Bilingual Glossary

The act of calling attention to oneself to participate or show one’s knowledge; being the main speaker in a group.

The language that the learner is trying to acquire.

The international professional organization for educators and administrators concerned with teaching English as a second or foreign language. 

Teacher training programs for teachers of ELLs. 

Speech characterized by the use of a few content words without functional words or certain grammatical markers, as in telegraphs.

Instruction that provides opportunities for students to develop language and conceptual understanding by physically doing an activity or engaging in the concept being taught. 

his program uses the student’s L1 for instruction.  The program maintains and develops skills in the primary language and culture while introducing, maintaining, and developing English skills.  The primary purpose of a TBE program is to facilitate the ELL’s transition to an all English program.

“Interpreter” and “translator” are often used interchangeably, but they have different meanings.  A translator conveys information in the written form.  An interpreter conveys information from one language to another orally (Weber, 1990). 

provides integrated language and academic instruction for native English speakers and native speakers of another language with the goals of high academic achievement, first and second language proficiency, and cross-cultural understanding.  Teachers are licensed with bilingual endorsement or fluent as determined by a proficiency test.