What STEM Teachers Need to Know and Do to Engage Families of Emergent Multilingual Students (English Language Learners)

STEM teacher educators are aware that they teach far more than content-specific methodology. Educators need to guide STEM teachers in the knowledge and skills to support emergent multilingual students (English learners, or ELs) by simultaneously developing their STEM content learning and scaffolding their language acquisition. The authors advocate for a STEM family engagement model that honors and grows out of families' existing funds of knowledge. They argue for STEM teacher educators to explicitly address multilingual family engagement as a key part of STEM education. The authors encourage STEM educators to address STEM mindset in addition to STEM literacy skills and interdisciplinary STEM content knowledge.