Search

This 2-year case study is a phenomenology of belief-change resulting from a specific curricular re-configuration. It follows Álvaro, a Master of Arts in Teaching Spanish student, from the first week of classes until graduation, as he completed a 4-semester program. Seeking to stimulate a move toward conscientização, the pilot curriculum included a translanguaging approach to three graduate courses, readings and group discussions on translinguistics, and shadowing an undergraduate Spanish class (for 'heritage speakers') that adopted a translanguaging approach. Additionally, opportunities for professional development (e.g. preparing and presenting an original paper at a national bilingual education conference) were provided. Following an iterative approach, data were collected via interviews and written reflections throughout the program; datasets were transcribed (when necessary) and analyzed after collection. Manen's (1990) guidelines for phenomenological analysis were adopted, and member checking was used for validation of findings. Results chart out a baseline of beliefs held by Álvaro prior to entering the program, and three types of belief-shift he experienced during his studies; these regard the dynamic nature of Spanish, the link between race and language, and the value of multilingual practices in society and education. Critical awakening/despertar crítico is introduced as a metacategory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the use of language during the emergency eLearning period due to Covid-19 in the Basque Autonomous Community. Specifically, the main objective of this study is to analyze how the use of Basque (local minority language), English (foreign language), and Spanish (local majority language) changed during this period among children and the interactions that may exist between them. Four hundred eighty-four teachers and 410 parents participated in this research. The results revealed that teachers perceived a significant decline in the use of Basque that correlated with an increase in the use of Spanish. The decline in the use of Basque was particularly significant among children in kindergarten. The use of English also decreased but was not associated with the use of the other languages. It was also found that the perceptions of children's language use differed between teachers and parents. The findings are explained in terms of assumptions regarding language learning and use in relation to the context of the study. Finally, we discuss some implications of empowering minority and foreign language use in multilingual contexts during emergency eLearning and the measures that should be taken to mitigate the decline in their use at the current time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, Heritage Language Programs have been attracting more and more attention in the European academic and educational policy contexts. In Germany, many efforts are being undertaken to foster the teaching of heritage languages in schools. This paper provides an overview of the teaching of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Germany through the long-established Program 'Spanish Culture and Language Lessons' (Aulas de Lengua y Cultura Españolas) funded by the Spanish Ministry of Education for school-aged Spanish heritage speakers. The principal objectives of the study are to analyze the main fostering and constraining factors to participate in this program and to propose improvement measures. To achieve these purposes, a mixed quantitative and qualitative research methodology has been used. The findings are discussed according to these main topics arising during the research process: reasons for students to participate and learning needs, teaching challenges, family implication, relationship with the regular formal education system, blended learning, linguistic and culture diversity. Moreover, improvement measures for this Spanish Heritage Language program are suggested. The main conclusions may be useful for heritage language teachers and program managers in other heritage language (HL) programs in Germany and more generally in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is on pedagogical translanguaging, understood as planned instructional strategies used with a pedagogical purpose in a multilingual educational context. The paper reports a study on cognate identification and cognate awareness carried out in a multilingual primary school. The study aims at analyzing whether the identification of cognates in three languages is related to linguistic factors and to teaching. The relationship between teaching cognates and metalinguistic awareness is also explored. Half of the participants took part in an intervention based on pedagogical translanguaging using multilingual resources from the students' own repertoire while the other half followed regular classes. Participants completed a background questionnaire and a cognate recognition task. Information was also gathered by means of a think-aloud protocol and an interview. The results indicate that the identification of cognates is connected to the linguistic characteristics of cognates but not to having Basque or Spanish as a first language. Participants who had taken part in the intervention showed a higher development of cognate awareness but there were no significant differences between the groups in cognate identification. The results are exploratory but they indicate that using the languages in the students' whole linguistic repertoire can create more opportunities for language learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dual language immersion (DLI) programs have emerged in the U.S. as effective ways to bring together language minority and language majority speakers in school settings with the goal of bilingualism and bi-literacy for all. However, the proliferation of these programs has raised concerns regarding issues of inequity and dissimilar power dynamics in these spaces (Cervantes-Soon, 2014, "A Critical Look at Dual Language Immersion in the New Latin@ Diaspora." Bilingual Research Journal 37 (1): 64–82; Flores, 2016, Do Black Lives matter in Bilingual Education [Web log post]. Accessed May 1, 2017. https://educationallinguist.wordpress.com/2016/09/11/do-black-lives-matter-in-bilingual-education/; Valdes, 1997, "Dual language immersion programs: A cautionary note concerning the education of language-minority students." Harvard Educational Review 67: 391–430, 2018, "Analyzing the curricularization of language in two-way immersion education: Restating two cautionary notes." Bilingual Research Journal). With this in mind, this study aims to shed light on the intricate social processes at work in DLI contexts. In particular, this paper examines first, how notions of language use, race, and ethnicity are socially constructed and intersect in DLI settings; and second, it explores how these ideas are discerned and re-shaped by young children into their own social and linguistic norms. Employing qualitative research methods, this year-long ethnographic case study uses the intersectional lens of raciolinguistics (Alim, Rickford & Ball, 2016, Raciolinguistics: how language shapes our ideas about race. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; Rosa & Flores, 2017, "Unsettling race and language: Toward a raciolinguistic perspective." Language in Society 46 (5): 621–647), to examine the intricate cross-cutting dynamics at play in bilingual spaces. The exploration of these ideas helps to illuminate the ways in which language practices and interactions are shaped by social constructions from a very early age. Furthermore, it contributes to understandings of social perceptions and relations in multilingual/multicultural/multiethnic contemporary school settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to describe the process of designing and implementing a teaching unit that links a curricular subject – in this case, Spanish language – with the identity of students as a strategy aimed at improving engagement and learning. The teaching unit was implemented in a Shared Education Unit in Catalonia (Spain) for at-risk students. The design of the teaching unit was based on the theoretical approaches of the funds of identity and proposals made by Cummins, which integrate the identity of students into educational practices as a way of reaffirming and empowering those students. We shall describe the funds of identity uncovered, the implementation of the teaching unit and the evaluation of the educational activity by participants. In general, the participating students gave a positive evaluation of the activity, emphasizing its motivating character since it stemmed from their own hobbies and interests, in particular the manipulative arts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]