1. Rural Pre-Service Teachers’ Beliefs About ELLs
Karen J Kindle, University of South Dakota
Peter A Kindle, University of South Dakota
Association of Literacy Educators and Researchers
November 7, 2015

2. ELLs and the Rural Context
Rapid growth nationally – not limited to urban areas
44% of ELLs reside in rural communities
Refugee resettlement
Rural industries
Low population density
Social services with limited experience meeting needs of immigrant familes

3. Upper Midwest (Census Data)
South Dakota was 88.7% White as recently as 2000
Native American were 8.3%, all other 3%.
Since 2010, the foreign-born population of SD has grown 13.3% or 283% faster than the national average.
Many are dealing with racial diversity for the first time.

4. South Dakota Teachers Poorly paid, among worst in the nation.
Accustomed to White/Native segregation except in remote rural communities adjacent one of the nine reservations.
No personal experience of inter-racial relationships.
93% of students at the state flagship university were White in 1997; 86% last year.

5. Huron, SD Dakota Provisions organized, 2005
44 Hutterite family farms
Huron population was 11,500
Could not hire locals to process 400,000 turkeys / month
Latinos could not provide documentation
170 Karen refugee families moved St Paul, MN
Huron grew younger, more diverse, and the schools were completely unprepared

6. Teachers Beliefs and Attitudes Matter
They influence teacher-student interactions (Kagan, 1992; Pappamihiel, 2007).
They are resistant to change (Pajares, 1992).
They are present when candidates enter teacher preparation (Pappamihiel, 2007).
They shape instructional decisions and ultimately student achievement (Polat, 2010).

7. Addressing the Need
Program revised to require a course in Teaching English as a New Language for all Elementary Education candidates
Single 2 credit course taken in the sophomore or junior year
Creation of an ELL minor
Is this enough?

8. This Study
Explores the beliefs and attitudes about ELLs shared by Upper Midwestern pre-service teachers as a beginning step toward identifying those beliefs and attitudes that should be the target of specific educational interventions during their education.

9. Method
Convenience sample (N = 141) of students enrolled in first ELL course (AY ).
Response rate was 95.3%.
Paper questionnaire completed in class.
Enrollment was 87.8% female and 93.9% white.
All were native English speakers.

10. Instruments
Beliefs About Language Learning Inventory, Version 2.0 (BALLI 2.0).
Many versions since 1980
Have been used to assess students and ELL students.
44-items, 1-5 Likert scale
Factor structure has not withstood challenge
BALLI 2.0 slightly modified for pre-service teachers who are native English speakers. Two items omitted.

11. Other Questions Demographics:
K-12 was rural (49.6%), suburban (26.6%), or urban(23.7%).
K-12 had few (77.2%) or many (22.8%) ELL students.
Expectation of teaching ELLs was likely (92.2%) or unlikely (7.8%).

12. Results
Chi square tests on the 42 BALLI 2.0 items did not reveal significant differences between respondent expectations of the likelihood of teaching ELL students or their reported experience of having ELL students in their K-12 classrooms on any items.
Suburban respondents thought that ELLs wanted to learn English well at a higher rate.
We conclude, the respondents are remarkably homogeneous.

13. Comparisons
29 of 44 items could be matched between studies. This sample was in agreement significantly over two comparison groups on only four (c2 tests)
This
Study
(N = 141)
Altan
(2012)
Turkey
(N= 217)
Peacock
(2001)
Hong Kong
(N = 72)
Vibulphol
(2004)
Thailand
(N = 42)
English is a difficult or very difficult language.
79%
60%
33%
10%
It is important to practice with multi-media. 63 45 51 81
The most important part of learning English is learning how to translate from one’s native language. 42 30 6 12
People who speak more than one language well are very intelligent. 59 64 38
For eleven of the 29 items, there were no significant differences between respondents and at least two of the comparison groups.

14. Significantly Lower Agreement than Two Comparison Groups
Some people have a special ability for learning foreign languages.
English is very easy, easy or medium difficult language.
I believe that anyone can learn to speak English very well.
It is important to speak English with an excellent accent.
It is easier for someone who already speaks a foreign language to learn another one.
It is best to learn English in an English-speaking country.
It’s O. K. to guess if you don’t know a word in English.
I have a special ability for learning foreign languages.
The most important part about learning English is learning vocabulary words.
If you learn to speak English very well, you will have better opportunities for a good job.
Women are better than men at learning foreign languages.

15. Implications
Midwestern pre-service teachers are amazingly homogeneous.
White.
Rural.
Native English speakers.
Expecting ELLs in their class.
Effective pedagogy to prepare as ELL teachers, once discovered, should be easily generalizable.

16. Implications
Midwestern pre-service teachers are remarkably similar to non-native English speakers training to be EFL teachers in their home countries.
This sample tended to overrate the difficulty of learning English.
This sample tended to underrate language learning as a special ability or talent.

17. Faulty Beliefs to Address
Length of time required to acquire conversational and academic English proficiency
Role of individual differences (cultural, language, family, resources)
Difficulty in language learning results from a lack of effort