Within the Wonders curriculum, there are a few translingual texts that we read. Below is Aguinaldo, a text set in Puerto Rico that uses Spanish and English languages. My goal is to frame my students as linguists to analyze why the author utilizes Spanish in her writing. Delacre (2020) writes about a little girl, Marilia, who doesn’t want to go on a school field trip to a nursing home during Christmastime. Delacre writes, “I glanced across the room to the trays of besitos de coco, the coconut sweets that the sixth graders had prepared to bring to the nursing-home residents as an aguinaldo. Aguinaldos, Christmas gifts, were fun to receive” (2020, p. 182). With students, we will discuss why the author decides to use the Spanish words that she does. Why not just write "Christmas gifts" instead of "aguinaldos"? Having conversations about the importance of Spanish in this text will help students to think about the importance of language and specific language use in writing. 

Our science investigations are guided by "focus questions." Each investigation has a focus question that is posed at the beginning, and students answer at the end. Many of the focus questions have vocabulary that many students, language majority included, may not be familiar with. Breaking down the focus question and some of those unfamiliar vocabulary words will help students to interact metacognitively with language. I included two examples of focus questions that I analyzed, and I included definitions in English as well as cognates in Spanish. This would be a collaborative class effort where students would be encouraged to share any translations or cognates that they already know. Any words that we don't know can be translated on-the-spot.