At the time I was writing my dissertation I was a student at University of Cincinnati. University of Cincinnati has had an established program for teaching assistants since 1993; however, at the time I was there, I observed the need for the component for international teaching assistants in the program. That need guided my dissertation and this book. When revisiting the manuscript and preparing the publication, my aim was to offer something tangible and useful for higher education institutions. I currently work as part of a higher education insitution, too, and reading my dissertation after twelve years, I realize that communicative competence is still a valid topic, and that it can guide higher education institutions, researchers, as well as teaching and learning centers.

North American universities depend on international teaching assistants (ITAs) as a substantial part of the teaching labor force, which has led to the idea of an ‘ITA problem’, a deficiency model which is framed as a divergence between ITAs’ linguistic competence and undergraduates’ and their parents’ expectations. This outdated positioning of ITAs as deficient diminishes the invaluable role they play within the academy. This book argues instead for an approach to ITA which recognizes them as multilingual, skilled, migrant professionals who participate in and are discursively constructed through various participant frameworks, modalities and activities. The chapters in this volume offer state-of-the-art research into ITA using a variety of methods and approaches, and as such constitute a transdisciplinary perspective which argues for the importance of dialogue between research and practice.

Written for all types of ITA programsan independent study course, a brief workshop, or extensive trainingthis versatile text provides essential information for ITAs to develop strong teaching skills that ensure effective communication in the undergraduate classroom. The authors take the perspective that incoming ITAs are responsible for their own learning and teaching style. Each of the texts ten units includes work on English proficiency, teaching skills, and cultural awareness. Each unit centers around a common rhetorical teaching task in U.S. university classrooms: introducing oneself, introducing a syllabus, explaining a visual, defining a term, teaching a process, fielding questions, explaining complex topics at a basic level, presenting information over several class periods, and leading a discussion. Undergraduate textbook materials for fifteen academic fields are included in the appendix to provide ITAs with content relevant for practicing teaching and language skills. Because ITA programs vary in structure and number of training hours, the authors include a To the Instructor section, which is full of recommendations for the many ways the text can be used.

Second Language Identities examines how identity is an issue in different second language learning contexts. It begins with a detailed presentation of what has become a popular approach to identity in the social sciences (including applied linguistics) today, one that is inspired in poststructuralist thought and is associated with the work of authors such as Anthony Giddens, Zygmunt Bauman, Chris Weedon, Judith Butler and Stuart Hall. It then examines how in early SLA research focussing on affective variables, identity was an issue, lurking in the wings but not coming to centre stage. Moving to the present, the book then examines in detail and critiques recent research focussing on identity in three distinct second language learning contexts. These contexts are: (1) adult migration, (2) foreign language classrooms and (3) study abroad programmes. The book concludes with suggestions for future research focussing on identity in second language learning.

By offering the implications of this research for participant and host selection, cross-cultural orientation, and in-country interventions and assessment, this volume provides valuable information for language education and intercultural communication scholars.

This handbook gathers in one volume the major research and scholarship related to multicultural science education that has developed since the field was named and established by Atwater in 1993. Culture is defined in this handbook as an integrated pattern of shared values, beliefs, languages, worldviews, behaviors, artifacts, knowledge, and social and political relationships of a group of people in a particular place or time that the people use to understand or make meaning of their world, each other, and other groups of people and to transmit these to succeeding generations. The research studies include both different kinds of qualitative and quantitative studies. The chapters in this volume reflect differing ideas about culture and its impact on science learning and teaching in different K-14 contexts and policy issues. Research findings about groups that are underrepresented in STEM in the United States, and in other countries related to language issues and indigenous knowledge are included in this volume.

North American universities depend on international teaching assistants (ITAs) as a substantial part of the teaching labor force, which has led to the idea of an ‘ITA problem’, a deficiency model which is framed as a divergence between ITAs’ linguistic competence and undergraduates’ and their parents’ expectations. This outdated positioning of ITAs as deficient diminishes the invaluable role they play within the academy. This book argues instead for an approach to ITA which recognizes them as multilingual, skilled, migrant professionals who participate in and are discursively constructed through various participant frameworks, modalities and activities. The chapters in this volume offer state-of-the-art research into ITA using a variety of methods and approaches, and as such constitute a transdisciplinary perspective which argues for the importance of dialogue between research and practice.