Educator-Led Differentiation: Building a Sense of Belonging in the High School Classroom

This teacher action research examined the impact of language learning strategies such as repetition, reformulation, sentence frames, and structured collaboration on mathematical academic discourse among multilingual learners in an eighth grade mathematics class at a Title I middle school in Sacramento, California. The focal group consisted of eight multilingual learners: one student recently arrived to the United States, three receiving support as Long Term English Learners (LTELs), one student dually receiving accommodations through a 504 plan, and four Reclassified Fluent English Proficient (RFEP) students continuing to develop confidence and skills in mathematics. Students engaged in Math Talk lessons, collaborative study guide work, quiz corrections, and inquiry based group tasks supported by language scaffolds. Data from student work, observations, and audio recordings showed increased participation, confidence, and use of academic language. Findings suggest that providing explicit strategies affirms student voice, supports co construction of meaning, and fosters positive math identities, creating more equitable opportunities for multilingual students to thrive in mathematics.