The Dual Language Program (one-way and two-way) prepares students to become literate in English and Spanish. Milwaukee Public School utilizes the Teaching for Biliteracy pedagogical approach to promote and facilitate the development of two languages. Attention to the process of language acquisition and language interdependence ensures that each language is leveraged towards the acquisition of the other. This is accomplished through deliberate planning and instruction around three key components of the Biliteracy Unit Framework (BUF).
Building Oracy: promotes the development of students’ speaking and listening skills, in and across content areas, building vocabulary and background knowledge while providing a venue through which students can process their learning.
The Bridge: is the instructional moment when students are guided to actively engage in contrastive analysis by visually placing the two languages side by side “to transfer the academic content they have learned in one language to the other language” (Beeman & Urow, 2013, p. 151) and increase their metalinguistic awareness. This transfer is solidified through the Extension, the third component.
The Extension: takes place in the partner language and provides students with meaningful, engaging, and novel ways to use the acquired academic vocabulary to deepen and extend their learning.