Academic Language: More than Just Vocabulary?

Two TESOL presentations got me thinking about what constitutes "academic language" at the K-12 level. What typically comes to mind when I hear this phrase is vocabulary: content-specific words such as plateau and condensation, as well as general academic words like source, process and analyze. But in a presentation called "Scaffolding Academic Language for ELLs at Every Proficiency Level," Christina Celic, a former teacher and author of English Language Learners Day By Day K-6, pointed out that vocabulary is just one part of the equation. Because academic language relies on so many sentence structures that aren't familiar to English language learners (even advanced ELLs), we must also be sure to explicitly break down some of its key elements:

* Academic language is typically written in the passive voice (e.g.,water vapor is released from plants during transpiration).
* It includes many signal words (e.g., likewise, moreover, in spite of).
* It contains nominal phrases (higher, cooler parts of the atmosphere).
* It uses multiple clauses.

In a separate presentation, "Oral Language Development in the Grade-level Content Classroom," Mary Lou McCloskey and Linda New Levine outlined specific challenges in teaching the academic language of science. The following excerpt offers some good examples and is taken from a handout available here:

Specific grammatical structures include:
* passive voice: is shown, was found, has been explained, etc.
* modals: possibly, could, might be, would, etc.
* embedded clauses: The latest research, developed from laboratories on three continents, indicates that…
* complex sentences: A growing number of research studies suggests, however, that such an increase in temperature could have a large impact on life, especially in coastal regions of North America and sub-Saharan Africa.

Science text organizational structures:
*steps of a process: Following evaporation, water vapor cools and falls to the Earth as rain or snow.
*cause and effect: As a result of auto emissions, nitric oxide and sulfur dioxide combine with water in the air.
* main idea and details: The biomes in this area consist of grasslands, scrublands, deserts, and deciduous forests.