Preview/Review
Preview/Review (also called Preview-View-Review) is a three-phase scaffolding routine for emergent bilingual students. The teacher previews the upcoming lesson's key concepts and vocabulary in the student's home language or through multilingual resources, teaches or "views" the core lesson in the new language with sheltered supports, and then reviews and consolidates understanding in the home language. The routine deliberately bridges what students already know in their home language to the academic content and language of instruction, treating that home language as a cognitive asset rather than something to set aside. It can be used directly by bilingual teachers or adapted by teachers who do not share the home language through student-directed previews, multilingual media, and family conversations.
How it’s typically applied
- 1Identify the lesson's 3-5 essential concepts, the academic vocabulary, and the language demands students will face, so the preview and review target what matters most.
- 2Preview: introduce the topic, build background knowledge, and surface key terms in the student's home language (teacher, peer, bilingual aide, family, or a short multilingual video or text). Keep it brief; the goal is orientation and activating prior knowledge, not pre-teaching the whole lesson.
- 3View: teach the core lesson in the target language using sheltered supports such as visuals, gestures, realia, sentence frames, and hands-on tasks, so the input is comprehensible and pitched just beyond students' current level.
- 4Build in interaction during the view phase so students process the content through speaking, writing, or doing, not just listening.
- 5Review: after the lesson, return to the home language to summarize, check understanding, clarify confusions, and let students explain what they learned in their stronger language.
- 6Bridge the two languages explicitly during review by comparing key terms and cognates across languages, so students consolidate the concept and notice cross-linguistic connections.
- 7When you do not share the student's home language, adapt: assign a home-language preview text or video before class, pair same-language peers, send the topic home for family discussion, and let students review by showing understanding in their home language through drawing, writing, or recording.
Why it works for emergent bilingual students
Preview/Review rests on Cummins's common underlying proficiency: concepts and academic skills learned in a student's home language are not sealed off from the new language but transfer across both, so previewing in the home language gives students a conceptual foundation they carry into the target-language lesson (Cummins, 1979). Because the core lesson is delivered with sheltered supports, the view phase provides comprehensible input that is understandable yet still challenging (Krashen, 1982). Previewing and reviewing in the home language lower the load of meeting new content and new language at the same time, so students can engage with grade-level ideas while their target-language proficiency is still developing. The explicit cross-language comparison in the review phase functions as a bridge that helps students transfer learning and build metalinguistic awareness (Beeman & Urow, 2013). This is an asset-based routine: it positions students' full linguistic repertoires as resources for learning rather than obstacles, consistent with translanguaging pedagogy (García et al., 2017) and with the 2026 Texas ELPS, which call for using students' primary language as a resource to support learning across the language domains.
Adapting it across proficiency levels
Pre-Production
Make the home-language preview the anchor and keep it concrete. Front-load the concept with pictures, objects, gestures, and a short home-language explanation or video so students grasp the big idea before any target-language input. During the view, accept nonverbal responses (point, match, draw, act out) and do not require speech. Review entirely in the home language, letting students show understanding through drawing, sorting, or pointing rather than producing the new language.
Beginning
Keep a robust home-language preview that establishes the concept and 3-5 key words with visuals and cognate links. During the view, use heavily sheltered input with sentence stems, labeled visuals, and word banks so students can attempt short phrases. Review bilingually: students summarize in the home language and try one or two target-language key terms or a simple frame, with the home language available as support.
Intermediate
Shorten the home-language preview to activating prior knowledge and clarifying the few most demanding terms, then move more of the lesson into the target language. During the view, students take part in structured discussion and writing with sentence frames. Review primarily in the target language with the home language as a strategic clarification tool, and have students explain their reasoning and compare key terms across languages.
High Intermediate / Advanced
Move the preview to a brief, student-directed activation of background knowledge, often using a home-language text or video that students access independently, then deliver the lesson fully in the target language at grade level. During the view, students engage in extended academic discussion and writing. Use review mainly for metalinguistic and metacognitive work, comparing how a concept is expressed across languages and self-assessing understanding, with the home language reserved for nuanced clarification. (Under the 2026 ELPS this band spans High Intermediate and Advanced.)
In the classroom
In a 5th-grade science lesson on the water cycle, the teacher previews by showing a 3-minute Spanish-language animation and naming key terms (evaporación/evaporation, condensación/condensation, precipitación/precipitation) while pointing to a labeled diagram, then invites students to share in Spanish what they already know about rain. During the view, she teaches the cycle in English using a hands-on model, gestures, and the sentence frame "When water ___, it ___," so students narrate each stage. To review, students turn to a same-language partner and explain the full cycle in Spanish, then label an English diagram and circle the three cognate pairs, consolidating the concept in their stronger language while anchoring the English academic vocabulary.
Research basis
Concepts and academic skills learned in a student's home language transfer to the new language because the two languages share a common underlying proficiency, which is the theoretical basis for previewing and reviewing content in the home language.
Cummins, J. (1979). Linguistic interdependence and the educational development of bilingual children. Review of Educational Research, 49(2), 222-251. https://doi.org/10.3102/00346543049002222 [link]
Language is acquired through comprehensible input that is slightly beyond the learner's current level (i+1), which the sheltered 'view' phase of Preview/Review is designed to deliver.
Krashen, S. D. (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Pergamon Press. [link]
Purposefully bringing the two languages together so students transfer academic content across languages and build metalinguistic awareness (the 'Bridge') is the scholarly basis for the explicit cross-language comparison in the review phase.
Beeman, K., & Urow, C. (2013). Teaching for biliteracy: Strengthening bridges between languages. Caslon.
Students learned and retained significantly more second-language vocabulary through the preview-review method than through concurrent translation, supporting its use in bilingual classrooms.
Ulanoff, S. H., & Pucci, S. L. (1993, April 12-16). Is concurrent-translation or preview-review more effective in promoting second language vocabulary acquisition? [Paper presentation]. Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Atlanta, GA, United States. (ERIC Document No. ED360831) [link]
Drawing on students' full linguistic repertoires and home language practices as resources for learning reflects asset-based translanguaging pedagogy for emergent bilinguals.
García, O., Johnson, S. I., & Seltzer, K. (2017). The translanguaging classroom: Leveraging student bilingualism for learning. Caslon. [link]
In Preview/Review the teacher previews a lesson in the student's primary language, teaches it in English, then reviews in the primary language, and the routine can be adapted for teachers who do not share the home language through student-directed previews and family involvement.
Gonzalez, V. (2019, July 10). Primary language support in general education classrooms. Seidlitz Education. https://seidlitzblog.org/2019/07/10/primary-language-support-in-general-education-classrooms/ [link]
Herrell and Jordan's own Preview/Review chapter (Strategy 26, "Preview/Review: Building Vocabulary and Concepts to Support Understanding") opens by crediting the strategy to Judith Lessow-Hurley's dual-language methods text rather than presenting it as their own; their chapter's first sentence reads "Preview/review (Lessow-Hurley, 1990) is a teaching strategy usually associated with bilingual classrooms," and their reference list cites Lessow-Hurley (1990). This is the scholarly source behind the strategy's name and definition.
Lessow-Hurley, J. (1990). The foundations of dual language instruction. Longman.
Sources reviewed by an independent second-language-acquisition specialist and an adversarial citation audit.
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