About

April Salerno is an Associate Professor of Education at the University of Virginia's School of Education and Human Development. She coordinates the curriculum and instruction programs within the school and advises students in multiple online English as a Second Language (ESL) programs, including Ed.D., Ed.S., M.Ed., MT, certificates, and endorsements. Her academic background includes a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia obtained in 2014, a Master of Teaching from Western New Mexico University in 2009, and a Bachelor of Arts from the University of North Carolina in 1999. Her professional focus involves curriculum and instruction, with a particular emphasis on ESL education. She is actively involved in supporting teacher advocacy and education research, contributing to the development of programs that prepare educators for complex conversations and effective student advocacy.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Pedagogy
• Computer Science
• Mathematics education
• Psychology
• Linguistics
• Gender studies
• Art
• Social psychology
• Literature
• Developmental psychology
• Philosophy

Selected publications

• “I Only Have Their Students' Best Interests in Mind”: Teachers' Figured Worlds in Advising Multilingual Families

  TESOL Journal · 2025-11-03

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  ABSTRACT As language teacher educators, we studied how teachers in April's English as a Second Language (ESL) graduate‐level assessment course for practicing teachers planned to talk with families about ESL identification, including home language surveys (HLS). We studied how 30 mostly in‐service teachers planned to reassure families they had students' “best interest in mind,” a phrase problematic for its paternalistic overtones. We examined how teachers' underlying worldviews, or “figured worlds,” were present in their plans for parent conferences. We used qualitative and discourse analytic methods to explore: How do teachers consider students' best interest when planning family HLS conferences? What figured worlds are suggested in two focal teachers' plans to tell multilingual families that teachers have students' best interest in mind? We found teachers sometimes understood that not only teachers but families also wanted students' best interest. Additionally, teachers thought that if they reassured families and gave them information about ESL, then families would want ESL services. We closely examined two focal cases, illustrating how figured worlds shaped teachers' views of “best interest.” This study emphasized that educators need to hear from families how they view their students' interests and engage together in meaningful dialogue about ESL services.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Using short-story narrative analysis to understand tensions in language education practitioner-research

  System · 2025-10-25

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Complicated Conversation as Curriculum in Language Teacher Education Amid Rapid Change

  TESOL Quarterly · 2025-02-20 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access1st author

  Abstract As language teacher educators, we consider how times of flux bring opportunities for re‐envisioning curriculum as conversation. We have found ourselves and our students to be situated at the nexus of tensions between sometimes fast‐moving societal shifts and sometimes slow‐moving changes in educational systems and institutions. One approach we have found for bridging the fast and the slow worlds is to rethink how we define curriculum. We draw from Pinar (1995) in re‐envisioning curriculum as “complicated conversation” between teachers and students. Pinar and colleagues view curriculum as verb ( currere , or “to run” in Latin) in which students' lived experiences – combined with planned materials – become the curriculum. In this teaching issues article, we explore how we as teacher educators have engaged our students (who are current, in‐service teachers) in complicated conversation around recent moments of flux. We consider examples of how, in our English as a Second Language teacher‐education courses, we have talked with teachers about two such moments: advocating for students amid recent global conflicts and navigating the advent of artificial intelligence. We underscore the idea that curriculum as currere requires a balance between being responsive and proactive.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Developing Teachers’ Advocate Identities Through Exploratory Talk

  Journal of Language Identity & Education · 2024-06-20

  articleSenior author

  In educational contexts characterized by persisting inequalities, preparing teachers to advocate for historically marginalized students is a critical element in constructing more equitable educational experiences for all students and their families. However, little is known about how teachers develop and hone their sense of advocacy. Therefore, this study documents how English as a second language (ESL) endorsement candidates (ECs; n = 60) collaboratively develop a sense of "advocacy identity" when they engage in exploratory talk after a simulated advocacy experience. Drawing on group reflection videos, findings highlight how teachers' lives and experiences inform their interpretations of advocacy. By sharing personal narratives and different types of knowledge, teachers articulate their thinking, solidify their stance as advocates, and co-construct new understandings of what it means to be an advocate for their multilingual learners (MLs). These findings have implications for promoting deeper engagement with advocacy in teacher education and professional development, ultimately toward building collaborative capacity for teachers to support and advocate for historically marginalized students.

  PublisherDOI

• Teachers’ Stories about Home Language Surveys

  Second Language Teacher Education · 2024-04-22 · 1 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  U.S. schools use home language surveys (HLS) as initial screening tools to determine whether students should be screened for ESL services. These placement decisions have potentially long-lasting implications for multilingual students. In this Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices (S-STEP) project, we explored how teachers talk about HLS across 7 academic years of the first author’s ESL assessment course, and how they made sense of families’ decisions to hide home languages on the HLS. We analyzed teachers’ stories when discussing a news article about families who provided misinformation on HLS, so their children would not be screened for ESL. Our question is: How do teachers use their experiences to understand families’ decisions about providing misinformation on HLS? These stories illuminated how teachers made sense of the HLS experiences of families in the news article, and how teachers identified problems with HLS. Teachers’ stories included sharing about people they knew or about they themselves, as parents, completing HLS; about what happened after families submitted HLS; and about why families would provide misinformation, including past difficult experiences in ESL themselves and fears of stigma or tracking. Based on these stories, we consider implications for those who might change HLS, teachers, teacher educators, and researchers.

  PublisherDOI

• Teacher Inquiry in ESOL Teacher Education

  2024-10-21

  book-chapter

  In this chapter, we present findings from ongoing self-study of our own teacher education practices to delineate and demonstrate key aspects of what we describe as “L2 writing teacher reflective expertise.” Specifically, we draw upon the notion of adaptive expertise to examine how in-service teachers in an online ESOL assessment course engaged in their own exploration of focal students’ writing process through use of a longitudinal interactional histories approach to teacher inquiry. We share the expertise and misconceptions in-service teachers brought to this work and their responses to evolving resources provided by the instructor. Based upon this data, we propose a definition of L2 writing teacher reflective expertise that includes multiple teacher competencies: (1) observing multilingual students closely enough to recognize their assets as writers and the social dynamics of the spaces where they learn, (2) building upon those assets through instruction to support writing development, (3) asking themselves challenging questions, and (4) considering multiple explanations of what they observe.

  PublisherDOI

• Teachers’ conceptualizations of multilingual learners’ so-called ‘academic’ language in oral-language assessments

  Language and Education · 2024-06-22 · 1 citations

  articleCorresponding

  We used a Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices (S-STEP) methodology to consider how 16 teachers in an English as a Second Language (ESL) assessment course discussed 'academic' versus 'social' language while assessing a multilingual student's oral language. Using a ­figured-worlds framework to explore teachers' underlying beliefs about the 'academic'/'social' language dichotomy, we aimed to explore: What figured worlds were present in teachers' dichotomous descriptions of multilingual students' 'academic' and 'social' language? Our findings reveal four inter-related figured worlds that teachers' descriptions revealed about students' oral language. First, teachers used words like formal, complex, and difficult to characterize so-called 'academic' language, while they described 'social' language as informal, simple, non-specific, etc. Second, teachers depicted multilingual students as struggling with or overwhelmed by 'academic' language but as having strong conversational skills and a relaxed and even jovial manner when using so-called 'social' language. Third, teachers depicted themselves as owners and controllers of 'academic' language and as charged with imparting 'academic' language on students. Finally, teachers associated English with 'academic' language and students' home languages with 'social' language. These findings suggest that teachers' figured worlds relate both to their views of language and to their identities and roles as teachers.

  PublisherDOI

• Language teacher educators' identity development through self‐study: A case for collaboration and community

  TESOL Journal · 2024-09-02 · 7 citations

  article

  Abstract In this conceptual feature article, we explore how our language teacher educator (LTE) identities have been shaped through collaboration around practice‐based research as we have engaged in more than a decade of self‐study of teacher education practices (S‐STEP) work. We consider three key aspects of our collaborative identities: (1) we have a shared identity and purpose as LTE researchers; (2) we also have individual LTE identities and so heterogeneity within our group is a strength; and (3) our shared and individual LTE identities are nested within a mutual community of trust. We have found that all three of these components are necessary to develop and sustain our collaborative work, which has a dual goal of contributing to the field while we strengthen our own practices. It is our hope this article can help guide LTEs who are seeking to develop their identities and expertise and searching for communities in which to do so.

  PublisherDOI

• Moving beyond language dichotomies in the education of multilingual students: recontextualizing teacher resistance

  International Multilingual Research Journal · 2023-06-01 · 9 citations

  article

  Several language dichotomies – particularly the pervasive idea that “academic” language distinctly contrasts with “social” language – have dominated teachers’ thinking and discourse about language-related instructional practices in recent decades. Many researchers now question ramifications that binary thinking about language might have for students, particularly multilingual students and students speaking non-dominant English varieties. Teacher educators are called to challenge dichotomous thinking about language in working with teachers, and our study illuminates some of the difficulties they face in that pursuit. In this practitioner-research study, we present data from online discussions in a graduate-level linguistics in education course, in which 19 in-service teachers seeking ESL endorsements discussed an article critiquing the dichotomy of Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) and Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP). Our question was: How do in-service teachers respond to critiques of dichotomous views of language? We used structural and descriptive qualitative coding to locate teachers’ exploration of these ideas in their discussions and then examined their rationales. Our findings suggest that most teachers rejected the article’s critique and instead defended BICS and CALP alongside other language dichotomies, often linking justifications to their experiences with multilingual students. We offer implications for disrupting this binary thinking through new approaches to recontextualizing teachers’ knowledge.

  PublisherDOI

• Classroom as Neo‐National Microcosm: Teachers Learning to Disrupt Linguistic Microaggressions

  TESOL Quarterly · 2023-03-25 · 5 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract Neo‐national ideologies are often associated with despots and political extremists. Yet, we argue that neo‐nationalist discourses also manifest in everyday TESOL classroom interactions. In English‐dominant contexts, teachers send potent messages about who does or does not “belong” in classrooms, largely based on racialized notions of English proficiency. These dynamics create a classroom microcosm where students are apprenticed into linguistic normativity and anti‐immigrant sentiments, ultimately sustaining future generations of neo‐nationalist rhetoric. In light of these dynamics, we believe that teachers can play a key role in disrupting normative, monolingual language ideologies in classrooms, but that they often feel underprepared to do so. In this brief research report, we present findings from our ongoing examination of TESOL licensure endorsement candidates responding to deficit‐oriented microaggressions about multilingual learners in a simulated environment. Our results suggest teacher candidates have the desire to promote asset‐based orientations around multilingualism, but are often unable to do so in real time. These findings have important implications for teacher education and the underutilized potential of teachers for disrupting deficit‐oriented monolingual discourses that too easily turn into neo‐nationalist ideologies.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Amanda K. Kibler

  Oregon State University

  20 shared

• Elena Andrei

  University of Medicine and Pharmacy of Craiova

  9 shared

• Elena Andrei

  Cleveland State University

  4 shared

• Chris K. Chang‐Bacon

  3 shared

• Christine Hardigree

  3 shared

• Natasha A. Heny

  2 shared

• María Guzmán Antelo

  University of Virginia

  2 shared

• W.F. Fox

  University of Virginia

  2 shared