Emergent Bilingualism and Biliteracy

Mariana held the pencil carefully and focused intently as she wrote the fi nal sentence of her story about what she and her family had done over the weekend: " Y nos dibertimos en el parce [sic]. " (And we had fun at the park.) As she punctuated this sentence with a large, stylized period, Mariana smiled before looking up at the nearest classmate in her K– 1 multiage classroom and exclaiming, " Ya acabé. " (I'm fi nished.) She then put away her writing materials and reached into a small bin on her desk to retrieve two leveled books— one in Spanish and the other in English. She examined the two books for a moment, as if deciding which to read fi rst, and then opened the English book and began to read, tracking with her fi nger from left to right as she negotiated the fi rst line of English text.

Children’s multimodal composing represents an important aspect of their oracy practices that are foundational to their later literacy development. Utilizing multimodal discourse perspectives, this study explored the range of multimodal resources that preschool children employed to convey their meaning making when interacting with peers and teachers in an oracy activity, show-and-tell. Through a qualitative analysis of video-recorded interactions, we investigated how preschoolers in Ms. Leticia’s dual language classroom were resourceful in using actions, visual understandings, and language to support their meaning-making and communication around their presentations. Because Ms. Leticia showed flexibility in inviting peer interaction throughout their presentations, students wielded their actional, verbal, and visual modes to respond to audience members’ concerns and requests and performed to recruit their audience members’ attention. This study helps to expand our understanding of children’s literacy development in early childhood settings as supported not only by oracy, but more holistically, through their multimodal composing.

This study reports on an innovative approach to dual-language instruction (DLI) at the secondary-education level and introduces the 2–1-L2 model. The context of the study is an American Government class at a public charter high school in Tucson, Arizona, where the 2–1-L2 model was used for nine weeks to structure daily 90-minute lessons into a 30-minute immersion in English, a 30- minute immersion in Spanish, and a final 30-minute section of hybrid language practices, such as translanguaging (Bhabha, 1994; García & Wei, 2013; Kramsch & Uryu, 2012). The culturally and linguistically diverse participants represented an almost equal division of recursive dynamic bilinguals and dynamic bilin- guals, plus an emergent bilingual who had recently moved from Mexico to the United States (García, Kleifgen, & Falchi, 2008; García & Sylvan, 2011). Through the bilingual structure of the 2–1-L2, all students were treated and valued as bilingual content users, as they learned American Government content together, an identity that they claimed for themselves. Findings suggest that the 2–1-L2 model may contribute to providing equal access to world lan- guage/English as a Second Language (ESL) instruction for students in content area classes at the secondary level and offer a response to the Language-as- Problem “Θ(threat)-inversion” (Richard Ruiz, personal communication/lecture PowerPoint slides, August 2013).

While research on cognitive and metacognitive abilities of bilingual and biliterate students has been advancing, limited studies have examined these influences in the Arabic context. The current study explores the influences of cognitive and metacognitive abilities on the bilingualism and biliteracy of Emirati fifth-grade students whose mother tongue is Arabic but who are learning core subjects in English. This is an explanatory sequential mixed method study where quantitative data from Grade 5 students (n = 350), and their Arabic and English teachers (n = 200; and n = 150 respectively) were first collected, followed by in-depth interviews with three students, two English teachers, and two Arabic teachers. Findings showed that students used their cognitive and metacognitive abilities more freely in Arabic lessons as compared to English. However, Arabic teachers reported that students use background knowledge in their first language in a better way but also demonstrated insufficient transfer strategy between the two languages.

In the U.S., non-bilingual education designed for English speakers goes by many names – mainstream, regular, normal, English, and others. Drawing from research on discourse, normality, and framing, this conceptual paper examines each of the popular labels for English-medium education in the U.S., and demonstrates their unsuitability. Inspired by the discursive shift toward the term emergent bilinguals, a more accurate label is proposed for these non-bilingual programs and classrooms: monolingual education, highlighting the one feature they have in common. Naming classrooms as monolingual can reveal their subtractive nature, and embrace a discourse that positions bilingual and multilingual programs as normal, or even superior. A number of implications are addressed, for students, schools, and the education system.

This article uses ethnographic data to examine the schooling experiences of Latinx emergent bilinguals and the educators who worked with them at a mid-size high school in a small Wisconsin city. Using Critical Race Theory, I argue that as tensions have increased in recent years from school funding cuts, deindustrialization, and demographic shifts, the community’s white residents have repeated long-standing patterns of white supremacy to assert economic and cultural dominance over Communities of Color. I examine the manifestation of these dynamics in the schooling experiences of my participants through a racially hostile schooling environment and a general lack of investment in their education. This work offers important insights on the sociohistorical
intersections of race and class within predominantly white, rural and suburban ‘new destination’ communities and problematizes the very notion of ‘new’ in such locals by questioning assumptions about who is ‘native’ and who is ‘new’ to a particular community.

This study examined how a pair of Spanish/English dual language bilingual education (DLBE) preschool teachers enacted their bilingualism while working cohesively and simultaneously toward common instructional goals. We drew on classroom video data, field notes, and other relevant artifacts collected weekly during shared readings of English- and Spanish-language storybooks over the course of one academic year to document coteachers’
book-based interactions with each other and their students. Guided by translanguaging (O. García, 2009a, 2009b; O. García & Wei, 2014) and distributive cognition (Brown & Campione, 1996; Hutchins, 1995) frameworks, findings elucidate how teachers drew on their own and each other’s dynamic bilingualism through both monolingual and bilingual performances, supporting the coordination of instructional targets (e.g., vocabulary, narrative genre) and instructional practices (e.g., translation, explanation). Findings have implications for DLBE program language policy and practice as they highlight the utility of a bilingual pedagogy.

For nearly three decades, researchers of young English language learners (ELLs) have suggested that a reason for low ELL graduation rates in U.S. high schools is their failure to master academic language in English. The instigation of the Common Core promoted the notion that reading for information should cut across all content areas. In Florida, as mandated in the Florida Consent Decree, elementary teachers, as well as secondary English Language Arts teachers or Reading coaches, are charged with assisting ELLs in the acquisition of linguistically complex language promoting critical thinking. Thus, any curriculum design akin to the Common Core implies that content area teachers--including those of Math, Science, and Social Studies--should similarly engage in ELLs' linguistic needs.

Meanwhile, corpus linguists have amassed word corpora unveiling specific academic vocabulary, suggesting that mastery of 2570 word families can help ELLs work with college texts. This pilot study investigates the degree to which such lexical items appear in a small corpus represented by 52 elementary and secondary textbooks. Results show that Social Studies texts seemingly supply students with the greatest quantity of academic vocabulary. It further indicates that the bulk of difficult vocabulary appears in secondary grades, offering further detail with respect to deepening linguistic obstacles ELLs face in school. Results suggest that 1) instructors of all major subjects should engage in far deeper professional development with respect to ELLs?literacy development and 2) any exclusive burden on Language Arts instructors is questionable.

This essay addresses Katherine Richardson Bruna’s paper: Mexican Immigrant Transnational Social Capital and Class Transformation: Examining the Role of Peer Mediation in Insurgent Science, through five main points. First, I offer a comparison between the traditional analysis of classism in Latin America and Richardson Bruna’s call for a class-first analysis in the North American social sciences where there has been a tendency to obviate the specific examination of class relations and class issues. Secondly, I discuss that a class-first analysis solely cannot suffice to depict the complex dimensions in the relations of schools and society. Thus, I suggest a continuum in the class-first analysis. Third, I argue that social constructions surrounding issues of language, ethnicity, and gender necessarily intersect with issues of class and that, in fact, those other constructions offer compatible epistemologies that aid in representing the complexity of social and institutional practices in the capitalist society. Richardson Bruna’s analysis of Augusto’s interactions with his teacher and peers in the science class provides a fourth point of discussion in this essay. As a final point in my response I discuss Richardson Bruna’s idea of making accessible class-first analysis knowledge to educators and especially to science teachers.

Este ensayo es una respuesta dada mediante cinco puntos al manuscrito de Katherine Richardson Bruna: Mexican Immigrant Transnational Social Capital and Class Transformation: Examining the Role of Peer Mediation in Insurgent Science. Primero ofrezco una comparación entre el análisis tradicional latinoamericano sobre clasismo y la propuesta de Richardson Bruna de un primer análisis de clase en las ciencias sociales norteamericanas donde la tendencia ha sido obviar el examen específico de las relaciones y temas de clase. En segundo lugar comento que un primer análisis de clase no constituye una representación suficiente de la complejidad de las relaciones entre escuela y sociedad. Tercero, argumento que las construcciones sociales de lenguaje, etnicidad y género necesariamente se intersecan con las de clase y que, de hecho, esas construcciones ofrecen epistemologías compatibles que asisten en las representaciones de las prácticas sociales e institucionales en la sociedad capitalista. El análisis de Richardson Bruna sobre las interacciones de Augusto con su maestra y compañeros en la clase de ciencia constituyen el cuarto punto de discusión en este ensayo. Como punto final comento sobre la idea del autor de hacer accesible el conocimiento sobre el primer análisis de clase a educadores y especialmente a maestros de ciencia.

Along with the immigration throughout the US, rural schools have experienced changes in demographics and need to adapt to meet the needs of diverse students. Addressing this issue, this chapter argues that rural schools in the US might benefit from Distributed Leadership (DLS) to meet the needs of school personnel and better understand emergent bilingual (EB) students. We highlight that DLS is likely to promote student-centered pedagogy (SCP) when the values of democratic education are adhered to. We first map out the recent research on rural schools with EB students and address the common challenges through big ideas from DLS. Then, we argue why DLS is functional in grappling with these challenges and discuss how rural schools can implement DLS efficiently. Lastly, we present pedagogical implications for professional development with a focus on deliberative democracy and share recommendations for future research.

Throughout our targeted approach of explicit collaborative translation during small-group reading instruction, fourth grade emergent bilinguals employed the strategy to comprehend narrative text in a range of ways, similar to middle schoolers in reading instruction research.  As students acknowledged the usefulness of their translation skills in constructing meaning with text, they also demonstrated increased initiative to engage in reading across classroom literacy events.  Findings from this exploratory inquiry, including initial evidence for students’ developing bilingual identities of compentence, suggest further research is warranted on explicit collaborative translation as part of a growing corpus of evidence-based translingual practices in bilingual classrooms.

In this case study, situated in a preschool classroom within an early childhood Spanish/English dual language programme, we examine how an emergent bilingual child engages with multimodal resources to participate in sociodramatic play discourses. Guided by sociocultural and critical discourse perspectives on multimodality, we analysed ways in which Anthony, a four-year-old emergent bilingual child, engaged in meaning-making during play through verbal, visual and actional modes and in conjunction with additional subcategories in his transmodal repertoire (e.g. translanguaging, sentence types, actual versus signified use of artefacts). Our results revealed differences in the ways Anthony engaged his verbal modes (e.g. monolingual languaging versus translanguaging; varying sentence types) together with actional and visual modes to accomplish adult-centric tasks versus creatively engaging in child-centric play. His translanguaging furthered his communication in tandem with the affordances of his visual and actional resources, depending on his play purposes and collaborators. Anthony’s case illustrates how emergent bilingual children access a variety of modes to participate in literate discourses in complex and varied ways. This article concludes with a discussion on the importance of thoroughly accounting for the contexts and multimodal supports in interactive learning spaces.

Bilingualism is prevalent throughout the world as children routinely learn two or more languages with the support of their families and communities, and in some cases, their schools. In the United States, the number of young bilinguals in PreK-12 settings in established and new immigrant destination areas is rapidly increasing. This white paper presents a summary of key findings and patterns of early bilingual development and separates common myths from scientific findings about childhood bilingualism. When carefully analyzed, the research often contradicts common beliefs—or myths—held by many, including parents, general educators, education specialists and other professionals who work with young children (e.g., doctors, speech-language pathologists), and educational policymakers. These myths have influenced home and school language practices, instruction, assessment and support services, and the organizational structures of education programs serving young bilinguals. With a solid understanding of how language develops for young bilinguals, families, education professionals, and policymakers can nurture and encourage bilingualism as a valued individual and societal asset.

O presente artigo apresenta um levantamento sobre a influênciado lar, da comunidade e da escolana manutenção da língua e cultura minoritárias em crianças matriculadas em programas de biletramento (que ensinam a ler e a escrever em duas ou mais línguas) enquanto residentes de comunidades de imigrantes nos Estados Unidos. Este artigo traz o pano histórico, adescrição dos programas dos tipos Two-Way Immersion e Transitional Bilingual Programdisponíveisno país atualmente, e a legislação estadual vigente de um sistema escolar relativamente descentralizado a fim de encontrar um elo entre o papel de cada um de seus participantes –a família, a comunidade e a escola – como uma fundamentação teórica formulada a partir da perspectiva sócio cultural. Um dos temas resultantes mais eminentes é a construção constante de uma identidade bicultural para suportar o biletramento, ou seja, a junção de práticas culturais e sociais em mais de uma língua por todos envolvidos para que a estrutura e o invest...

Proficient writing performance in English requires multiple cognitive skills, which can be particularly challenging for English Learners (ELs). However, compared with reading and mathematics, there have been fewer scientific inquiries that explore the relationship between cognitive components and writing. The purpose of this study was to examine the role of three cognitive components (phonological awareness [PA], oral language development [OLD], and working memory [WM]), on writing development in Spanish-speaking EL children. To achieve this goal, 374 children in Grades 3 to 5 were administered a battery of cognitive measures in both Spanish as well as English, and a narrative writing task in English. Using structural equation modeling, three important findings emerged. First, the results showed that PA in both Spanish and English positively predicted English writing performance. Second, English OLD had a positive effect on writing, but Spanish OLD was a negative predictor of writing. Third, WM in both languages had large positive effects on writing in English. Taken together, the findings from this study highlight the important roles first- and second-language PA, OLD, and WM play in upper elementary ELs’ English writing.

This qualitative study examined code-switching patterns in the writing-related talk of 6 emergent Spanish-English bilingual first-grade children. Audio recordings, field notes, and writing artifacts documenting participant activities and language use in Spanish and English writing workshops were gathered over the course of 6 months and analyzed for code-switching prevalence, form, content, and purpose in relation to the writing process. The percentage distribution of oral code switching across the two linguistic contexts suggests a sociolinguistic imbalance between the two languages, wherein English played a prevalent role in the creation of Spanish texts, but Spanish did not appear to have the same utility in the development of English texts. Four general categories of code-switching functions emerged, indicating emergent bilingual writers’ (a) evaluation and self-regulation skills, (b) sociolinguistic and sociocultural competence, (c) metalinguistic insights, and (d) use of code s...

As we write the introduction to this journal issue, former Vice President, Joe Biden, has been elected as the 46th president of the United States and Senator Kamala Harris is making history as the first female, first Black, and first South Asian vice president. A new day is dawning; a new era is beginning. However, this is not a time to let our guard down or become complacent. At the time of this writing, there is much division and strife within our nation. Because of Trump’s refusal to concede the election, he is intentionally sowing paranoia and strife among his supporters and is blocking necessary steps for a smooth transition of power. Although there is a feeling of relief for Biden’s supporters, there is also a growing sense of impending chaos and uncertainty in anticipation of 45’s last day of presidency on January 20, 2021. This wait is punctuated by a virus spiraling into the tens of millions in the United States and the knowing that little to nothing will be done by our federal government to assist those most affected: Black, Brown, and indigenous people with disabilities and pre-existing conditions. We can no longer assume that our country’s leaders—whether in executive, legislative, or judicial branches—can or will bring about the transformative changes we want to see in our country. It is time for each of us to dig in deep, roll up our sleeves, and commit—with even more dedication—to making this country’s policies and practices more just, equitable, and fair for each and every person.

„Lass deine Treuen nicht mehr in die Welt hinein /  nur jene, die dir sehnend wieder entgegeneilen“.  Persönliche, familiäre und studienbezogene  deutsch-tschechische Affinitäten Otokar Fischers
(PowerPoint)

Tagung: Otokar Fischer (1883-1938): v rozhraních / in Grenztgebieten
21. 5. 2013 Österreichisches Kulturforum Prag

The main intervention study in the two kura kaupapa Māori benefitted from the insights of the pilot study described in Chapter 6. The value of the kahikatea metaphor in illustrating the analogy of the tree’s interlocking root system and the mind’s similarly interlocking conceptual and linguistic system proved to influence the children as it had the parents and for the same reasons – establishing trust and showing how TransAcquisition works to activate understanding. The pilot study’s revelation of the importance of the sequencing enabled the connection to be made between the correctly sequenced tasks and the building of understanding which Vygotsky (1962) identifies as occurring in the zone of proximal development. The account of the children’s comments in this chapter
shows this understanding happening within the tasks and their sequencing. The Reading Running Records provided not only quantitative data, but they also contributed to the qualitative methods of data collection.

Abstract: A large and growing number of students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds in the US and around the world have the potential to develop bilingualism and biliteracy if supported in their immediate environment. At the forefront in focusing exclusively on biliteracy development in early childhood across a variety of languages, this book provides both findings from empirical research with young bilinguals in home and school contexts and practical applications of these findings. Each chapter is structured in a similar ...

Multilingual students arrive in classrooms with rich language knowledge and funds of knowledge. Educators must recognize that emergent bilinguals speak multiple languages. They have one unitary language system; their language is bilingualism. Whether in a monolingual classroom setting or a multilingual setting, when working with emergent bilinguals, it is important that all of the students’ linguistic resources are welcomed into the classroom. The author describes how, as a first‐grade dual‐language (Spanish–English) teacher, she used children's literature and translanguaging to support her emergent bilinguals in using all of their linguistic resources to make meaning and build a linguistically sustaining space. The use of the text created a space for the teacher to model translanguaging and for the students to use all of their linguistic resources.

A large and growing number of students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds in the US and around the world have the potential to develop bilingualism and biliteracy if supported in their immediate environment. At the forefront in focusing exclusively on biliteracy development in early childhood across a variety of languages, this book provides both findings from empirical research with young bilinguals in home and school contexts and practical applications of these findings. Each chapter is structured in a similar format to offer parallel descriptions of the research, including a brief review of related empirical studies, an overview of the methods for data collection and analysis, a description of the main findings, and specific pedagogical implications to support educators’ efforts to construct meaningful, challenging, and dynamic literacy and language learning communities where one or more languages are used for communicating and learning. Pushing the field forward, this book is a valuable resource for helping literacy educators understand and respond to critical issues related to the development of young children’s literate competencies in two languages in home and school contexts.

In this case study, situated in a preschool classroom within an early childhood Spanish/English dual language programme, we examine how an emergent bilingual child engages with multimodal resources to participate in sociodramatic play discourses. Guided by sociocultural and critical discourse perspectives on multimodality, we analysed ways in which Anthony, a four-year-old emergent bilingual child, engaged in meaning-making during play through verbal, visual and actional modes and in conjunction with additional subcategories in his transmodal repertoire (e.g. translanguaging, sentence types, actual versus signified use of artefacts). Our results revealed differences in the ways Anthony engaged his verbal modes (e.g. monolingual languaging versus translanguaging; varying sentence types) together with actional and visual modes to accomplish adult-centric tasks versus creatively engaging in child-centric play. His translanguaging furthered his communication in tandem with the affordanc...

In this case study, situated in a preschool classroom within an early childhood Spanish/English dual language programme, we examine how an emergent bilingual child engages with multimodal resources to participate in sociodramatic play discourses. Guided by sociocultural and critical discourse perspectives on multimodality, we analysed ways in which Anthony, a four-year-old emergent bilingual child, engaged in meaning-making during play through verbal, visual and actional modes and in conjunction with additional subcategories in his transmodal repertoire (e.g. translanguaging, sentence types, actual versus signified use of artefacts). Our results revealed differences in the ways Anthony engaged his verbal modes (e.g. monolingual languaging versus translanguaging; varying sentence types) together with actional and visual modes to accomplish adult-centric tasks versus creatively engaging in child-centric play. His translanguaging furthered his communication in tandem with the affordanc...

This ethnographic case study explores the dynamic and fluid development of one African-American student’s bilingual/biliterate identity through her enrollment in a Spanish-English Dual Language Education program. We integrate the frameworks of identity in interaction and monoglossic and raciolinguistic language ideologies to understand how this student approaches her Spanish language and literacy development from kindergarten to grade 5. The study documents the fluid nature of the focal student, Tamara’s, identity as she journeyed from a Spanish enthusiast in kindergarten who embraced her emerging bilingualism/biliteracy to a student who seemed to question her identity as Spanish literate person. Specifically, we examine her affective response to developing bilingualism and biliteracy. We identify three paradoxical influences, or double-binds, in how she was differently positioned across multiple interactions as a bilingual African-American student.