Beyond the Sentence: Using the Dictado to Deepen Metalinguistic Awareness in Bilingual Classrooms
This session reimagines the Dictado as a dynamic instructional strategy that moves beyond transcription to support biliteracy and metalinguistic development in K–12 bilingual programs. Grounded in research identifying metalinguistic awareness as a core component of bilingual proficiency (Bialystok, 2001), the Dictado is reframed as a structured routine for cross-linguistic analysis, where students examine grammar, syntax, and spelling through a metalinguistic “talkthrough.”
Attendees will explore how the Dictado supports academic language development and biliteracy instruction goals while fostering student reflection on language structure and use (Escamilla et al., 2014). This approach aligns with Cummins’ Interdependence Hypothesis, which emphasizes that strengthening literacy in one language reinforces literacy in another (Cummins, 2000). The session will demonstrate how to scaffold the Dictado across grade levels and language proficiency stages, with connections to dual-language program standards and translanguaging pedagogy (García & Wei, 2014).
Participants will receive ready-to-use instructional resources, including sentence templates, talkthrough guides, and digital tools to support student engagement and reflection. Policy-aligned applications will also be shared to support the integration of the Dictado into multilingual instructional planning. This approach positions the Dictado as a practical, linguistically focused method for strengthening multilingual education.