The Multilingual Learner and the Science of Reading

In episode two, Paul, the “Literacy Guy,” explores treating a student’s home language as an asset and leveraging cross-linguistic transfer to accelerate English literacy.

Learn more about the Savvas California Literacy Suite, built for the ELA/ELD Framework: Savvas.com/California/Solutions/Literacy

The Savvas California Literacy Suite is designed to meet and exceed the expectations of the California ELA/ELD Framework. It delivers comprehensive literacy instruction with integrated and designated ELD, along with targeted intervention to support all students—including multilingual learners—from the first day of school through graduation.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to Literacy Pulse California Edition, a podcast about the state of literacy in California, what's working, what's shifting, and what it actually looks like to build strong literacy systems for the teachers and students in our schools. I'm Paul, the Literacy Guy. I'm a former ELA teacher, instructional coach, and literacy consultant. I now serve as Director of Literacy in California for Savis Learning Company. Last time we spoke, we talked about why California's literacy moment is different. The scale, the policy landscape, the 2026 ELA adoption in K-8, and the fact that nearly 40% of California students are developing literacy in a language that isn't their first. That last piece, I want to stay there for a minute because I think it's the most important and underexplored part of the California Literacy Conversation. Today, we're talking about multilingual learners and the science of reading. Specifically, what does the research actually tell us about students who are learning to read in English while simultaneously developing English as a language? And what does this mean for the instruction and curriculum we build around them? So let's start with who we're actually talking about. In California, nearly 40% of students are English learners or have been reclassified as English proficient. That's not a subgroup, that's close to half the students in the state. And to be clear, multilingual learners are not a monolith. We're talking about students who speak more than a hundred different home languages Spanish, Mandarin, Vietnamese, Arabic, and many, many more. Students who have strong literacy foundations in their home language. Students who are newcomers still building basic English proficiency. Students who were born here and are fully bilingual. The range is enormous. That range matters because it means there's no single answer. But it doesn't mean there's no research. There is, and it should be informing what we do. Here's something worth acknowledging honestly. A significant portion of the science of reading research base was built on studies with monolingual English learners. That's changing. The field is catching up, but it's part of why the national conversation doesn't always feel like it fits the California context. What we do know, and what the research is increasingly clear on, is this. A student's home language is an asset, not an obstacle. It's not something to be set aside while they learn English. The linguistic knowledge students bring, their awareness of sounds, their vocabulary, their understanding of how language works, transfers. And we call some of this cross-linguistic transfer, and it's one of the most important concepts in multilingual literacy research. We also know that the foundational skills at the heart of structured literacy, phonemic awareness, the phonics, decoding, matter for multilingual learners too. The process of mapping sounds to print is fundamental across languages. What strong instruction looks like may have some important nuances depending on a student's home language, but the core work is the same. What's especially critical for multilingual learners, and this is where the research is really consistent, is vocabulary and oral language development. Students who are simultaneously developing English as a language need robust, intentional support in building the oral language foundation that reading comprehension depends on. You can't read with understanding in a language you're still developing. And that's not a deficit, it's a reality of language acquisition, and strong curriculum should account for it. So what does this mean in practice? It means the materials we put in front of multilingual learners should be built with them in mind from the ground up, not designed for a different student population and then adapted. The research exists, curriculum can reflect it, and when it does, teachers don't have to bridge that gap on their own. It also means oral language development can't be an afterthought. It needs to be woven into literacy instruction, not treated as a separate block, not assumed to happen on its own, but intentionally built into the curriculum and the school day. What I find most compelling are the classrooms and systems where curriculum, instruction, and language development are working together, where the pieces are coherent, where teachers have what they need to meet multilingual learners where they are, and where students' full linguistic backgrounds are treated as the asset that they are. So here's where I'll land today. The science of reading conversation in California has to include multilingual learners, not as a footnote, but as a central part of the story. Nearly 40% of our students are developing literacy in a new language. The research to support them exists, and the curriculum to reflect that research should too. California's linguistic diversity isn't a complication to work around. It's the context we're working in. And getting literacy right here means holding that context fully. Next time, we're going to talk about designated ELD, California's policy-level commitment to English learners, what it looks like when it's working, and why it's such an important piece of the California literacy puzzle. Thanks for listening. See you next time.