysis of their induction, and an inferential analysis (i.e., regression) of the extent to which working with a mentor improved their first-year instruction. The first manuscript (Chapter 2) is a systematic review of peer-reviewed articles documenting the experiences of and supports for new ESL/bilingual teachers in U.S public schools. Findings from 32 studies published from 2002-2020 were synthesized into three overarching themes (i.e., instructional contexts and roles; social contexts of teaching; formal induction supports). Many new teachers experienced challenges in their instructional contexts and roles and struggled to connect socially with others in their schools, leading to physical segregation and marginalization. Moreover, only a few studies elaborated on specific induction and mentoring supports. Manuscript 1 concludes with suggestions for researchers and implications for K-12 school leaders, teacher educators, and new ESL/bilingual teachers. The second manuscript (Chapter 3) presents the findings of a secondary descriptive analysis of new ESL/bilingual teacher induction using the nationally representative 2011-12 Schools and Staffing Survey Teacher Questionnaire. Findings provide a first of its kind national profile of their induction supports, levels of perceived preparedness for the first year, and demographic characteristics, as well as a comparison to new general educators. Findings indicate that a lower percentage of new ESL/bilingual teachers than general educators received important induction supports (i.e., administrator feedback, same-subject mentoring, and frequent mentoring) and were not well prepared for critical teaching tasks (e.g., assessing students). Demographically, a higher percentage of new ESL/bilingual teachers than general educators were teachers of color. The manuscript concludes with directions for future research and implications for teacher educators and school leaders. The third manuscript (Chapter 4) investigated which mentoring components (i.e., same-subject mentors, frequency of mentoring, and other mentoring activities), predicted new ESL/bilingual teachers' perceptions that their mentors helped improve their first year of teaching. Using a nationally representative sample of ESL/bilingual teachers. I found that frequent weekly mentoring, help with developing student assessment tools, and help with paperwork/record keeping were statistically significant predictors of the extent to which new ESL/bilingual teachers indicated their mentors improved their first-year teaching. I conclude with suggestions for future research and improving mentoring programs for new ESL/bilingual teachers. / Doctor of Philosophy / The induction and mentoring experiences of new general educators are well documented; however, we know little about the experiences of new English as a Second Language (ESL) and bilingual teachers. This dissertation, comprised of three manuscripts, explores their induction and mentoring experiences. Chapter 2 reviews the literature published between 2002-2020 on the experiences of and supports for new ESL/bilingual teachers. Findings revealed that new ESL/bilingual teachers experienced challenges in instructional contexts and their roles, struggled in social contexts with other teachers and administrators, and sometimes felt marginalized and physically segregated in their schools. Moreover, evidence of induction and mentoring supports were limited. Chapter 3 presents findings from a secondary descriptive analysis of new ESL/bilingual teacher induction using nationally representative data. Findings suggest that low percentages of new ESL/bilingual teachers perceived themselves to be prepared in the first year for key teaching tasks and others did not have common induction supports. Moreover, these findings were compared with new general educators' revealing differences in descriptive results. Chapter 4 explores the mentoring experiences of new ESL/bilingual teachers. Using a nationally representative sample and regression, findings reveal that a number of new ESL/bilingual teachers did not have weekly mentoring with same-subject mentors, nor did they participate in important mentoring activities. Regression results revealed that weekly mentoring, help with paperwork/record keeping, and help with developing student assessments were statistically significant predictors of the extent to which new ESL/bilingual teachers perceived that their mentors improved their first-year teaching. Discussions in each manuscript provide suggestions for future researchers and implications for school leaders and teacher educators.

abstract: This multilevel, institutional case study used ethnographic methods to explore the intersections of local language policies and emergent bilingual students’ identities in dual language and structured English immersion (SEI) classrooms at one urban elementary school. Using a sociocultural policy approach as means to explore the ways that educational language policies are appropriated and practiced in schools and classrooms and an intersectional literacy identity framework, I engaged in a multilevel qualitative analysis of one school, two fifth-grade classrooms, and four focal emergent bilingual students. At the school and classroom levels, I sought to understand the ways educators practiced and enacted language policies as well as how they conceptualized (bi)literacy for emergent bilingual students. At the student level, I engaged in identity-text writing sessions designed around student interests yet aligned with the opinion/argumentation writing style the students were working on in class at the time of data collection. Additionally, I conducted one-on-one interviews with the participants at each level of analysis (i.e. school-level, classroom-level, and student-level). The primary data analysis sources included participant interviews, classroom observations, and student identity-text artifacts. Findings highlight the dynamic in-school and classroom-level realities of emergent bilingual students in an Arizona educational-language policy context. Specifically, at the school level, there was an ongoing tension between compliance and resistance to state-mandated policies for emergent bilingual students. At the school and classroom levels, there were distinct differences in the ways students across the two classrooms were positioned within the larger school environment as well as variation surrounding how language and culture were positioned as a resource in each classroom context. The role of teachers as language policymakers is also explored through the findings. Analysis of student texts revealed the centrality of intersectional student identities throughout the writing processes. The discussion and conclusions more broadly address implications for educational practice, policy, and future research directions. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Educational Leadership and Policy Studies 2018

Thesis advisor: C. Patrick Proctor / Traditionally strict language separation policies in dual language bilingual education (DLBE) programs reflect parallel monolingualism and have been criticized as failing to recognize the sociolinguistic realities of bilingual students (García & Lin, 2017). To leverage bilingual learners’ full linguistic repertoires as resources, this study explored how Sánchez, García, and Solorza’s (2018) translanguaging allocation policy could be strategically and purposefully designed in a third grade Mandarin/English DLBE classroom where the majority of the students were English-dominant speakers. Taking the form of participatory design research (Bang & Vossoughi, 2016), I (as a researcher) and a Mandarin teacher worked together to co-design translanguaging documentation, translanguaging rings, and translanguaging transformation spaces across different content areas – Chinese Language Arts, Science, and Social Studies. During the process, we also engaged in equitable forms of dialogue and listening to openly discuss, negotiate, and develop our translanguaging co-stance in iterative ways. Data collection included classroom and design meeting recordings, observational field notes, and teacher and students’ artifacts and interviews throughout the school year of 2018-19. Inductive and deductive coding were adopted for data analysis. Findings revealed that translanguaging pedagogies took many shapes based on contextual factors, such as the different pedagogical purposes and curricular demands across content areas. Students were able to develop deeper content understandings, build cross-linguistic connections, and develop their bi/multilingual identities and critical consciousness in those flexible bilingual spaces. Findings also demonstrated that the ideological (re)negotiation between the researcher and the teacher was a bumpy and discursive journey, replete with tensions, confusions, and difficult conversations. Overall, it was a balancing act to create translanguaging spaces while maintaining the language-minoritized (Mandarin) space and privileging students’ use of Mandarin given the societal dominance of English. This study provides implications for new theoretical and pedagogical understandings of translanguaging, and suggests that researcher-teacher collaboration provides a promising way to generate evidence-based, practitioner-informed, and context-appropriate knowledge for DLBE curricular and pedagogical improvements. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2020. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Teacher Education, Special Education, Curriculum and Instruction.

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The purpose of this study was to examine the phenomena of middle school transition and achievement as it relates to Hispanic students. According to the 2000 U.S. census, there are more than 35 million registered Hispanic citizens. Of those, 3.6 million are public school students. The literature indicated that there was a marked regression in student achievement during the transition to middle school. Through the use of descriptive statistics and regression analysis, sixth grade Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) reading and math developmental scale scores (DSS) were analyzed to determine if the mean achievement improved or declined after the transition to middle school. A purposeful sampling procedure was used to select 615 Hispanic students from more than 6,000 students that were enrolled in sixth grade during the 2008-2009 school year. The major findings of this study did not support the literature that indicated that students experienced a decline in achievement when they transitioned to middle school. Analysis of the descriptive statistics indicated that sixth grade Hispanic students experienced a substantial increase in their mean FCAT reading DSS and a smaller increase in the mean math DSS only increasing by 30 points or 2% after they transitioned to middle school.

This paper is divided into four chapters. Chapter one presents an introduction and overview of the nature of the problem, its significance and implication for public policy, and a presentation of the research design and methodology. Chapter two reviews the historical and legal background of bilingual education policy. Chapter three presents a literature review of bilingual education policy making, and examines the impacts and effects of federal aid in practice. Chapter four provides a summary of survey findings and recommendations for reform of the funding criteria for Title VII ESEA bilingual education grants.

The purpose of this study was to review Bilingual Bicultural teacher education in Texas and to collect opinions about present certification requirements and institutional guidelines. Narrative descriptions of the history and present status of programs at thirty-seven institutions were compiled. A questionnaire was completed with program directors and members of the Texas Association for Bilingual Education. Data from the questionnaires were reported in frequencies and percentages and cross-tabulations were completed to assess differences in opinions on general issues, TEA requirements, and nationally-set standards.

Considering the strategic role that bilingual education policies have played in the present educational setting, in this thesis, I have problematized the ways in which the discourses about bilingual education policies in the Brazilian context have emerged as a condition for the inclusion of deaf subjects in contemporaneity. The following objectives have been established: to identify the historical and political moment in which we started investing in bilingual education policies for the deaf in Brazil; to analyze how the discourses about bilingual education for the deaf have emerged as a condition of possibility of inclusion of deaf subjects in contemporaneity; to problematize the processes of negotiation between the bilingual education policies for the deaf in Brazil and the Special Education Policy from the Inclusive Education Perspective. Two reasons justify my interest in this topic: firstly, the investment made by inclusive education policies and Brazilian deaf communities in the configuration of bilingual education policies in Brazil; secondly, the capturing movement of the discourse of bilingual education for the deaf by inclusive education policies. I have selected a set of documents of the historical files of the National Institute of Deaf Education, official documents of the Ministry of Education and documents formulated by the Brazilian deaf community. A genealogy-inspired exercise has enabled me to address the issues of provenience and emergence of the Bilingual Education Policies for the deaf in Brazil as a guiding axis to understand how the discourses about Sign language and Portuguese Language have not stemmed from an alleged chronological sequence in the history of deaf education; rather, they are intertwined with displacements and disruptions at linguistic, educational, economic and political levels. Concerning this return to the past, I have argued that, in the 18th and 19th centuries, the model of deaf subject required the ability to oralize so that the social order could be maintained, and, therefore, the subject could become useful and productive in society. Thus, a power of normalization was instituted and focused on those who were able to oralize and, hence, could be professionalized, and those who used only gestures. It is interesting to understand how the professionalization of deaf subjects was a great concern of the State. Another important point is the perception that the oralization and teaching of written Portuguese Language were conditions of possibility for the contemporary discourses about bilingual education, i.e. the acknowledgement and the importance of the Sign Language led to the understanding that deaf education was triggered by the political rationality then in effect. However, by understanding the deaf community as a linguistic minority, there are possibilities for its politicization and resistance to normalization practices, such as the inclusion of the deaf in regular school, the acknowledgement of Sign Language as an official language, and the methodologization of Sign Language in regular school. The discussions about the presence of a relationship between Sign Language and written Portuguese Language are still constant in the education of those subjects, thus causing mobilizations, tensions, and negotiations. / Tendo em vista o papel estratégico que as políticas de educação bilíngue para surdos vêm exercendo no atual cenário educacional, nesta tese, problematizo como os discursos sobre as políticas de educação bilíngue no contexto brasileiro emergem como uma condição para a inclusão dos sujeitos surdos na contemporaneidade. Para isso, tomo como objetivos: compreender em que momento histórico e político passamos a investir em políticas de educação bilíngue para surdos no Brasil; analisar como emergem os discursos sobre a educação bilíngue para surdos como condição de possibilidade para a inclusão dos sujeitos surdos na contemporaneidade; problematizar os processos de negociação entre as políticas de educação bilíngue para surdos no Brasil e a Política de Educação Especial na Perspectiva da Educação Inclusiva.Justifico meu interesse pelo tema por dois motivos principais: primeiro, pela ordem do investimento tanto das políticas educacionais inclusivas quanto das comunidades surdas brasileiras na configuração de políticas de educação bilíngue no Brasil; segundo, pelo movimento de captura do discurso da educação bilíngue para surdos pelas políticas educacionais inclusivas. Elegi como materialidade de análise um conjunto de documentos do arquivo histórico do Instituto Nacional de Educação de Surdos, documentos oficiais do Ministério da Educação e documentos elaborados pela comunidade surda brasileira. Fazer um exercício de inspiração genealógica possibilitou, nesta tese, mobilizar a questão da proveniência e da emergência das Políticas de Educação Bilíngue para surdos no Brasil como eixo norteador para entender como os discursos sobre a Língua de Sinais e a Língua Portuguesa não provêm de uma suposta sequência cronológica na história da educação de surdos, e sim são perpassados por deslocamentos e rupturas nos âmbitos linguísticos, educacionais, econômicos e políticos. Sobre esse retorno ao passado, argumentei que, nos séculos XVIII, XIX, o modelo de sujeito surdo consistia em demonstrar quem era capaz de oralizar para manter a ordem social e, consequentemente, tornar-se um sujeito útil e produtivo para a sociedade. Dessa forma, instituía-se um poder de normalização que incidia sobre aqueles que tinham condições de oralizar e que, portanto, eram encaminhados para serem profissionalizados, e aqueles que usavam somente gestos. Com isso, foi interessante compreender como a profissionalização dos sujeitos surdos já aparecia como uma grande preocupação do Estado. Outro ponto de destaque no estudo foi perceber que as práticas de oralização e do ensino da Língua Portuguesa escrita foram condições de possibilidade para os discursos contemporâneos sobre a educação bilíngue, ou seja, o reconhecimento e a importância da Língua de Sinais permitiu entender que a educação de surdos foi agenciada pela racionalidade política vigente. No entanto, ao entender-se a comunidade surda como minoria linguística, criam-se possibilidades de sua politização e resistência às práticas de normalização, como a inclusão dos surdos na escola regular, o reconhecimento da Língua de Sinais como língua oficial e a metodologização da Língua de Sinais na escola regular. As discussões em torno da presença da relação entre a Língua de Sinais e a Língua Portuguesa escrita ainda são constantes na educação desses sujeitos, provocando mobilizações, tensionamentos e negociações.

No description available.