K-2nd Grade - Multilingual Learner Supports

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in extensive work with grade-level problems to meet the full intent of grade-level standards.

At the lesson level, the materials provide consistent, embedded strategies and scaffolds that enable MLLs to access and engage with rigorous, grade-level mathematical content. The materials intentionally designed these supports to develop both language and content knowledge through structured routines and opportunities for discourse across all four language domains—listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson describes the problem-based lesson design, which begins with a Warm-Up, then engages students with one to three instructional Activities, and ends with a Lesson Synthesis and Cool-Down formative assessment opportunity. The Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners outlines how this lesson design centers the unique language needs of MLLs by embedding Stanford University’s four design principles: Support Sense-Making, Optimize Output, Cultivate Conversation, and Maximize Meta-Awareness. The materials feature multimodal instruction, which creates accessible entry points and structured opportunities for disciplinary language usage alongside mathematics learning. Additionally, the materials describe the language and mathematics goals in the following features: Unit Goals, Section Goals, Lesson Narrative, Lesson Purpose, and Learning Goals (both teacher- and student-facing). The Course Guide, 2. Problem-Based Teaching and Learning states, “Good instruction starts with explicit learning goals… Without a clear understanding of the learning objectives, activities in the classroom, implemented haphazardly, have little impact on advanced students’ understanding.” This is especially pertinent in English language development; language development research states that MLLs understanding clear, explicit learning goals helps to facilitate their language development by setting an authentic purpose for using language.

The materials consistently employ adapted versions of the Mathematical Language Routines (MLRs) by Stanford University UL/SCALE, which designed the MLRs to support the simultaneous development of mathematical practices, content, and language. The materials reference MLRs in two ways: in the lesson facilitation or as an additional suggestion in notes titled Access for English Language Learners. 

The materials feature all eight of Stanford University UL/SCALE’s MLRs:

• MLR1 Stronger and Clearer Each Time: Students construct a verbal or written response to a math problem, then verbally share their response with a partner, get feedback from the listener to improve the response, and revise their original response based on the feedback they received.

• MLR2 Collect and Display: Students access their own and others’ mathematical ideas as the teacher scribes the language, strategies, and concepts students use during partner, small group, or whole-class discussions using written words, diagrams, and pictures.

• MLR3 Critique, Correct, Clarify: Students rewrite a math response from an example that is incorrect, incomplete, or otherwise ambiguous.

• MLR4 Information Gap: In a group, each student has different parts of a mathematical situation, and they work together to piece together that information orally or visually to bridge the gap between the parameters of the situation and a question to solve a mathematical problem.

• MLR5 Co-Craft Questions: Students examine a problem stem, a graph, a video, an image, or a list of interesting facts and author a mathematical question that might be asked about the situation. With partners or as a class, they compare questions before the teacher reveals the mathematical question of the task as designed. 

• MLR6 Three Reads: Students are guided to read the problem three separate times with three separate purposes with quick discussions between each read.

• MLR7 Compare and Connect: Students identify, compare, and contrast their own understandings with other students’ mathematical approaches, representations, concepts, examples, and language.

• MLR8 Discussion Supports: Teachers provide a variety of supports to foster inclusive whole-class discussions, such as:

  • Revoicing or rephrasing.

  • Pressing for details.

  • Providing sentence frames.

  • Providing multimodal instructional suggestions (e.g. reading, writing, speaking, listening, pointing, gesturing, acting out, etc).

  • Using choral responses.

  • Modeling a think-aloud.

  • Providing think time.

• However, while the materials note that the language domain of writing is addressed through routines such as MLR1 Stronger and Clearer Each Time, writing is not as consistently emphasized as listening and speaking. Structured writing tasks are less consistently present across lessons compared to listening and speaking tasks, which may limit opportunities for balanced development across all four language domains (see the report for 2g.MLL).

For example, in Grade 2, Unit 7, Adding and Subtracting within 1,000, Lesson 4, Activity 2, students work in partners to use place value understanding to add and subtract by place. The activity begins with a structured whole-class discussion where students compare two worked examples of two students’ solution strategies showing adding by place value. The materials direct the teacher to give students 1 minute of quiet think-time, followed by 3 minutes of a partner discussion before facilitating the whole-class discussion comparing the two worked examples. This structured think-time provides MLLs with time to translate in their heads, if needed, and an opportunity to orally rehearse their responses with a partner before participating in the whole-class discussion. After the whole-class discussion, students work independently on four problems with access to base-ten blocks, and then compare their answers and solution strategies with their partners. A note titled Access for English Language Learners suggests the use of MLR7 Compare and Connect which directs the teacher to lead a discussion comparing, contrasting, and connecting the different approaches by asking, “Did anyone solve the problem the same way, but would explain it differently?” This piece of evidence demonstrates how the materials embed supports that enable MLLs to regularly engage with grade-level mathematics in a language-rich environment; the materials do not dilute mathematical rigor but rather equip students with linguistic scaffolds that allow for their full and complete participation. This example illustrates how the materials integrate language support alongside math content.

Beyond the lesson level, the Course Guide, 2. Problem-Based Teaching and Learning describes how the material’s problem-based instructional design fosters the full and complete participation of all students. This section outlines the material’s approach to mathematics teaching and learning, including narratives describing the following principles: All Students are Capable Learners of Mathematics, Learning Mathematics by Doing Mathematics, and Community Building. Specific actions to support the principle of Community Building and the development of a math learning community are outlined in the Course Guide, 7. Key Structures in This Course. Here, a chart displays vital student actions and teacher moves to build a positive mathematics community as put forth by Phil Daro and the Strategic Education Research Partnership (SERP) Institute. This is especially pertinent in English language development; language development research states that MLLs understanding of clear, explicit learning goals helps to facilitate their language development by setting an authentic purpose for using language.

In addition, the Course Guide states that in order to extend the invitation to do mathematics to all students, explicit development of the math learning community is required. This is suggested in the first six lessons, where every grade embeds norm-building and reflection questions for teachers and students to collectively identify what it looks like and sounds like to do math together. For example, the Lesson Preparation for Grade 2, Unit 1, Adding, Subtracting, and Working with Data, Lesson 1 directs the teacher to co-create a Math Community poster that features columns labeled Doing Math and Norms with spaces for the class to describe both teacher and student actions. The materials state, “In upcoming lessons, students will add to and revise these ideas, including drafting classroom goals and expectations for the ‘Norms’ column. Keep the poster displayed in the classroom.” Additionally, the lessons in this unit feature Teacher Reflection Questions such as:

• “Today’s lesson provided an opportunity to learn from your students. How were you able to incorporate your students’ lived experiences into the lesson?” 

• “Think about who participated in math class today. What assumptions are you making about those who did not participate? How can you leverage each of your students’ ideas to support them in being seen and heard in tomorrow’s math class?”

• “Think about a time you recently made a mistake during math class. How did you leverage your mistake to show that mistakes are just learning in process?”

• “Who did math today in class and how do you know? Identify the norms or routines that allowed those students to engage in mathematics. How can you adjust these norms so that all students do math tomorrow?”

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt Mathematics v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in the intentional development of students’ conceptual understanding of key mathematical concepts. The materials provide embedded, intentional supports that promote conceptual understanding of grade-level mathematics through activating prior knowledge, pairing concrete, visual, and abstract representations, and engaging students in scaffolded tasks that are aligned with the depth and intent of the standards.

In every unit, the materials consistently provide opportunities for students to explore and make sense of mathematical ideas before engaging with multiple representations to formalize procedures, supporting conceptual understanding. To do this, the materials embed various representations, structured discourse, and Mathematical Language Routines (MLRs) to promote deep conceptual understanding. For example:

• Concrete and visual representations such as shape cards, counters or cubes, and 5- and 10-frames are used alongside MLRs to solidify understanding of numbers, geometric concepts, and operations.

• Sentence frames and structured partner work encourage students to explain their reasoning, compare strategies, and make sense of concrete and visual representations.

• Tasks that require students to move between representations (concrete, visual, and abstract), align with the standards’ call for conceptual understanding.

Specifically, in Kindergarten, Unit 1, Math In Our World, Lesson 12, students demonstrate conceptual understanding as they count collections of objects and say one number for each object (K.CC.4). The Warm-up offers embedded language supports for MLLs through activating prior knowledge from previous lessons about number names, one-to-one correspondence, and cardinality. Activity 1 is a counting collections activity in which students work independently to count a collection of objects by using a 5-frame or a counting mat, which pairs concrete manipulatives with abstract spoken number names to support students in developing conceptual understanding. The materials direct the teacher to formatively assess as students work by monitoring for students who say one number for each object. A note titled Access for English Language Learners suggests the use of MLR8 Discussion Supports that the teacher could choose to implement while they are formatively assessing students’ one-to-one correspondence. MLR8 recommends that the teacher provide additional opportunities for students to chorally count to support the language domains of speaking and listening, which supports MLLs’ full and complete participation in the task. 

Additionally in Grade 1, Unit 3, Adding and Subtracting Within 20, Lesson 13, Activity 2, students develop conceptual understanding as they solve Take From, Result Unknown and Take From, Change Unknown word problems using a method of their choice (1.OA.6). After the teacher reads the word problems aloud, students work independently to solve the two word problems using self-selected solution strategies with access to double 10-frames and cubes or counters. After four minutes of independent work time, students discuss their solution strategies with partners, pairing their work using concrete manipulatives with abstract spoken number names. The materials support the productive language demands of the partner discussion through a suggestion in a note titled Access for English Language Learners: the use of MLR2 Collect and Display. As students use vocabulary like counted back and equations while explaining their thinking to their partners, the teacher displays the written words and encourages students to borrow language from the display as needed. This language support helps MLLs connect abstract mathematical vocabulary to the concrete representations. By focusing on both the concrete representations of solutions and student explanations, the materials support MLLs in the language needed to build conceptual understanding of Take From, Result Unknown, and Take From, Change Unknown word problems.

These pieces of evidence demonstrate that the materials support MLLs’ full and complete participation in the intentional development of students’ conceptual understanding of key mathematical concepts. The materials are structured to build conceptual understanding through tasks that activate prior knowledge and that connect concrete, visual, and abstract representations with academic language and mathematical reasoning.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in the intentional development of MP1: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.

In every unit, the materials consistently provide opportunities for students to use and develop language when making sense of problems through whole-group and student-to-student discourse. The materials provide these opportunities through features embedded within the lesson facilitation or as a suggested support in notes titled Access for English Language Learners. An example of a feature embedded within the lesson facilitation is the Instructional Routines. Specifically, the Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson, describes how the Instructional Routine Notice and Wonder supports MP1: “Notice and Wonder invites all students into a mathematical task with two low-stakes prompts: ‘What do you notice? What do you wonder?’ By thinking about things they notice and wonder, students gain entry into the context and might have their curiosity piqued. Students learn to make sense of problems (MP1) by taking steps to become familiar with the context and the mathematics that might be involved.” 

As described in the report for 1d.MLL, the materials consistently employ Mathematical Language Routines (MLRs) by Stanford University UL/SCALE. The Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners outlines how the material’s lesson design centers the unique language needs of MLLs by embedding Stanford University’s four design principles, the first of which being Support Sense-Making, which aligns with MP1. The specific MLRs that directly support MP1 are as follows:

• MLR4 Information Gap: In a group, each student has different parts of a mathematical situation, and they work together to piece together that information orally or visually to bridge the gap between the parameters of the situation and a question to solve a mathematical problem.

• MLR5 Co-Craft Questions: Students examine a problem stem, a graph, a video, an image, or a list of interesting facts and author a mathematical question that might be asked about the situation. With partners or as a class, they compare questions before the teacher reveals the mathematical question of the task as designed. 

• MLR6 Three Reads: Students are guided to read a problem three separate times with three separate purposes with quick discussions between each read.

• MLR7 Compare and Connect: Students identify, compare, and contrast their own understandings with other students’ mathematical approaches, representations, concepts, examples, and language.

• MLR8 Discussion Supports: Teachers provide a variety of supports to foster inclusive whole-class discussions, such as:

  • Revoicing or rephrasing.

  • Pressing for details.

  • Providing sentence frames.

  • Providing multimodal instructional suggestions (e.g. reading, writing, speaking, listening, pointing, gesturing, acting out, etc).

  • Using choral responses.

  • Modeling a think-aloud.

  • Providing think time.

Specifically, in Grade 1, Unit 7, Geometry and Time, Lesson 1, the Warm-Up begins with students comparing four images of 2D and 3D shapes with a partner in the Instructional Routine, Which Three Go Together?. The Warm-Up supports MLLs with activating prior knowledge around, and making sense of, defining attributes of 2D and 3D shapes. Activity 1 directs the teacher to organize a set of about 15 geoblocks and solid shapes for each set of partners. The materials invite students to work with their partner to sort the shapes in a way that makes sense to them by comparing their attributes. Using physical manipulatives supports MLLs with making sense of the defining attributes of 2D and 3D shapes. During partner work time, the materials direct the teacher to implement MLR2 Collect and Display in which the teacher circulates to listen for, collect, and display the mathematically precise language students use to describe and compare the shapes, supporting MLLs with the productive language demands of comparing shapes with their partner. The lesson continues with extended work in describing physical shapes in Activity 2, ending with a whole-class discussion about different ways to compare shapes in the Lesson Synthesis. Throughout this lesson, students have worked on only one problem context; the materials consistently employ deep, sustained engagement with a small number of problems, supporting students in persevering in solving problems.

The materials for Grades K-2 consistently and frequently features Instructional Routines like Notice and Wonder, the MLRs listed above, and the use of physical manipulatives. There is a missed opportunity for the materials to support MLLs with making sense of problems by providing language support for multiple-meaning terms. In the Warm-Up of the example above, students use the word open to describe one of the displayed shapes; MLLs could benefit from explicit, direct instruction about the multiple meanings of the term open: open as referring to a gap in the sides of a 2D figure, or open as in a store is open for business. 

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in the intentional development of MP3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others.

In every unit, the materials provide opportunities for students to use and develop language when constructing arguments through whole-group and student-to-student discourse. The materials provide these opportunities through features embedded within the lesson facilitation or as a suggested support in notes titled Access for English Language Learners. 

An example of a feature embedded within the lesson facilitation is the Instructional Routines. Specifically, the Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson describes how the Instructional Routines 5 Practices and Choral Counting support MP3. 5 Practices states, “Lessons that include this routine allow students to solve problems in ways that make sense to them. Monitor to uncover and nurture conceptual understandings during the activity, as students engage in a problem in meaningful ways. During the Activity Synthesis, students collectively reveal multiple approaches to a problem and make connections between these approaches (MP3).” Choral Counting states, “While Choral Counting offers students the opportunity to practice verbal counting, the recorded count is the primary focus of the routine. As students reflect on the recorded count, they make observations, predict upcoming numbers in the count, and justify their reasoning (MP7 and MP3).” Additionally, the Course Guide, 9. Standards for Mathematical Practice states, “Some instructional routines are generally associated with certain MPs. For example… The Estimation Exploration routine offers students opportunities to share a mathematical claim and the thinking behind it (MP3), and to make an estimate or a range of reasonable answers, with incomplete information, which is a part of modeling with mathematics (MP4).”

As described in the report for 1d.MLL, the materials consistency employs Mathematical Language Routines [MLRs] by Stanford University UL/SCALE. The specific MLRs that directly support MP3 are:

• MLR1 Stronger and Clearer Each Time: Students construct a verbal or written response to a math problem, then verbally share their response with a partner to get feedback from the listener to improve the response, and revise their original response based on the feedback they received.

• MLR2 Collect and Display: Students access their own and others’ mathematical ideas as the teacher scribes the language, strategies, and concepts students use during partner, small group, or whole-class work, while constructing arguments and critiquing others. 

• MLR3 Critique, Correct, Clarify: Students critique mathematical reasoning by rewriting a math response from an example that is incorrect, incomplete, or otherwise ambiguous.

• MLR7 Compare and Connect: Students identify, compare, and contrast their own understandings with other students’ mathematical approaches, representations, concepts, examples, and language.

• MLR8 Discussion Supports: Teachers provide a variety of supports to foster inclusive whole-class discussions that support constructing mathematical arguments, such as:

  • Revoicing or rephrasing.

  • Pressing for details.

  • Providing sentence frames.

  • Modeling a think-aloud.

  • Providing think time to allow for mental or oral rehearsal.

Expanding on the sentence frames that MLR8 Discussion Supports occasionally references, the Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners contains a table with sample sentence frames and sentence starters for five language functions. Three of the language functions—explain, justify, and question—are directly related to MP3. Example sentence frames include:

• Explain: “First, I ____, because…” / “I noticed ____ so I…”

• Justify: “I know ____, because…” / “I heard you say… ”

• Question: “Why did you ____?” / “Can you say more about… ?”

These sentence frames support interdisciplinary language connections since they are generic in nature. This section of the Course Guide states, “The table shows examples of generic sentence frames that can support common disciplinary language functions across a variety of content topics. Some of the lessons in these materials include suggestions of additional sentence frames that could support the specific content and language functions of that lesson.” The materials do not reference these sentence frames within lessons at point-of-use. 

However, while the materials note that the language domain of writing is addressed through routines such as MLR1 Stronger and Clearer Each Time, writing is not as consistently emphasized as listening and speaking. Structured writing tasks are less frequently present compared to supports for speaking and listening, limiting opportunities for balanced language development across domains. Teachers could apply many of the sentence frames that MLR8 Discussion Supports references and within the Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners to written constructed responses, but the materials rarely reference such use.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in the intentional development of MP6: Attend to precision.

In every unit, the materials provide opportunities for students to use and develop language when attending to precision through whole-group and student-to-student discourse. The materials provide these opportunities through features embedded within the lesson facilitation or as a suggested support in notes titled Access for English Language Learners. One example of a feature embedded in the lesson facilitation is the Instructional Routines. Specifically, the Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson describes how the Instructional Routines Card Sort and Which Three Go Together? support MP6. Card Sort states, “Students sort cards on their own or in groups of 2–4. They organize objects into categories or groups based on shared characteristics or connections. As students work, monitor for the different ways groups choose their categories, and encourage increasingly precise mathematical language (MP6).” Which Three Go Together? states, “Which Three Go Together fosters a need for students to identify defining attributes and use language precisely in order to compare and contrast a carefully chosen group of geometric figures, images, or other mathematical representations (MP6).”

As described in the report for 1d.MLL, the materials consistently employ Mathematical Language Routines [MLRs] by Stanford University UL/SCALE. The specific MLRs that directly support MP6 are:

• MLR2 Collect and Display: Students access their own and others’ mathematical ideas as the teacher scribes the vocabulary, strategies, and concepts students use during partner, small group, or whole-class discourse.

• MLR4 Information Gap: In a group, each student has different parts of a mathematical situation, and they work together to piece together that information orally or visually to bridge the gap between the parameters of the situation and a question to solve a mathematical problem. This process prompts students to refine the language they use to ask increasingly more precise questions until they get useful input.

• MLR8 Discussion Supports: Teachers provide a variety of supports to foster inclusive whole-class discussions that support using precise terms, such as:

  • Revoicing or rephrasing.

  • Pressing for details.

  • Providing sentence frames.

  • Modeling a think-aloud.

  • Providing think time to allow for mental or oral rehearsal.

Generally, the materials invite students to engage with a mathematical concept, both through speaking and listening during mathematical discourse and through the use of visuals or manipulatives, before attaching a precise new vocabulary term to the concept. For example, in Grade 2, Unit 8, Equal Groups, Lesson 2, students work independently and in partners to comprehend the new vocabulary terms even and odd through making pairs from groups of objects. The Warm-up invites students to use precise language to compare four drawings of socks in various arrangements and colors using the Instructional Routine, Which Three Go Together? This supports MLLs with activating or building prior knowledge around the language needed to communicate using the terms pairing, partnering, and matching. Activity 1 invites students to work with partners to make pairs from different collections of red and yellow counters. Partners work together to represent the counters with a drawing, record the total number of counters, and the number of leftover counters. The Activity Synthesis directs the teacher to facilitate whole-class discourse to compare and contrast the drawings of collections of counters that have no leftovers and collections of counters that have one leftover. Within the Activity Synthesis, the materials direct teachers to implement MLR8 Discussion Supports in which the teacher reminds students to use words such as pairs, equal groups, and leftovers during the whole-class discourse. In the Lesson Synthesis, the teacher formalizes the terms even and odd by verbally sharing a student-friendly definition of each term as they add the terms to an anchor chart created in the previous lesson. 

The materials include a student-facing glossary that contains the printed word and the student-friendly definition. While the materials include a student-facing glossary, they do not reference it at the point of use within the lesson facilitation.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing support for Multilingual Learners’ (MLLs’) full and complete participation in the intentional development of MP7: Look for and make use of structure.

In every unit, the materials provide opportunities for students to use and develop language when looking for and making use of structure through whole-group and student-to-student discourse. The materials provide these opportunities through features embedded within the lesson facilitation or as a suggested support in notes titled Access for English Language Learners. An example of a feature embedded within the lesson facilitation is the Instructional Routines. Specifically, the Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson describes how the Instructional Routines Card Sort, Choral Count, How Many Do You See?, Number Talk, and True or False? support MP7. Card Sort states, “A card-sorting task gives students opportunities to analyze representations, statements, and structures closely, and make connections (MP2 and MP7).” Choral Count states, “While Choral Counting offers students the opportunity to practice verbal counting, the recorded count is the primary focus of the routine. As students reflect on the recorded count, they make observations, predict upcoming numbers in the count, and justify their reasoning (MP7 and MP3). How Many Do You See? states, “How Many Do You See helps early math learners develop an understanding of counting and quantity through subitizing and combining parts of sets to find the total in a whole collection. In later grades, this routine encourages students to use operations and groupings that make finding the total number of dots faster. Through these recorded strategies, students look for relationships between the operations and their properties (MP7).” Number Talk states, “The sequence of problems in a Number Talk encourages students to look for structure and use repeated reasoning to evaluate expressions and develop computational fluency (MP7 and MP8).” Finally, True or False? states, “The True or False routine structure encourages students to reason about numerical expressions and equations using base-ten structure, meaning and properties of operations, and the meaning of the equal sign. Often, students can determine whether an equation or inequality is true or false without doing any direct computation (MP7).”

As described in the report for 1d.MLL, the materials consistency employs Mathematical Language Routines [MLRs] by Stanford University UL/SCALE. The specific MLRs that directly support MP7 are:

• MLR4 Information Gap: In a group, each student has different parts of a mathematical situation, and they work together to piece together that information orally or visually to bridge the gap between the parameters of the situation and a question to solve a mathematical problem. Through this questioning, students are breaking down steps in multistep problems.

• MLR7 Compare and Connect: Students identify, compare, and contrast their own understandings with other students’ mathematical approaches, representations, concepts, examples, and language. Through this discussion, students are analyzing a problem with several different approaches. 

• MLR8 Discussion Supports: Teachers provide a variety of supports to foster inclusive whole-class discussions, which at times provide sentence frames to support students with describing what patterns or structures they notice. 

Expanding on the sentence frames occasionally provided in MLR8 Discussion Supports, the Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners contains a table with sample sentence frames and sentence starters for five language functions. The language functions of comparing and contrasting are directly related to MP7. These sentence frames support interdisciplinary language connections since they are generic in nature. This section of the Course Guide states, “The table shows examples of generic sentence frames that can support common disciplinary language functions across a variety of content topics. Some of the lessons in these materials include suggestions of additional sentence frames that could support the specific content and language functions of that lesson.” The materials do not reference these sentence frames within lessons at the point of use. 

The instructional materials reviewed for Grades K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the expectations that materials provide explanations of the instructional approaches of the program for Multilingual Learners (MLLs) and the identification of research-based strategies. The materials frame their MLL approach and supports throughout the program for the explicit purpose of ensuring they are able to meet grade-level standards.

Specifically, within the Course Guide, 4. Advancing Mathematical Language and Access for English Learners, the materials state that problem-based math classrooms are rich in language and require students to use multiple forms of communication, such as reading, writing, speaking, and listening, to make sense of mathematical ideas. The materials outline that students are expected to explain their thinking, make arguments, and engage in discussions. To support MLLs, the materials state that they integrate language development with math learning, creating inclusive, language-rich environments that encourage participation from all students. The materials state, “This table reflects the attention and support for language development at different levels of the curriculum:

• Course: 

  • Foundation of curriculum: theory of action and design principles that drive a continuous focus on language development.

  • Student glossary of terms. 

• Lesson: 

  • Language goals, embedded in learning goals, describe the language demands of the lesson. 

  • Definitions of new glossary terms. 

• Activity: 

  • Strategies to support access for English learners, based on the language demands of the activity.

  • Math language routines.” 

This section of the Course Guide continues to explicitly reference research from Stanford University's UL/SCALE initiative, particularly the framework outlined in Principles for the Design of Mathematics Curricula: Promoting Language and Content Development. This citation anchors the materials’ MLL approach in four research-based design principles:

• Principle 1: Support sense-making- Scaffold tasks and amplify language so students can make their own meaning.

• Principle 2: Optimize Output - Strengthen opportunities for students to describe their mathematical thinking to others, orally, visually, and in writing.

• Principle 3: Cultivate Conversation - Strengthen opportunities for constructive mathematical conversations.

• Principle 4: Maximize Meta-awareness - Strengthen the meta-connections and distinctions between mathematical ideas, reasoning, and language. 

The materials state, "These design principles and related Mathematical Language Routines ensure language development is an integral part of planning and delivering instruction. Moreover, they work together to guide teachers to amplify the important language that students are expected to know and use in each unit.”

As the report for 1d.MLL describes, the materials consistently employ Mathematical Language Routines (MLRs) by Stanford University’s UL/SCALE. This section of the Course Guide describes how the research behind these MLRs support the simultaneous development of both language and mathematics content, stating, “The MLRs emphasize the use of language that is meaningful and purposeful, and isn’t only about getting answers. The routines included in this curriculum were selected because they simultaneously support students’ learning of mathematical practices, content, and language. They are particularly well-suited to meet the needs of linguistically and culturally diverse students, who are learning mathematics while concurrently acquiring English. Adapt and incorporate these flexible MLRs across the lessons in each unit to support students at all stages of language development in improving their use of English and disciplinary language.”

Additionally, the Course Guide, 7. Key Structures in This Course contains a section titled Teaching Moves to Support Math Community. This section outlines some of the research-based student and teacher vital actions as authored by the SERP Institute (see report for 1d.MLL). One of the seven student vital actions listed is “English learners produce language,” which pulls from research by Barwell, Moschovich, and Savignon. The materials list the following corresponding vital teacher actions:

• “Provide multiple contexts for everyday words that have precise mathematical meaning, and invite students to explain what the word refers to in each context. Ask them to use the word to make connections between the different representations.

• Encourage students to use language to construct meaning from representations, with prompts such as, ‘Explain where you see (length, ten, oranges) in the (figure, equation, table). How do you know it represents the same thing?’ 

• Ensure that every student speaks, listens, reads, and writes.”

In summary, the instructional approaches and research-based strategies described in these documents consistently provide support for MLLs to access the materials, deepen their conceptual understanding, and reach grade-level standards in mathematics. Therefore, the materials meet the criteria of providing explanations of the instructional approaches for MLLs and the identification of research-based strategies.

The instructional materials reviewed for Grade K-2 of Kendall Hunt IM v.360 meet the criteria of providing scaffolds and supports for Multilingual Learners (MLLs) in an equitable way. The scaffolds and suggested language supports are included as a part of lessons at no additional cost, and they do not significantly increase the time required for lesson delivery. 

The materials provide scaffolds and supports such as Mathematical Language Routines (MLRs) embedded throughout most lessons to support MLLs' access to grade-level mathematics. The comprehensive approach ensures scaffolds are embedded in mathematical content and practices rather than being isolated additions, allowing MLLs to develop both content understanding and academic language without compromising pacing or expectations. 

The Course Guide, 3. What’s in an IM Lesson states, “The first event in every lesson is a Warm-up. The Warm-up is an instructional routine that invites all students to engage in the mathematics of the lesson. TheWarm-up routines offer opportunities for students to bring their personal experiences as well as their mathematical knowledge to problems and discussions. These routines place value on the voices of students as they communicate their developing ideas, ask questions, justify their responses, and critique the reasoning of others.” For example, in Grade 1, Unit 5, Adding within 100, Lesson 1, Warm-up begins with activating prior knowledge using the Instructional Routine What Many Do You See? where students subitize or use grouping strategies to describe images of ten frames with dots. The materials feature student responses that demonstrate activation of prior knowledge about place value language, such as, “Some students said they say it as 3 tens and 5 ones.” In Activity 1, students apply that place value language as they play a game where they use a spinner to find missing addends and describe their solution strategy. This activity includes language support in a note titled Access for English Language Learners, which suggests the use of MLR2 Collect and Display where teachers are directed to, “circulate, listen for, and collect the language students use as they talk with their partners.” Some suggested language includes tens, ones, sum, equation, starting number, secret number. Most suggested and embedded MLRs provide language scaffolds that require minimal additional time or planning. The pacing guide and lessons provide flexibility for teachers to include supplementary lessons or supports.