Gutiérrez asks about language instruction requirements in ECE
Gutiérrez asks whether NYCPS or the state mandate language instruction in early childhood education. Branch says there are no state mandates in 3K and pre-K, but the division embeds multilingual support in its policy handbooks.
Are there any requirements from NYCPS or the state about language instruction for early childhood education?
Is there specific requirements?
When thinking about what we value most is ensuring that our teachers are equipped and prepared to support multilingual learners in the classroom.
So specifically for early childhood education, all teachers are provided.
with the professional learning cycles around supporting that type of language instruction.
That language instruction is embedded in the day-to-day, the instructional core, right?
So from the minute the child enters the classroom to the minute they leave, the instructional time that the teachers spend with the children are pretty much
overloaded, right, with language strategies such as repeated read-alouds, translanguaging, you know, supporting the home language and embedding it into the instructional academic outcomes of the child for that day.
Other strategies that our teachers employ, just to kind of name a couple, would include gestures and
thinking about like how we could accelerate their vocabulary acquisition by labeling some of the discovery centers or areas in the child's home language or partner language if it is a dual language setting.
For a monolingual setting, those same strategies transfer over to support the students who are multilingual and sitting in those programs too.
Did you have anything to say?
Thank you.
But in terms of a state requirement in early childhood education, so in 3K programs, pre-K programs, unlike the K-12, where we do have state mandates, they do not exist in early childhood education.
However, in the Division of Early Childhood Education, it is a commitment of ours.
So we, in our policy handbooks for our CBOs, for our pre-K centers, all of the policy handbooks, it speaks to
ensuring that we are culturally responsive, that we are honoring home language, and that everyone's responsibility is to really to ensure that all multilingual learners are supported.
So the state may not, but the division, absolutely.
Thank you.