Co-Teaching Implementation: A Strategic Plan to Support Multilingual Learners

Co-Teaching Implementation: A Strategic Plan to Support Multilingual Learners. Tanisha Johnson, 2024: Strategic Research Project, Nova Southeastern University, Abraham S. Fischler College of Education and School of Criminal Justice. Keywords: Co-teaching. Dual Language Immersion Program, Multilingual Learner, Newcomer, Professional Development This strategic research project was designed to emphasize the need for support for multilingual students at Johnson High School. Johnson High School has seen an increase in the number of diverse languages spoken, with the top three being Spanish, Portuguese, and Arabic. The increase in languages has exposed a language barrier and inadequate assistance for multilingual students, negatively impacting the achievement gap at Johnson High School. The need for adequate resources for multilingual students, identified as a weakness in the strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats analysis, was the primary problem to address in this strategic research project. I chose the newcomer program for the Strategic Research Project. Supporting multilingual students by providing them with a program designed to help them learn the English language and adapt to a new country would benefit the students at Johnson High School. Based on the analysis of the quantitative strategic planning matrix, co-teaching received an overall total attractiveness score of 5.10 and is the most attractive strategy compared to professional development, which received an overall total attractiveness score of 4.78. An action plan was created to improve support for multilingual students. These steps include (a) planning a co-teaching workshop, (b) facilitating a co-teaching workshop, (c) selecting co-teachers and courses, (d) providing professional development, (e) developing a master schedule, (f) implementing the co-teaching strategy, and (g) maintaining sustainability. The implementation timeline begins in July 2025 and concludes in June 2026. Promoting a school culture that values collaboration and celebrates success may help sustain the co-teaching strategy at Johnson High School. Based on the research and potential findings of this study, I recommend that educational leaders at the district and school levels adopt co-teaching strategies specifically designed for multilingual learners, which promote collaboration between content and multilingual teachers to improve academic achievement and increase the number of multilingual students achieving English proficiency.