Data-Driven Education Insights

SLA is the determination of the linguistic systems of learners and how it evolves over time. One of the youngest and probably the most pervasive add-ons on Second language research, identity has now been a prominent field of research in its own right. Identity theorists believe that language is intricately associated with one’s being (both physical and imagined realities and identities), and they seek to identify how one’s race, gender, class, sexual orientation, and culture impact one’s language learning and teaching journey (Norton, 2013). Identity theorists directly draw on Bourdieu’s notion of the symbolic power relation between the people that take part in communication of any form. Any successful communication, as Bourdieu puts, follows an unspoken agreement that the person who speaks is worthy of speaking and the person who listens is worthy of listening. In addition, the person who dictates how the conversation goes, what to be said and discussed always have higher social ca...

Variation in language, as can be perceived, means the distinction in speaking or writing a language among the people of same language based on their places of living or demographic, individual, social or other characteristics. The study of language variation tells an important story about a language and its change over time. Primarily the distinction was associated with the regions (regional variation), but afterward, researchers discovered that the variation does not only exists between places but within them as well. They sought to decipher the subtle differences based on peoples’ social and cultural background, age, gender, race, occupation, and loyalty to a group, which is popularly known as social variation in language (Wardhaugh,. & Fuller, 2015). One of the most pioneers is William Labov, who is famous for his prominent voices in American sociolinguistics since 1960s. He spent much of his time devising an approach to investigating the relationship between language and s...

The Study of Language (6 th eds.) George Yule (2017) Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press Pp xi + 356 ISBN 978-1316606759 (paper) $30.30 U.S. The remarkable shift in the United States’ K-12 School demographic in last two decades required all teachers to be able to support EL’s language, literacy, and content learning in English by educating themselves with the characteristics of discourse and text (Nutta, Mokhtari, & Strebel, 2012, p. 10). Applied linguistics is one of the courses required to be mastered by the teachers of ELs (Nutta, Mokhtari, & Strebel, 2012). The Study of language (6 th ed.) is a comprehensive resource for in-service teachers, teacher candidates, and teacher trainers alike. Informed and trained by his years of experience in the field of applied linguistics and teacher education, Yule’s intention is to afford a clear introduction of various topics in engaging manner. Recently edited based on the comprehensive survey of instructors throug...

The United States Census Bureau reports that approximately 16.3% of the total population is of Hispanic/Latino descent, and 13.2% were other foreign-born populations in the year 2010 (Census, 2010).  One out of every four K-12 students in the United States comes from these immigrant families who speak English as a second language (Camera, 2016). Recent data show that the Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate (ACGR) of migrant children is much lower than native English speakers in the year 2013, and the dropout rates of language learners is more than double than that of native English-speaking Americans (i.e., total dropout rate-6.8%, White dropout rate- 4.4%, English learners dropout rate-12.7%) ( Stark, Noel, 2015). Studies in this direction show that the dropout rates are likely to be much higher among students who face the reality of a poor home-school relationship. Many researchers, academicians, and veteran teachers believe that regular and positive parent-teacher communication has...