Translanguaging program for teachers - website

Learning material (2021)

The www.transla-program.org website is a resource of theoretical and practical materials for teachers working with multilingual children. It exists in English, French, and German.

La chanson de Mara

Book published by Self-published (2021)

This book is a book I wrote for preschool immigrant children who struggle with learning a new language. Mara is a girl who comes to a new country and feels isolated in the school. She finds answers in the ... [more ▼]

This book is a book I wrote for preschool immigrant children who struggle with learning a new language. Mara is a girl who comes to a new country and feels isolated in the school. She finds answers in the nature and a refuge in music that she shares with her teacher and classmates in the end. [less ▲]

Sumak, der Fischer und der Junge

Book published by Self-published (2021)

This book is an illustrated book for immigrant parents who struggle to learn a new language and fit into a new country. Sumak is a woman who fled the war and is trying to understand new cultural and ... [more ▼]

This book is an illustrated book for immigrant parents who struggle to learn a new language and fit into a new country. Sumak is a woman who fled the war and is trying to understand new cultural and language codes in order to find her way. A fisherman helps her to do that. [less ▲]

Perspectives on multilingualism and multilingual literacies from early childhood educators in Luxembourg

Scientific Conference (2021, September 04)

The pedagogies of multiliteracies and translanguaging (García et al., 2017) call for multiliteracies, but early childhood educators are often ensure of how to develop practices in one, let alone multiple ... [more ▼]

The pedagogies of multiliteracies and translanguaging (García et al., 2017) call for multiliteracies, but early childhood educators are often ensure of how to develop practices in one, let alone multiple languages. The development of literacy skills is often reduced to the isolated training of phonological awareness or the letters of the alphabet. By contrast, storytelling is a holistic approach which contributes to the development of language and literacy skills (Sénéchal & Lefevre, 2001). It can promote multilingualism if multilingual speakers are involved (Kirsch, 2018). This presentation reports on the perspectives on multiliteracies of educators in crèches in multilingual Luxembourg, where 63.7% of the 4-year-olds do not speak Luxembourgish at home. Multilingual education became mandatory in 2017, requesting educators to develop Luxembourgish, promote French and value home languages. The mix-method project Collaboration with parents and Multiliteracy in early Childhood Education aims to develop literacy practices in multiple languages and with multiple actors (parents, educators) through professional development in crèches. In this paper we report the findings of interviews and a survey sent to 700 educators in May 2020. The latter were asked to identify literacy practices (e.g. storytelling), language-promoting strategies, and translanguaging practices. The data are analysed with thematic analysis and descriptive statistical analysis. The findings will contribute to our understanding of current ideologies, pedagogies, and practices, and help identify issues and possible ways forward. [less ▲]

Developing multiliteracies in early years education in Luxembourg

Poster (2021, August 17)

Teacher education in translanguaging to achieve social justice?

Scientific Conference (2021, April 29)

Multilingual and multicultural settings are an ever-growing reality all over the world. The potential of migrant’s multilingual and multicultural heritage can be unfolded if the citizens of the host ... [more ▼]

Multilingual and multicultural settings are an ever-growing reality all over the world. The potential of migrant’s multilingual and multicultural heritage can be unfolded if the citizens of the host country are open to it. However, immigrants are often confronted with cultural and linguistic supremacy while nationals of the host country are afraid of a loss or ‘dilution’ of their existing culture and language. The increase of multilingual and multicultural settings as well as the difficulty in overcoming this fear impelled scholars of various sciences to conduct extensive research on the issues of marginalization and cultural imperialism. Researchers in educational sciences, most notably Li Wei and Ofelia García, have opposed the linguistic and cultural hegemony in education through the promotion of translanguaging pedagogy. Translanguaging as a term describes both the natural discourse of bi- and multilingual people through the use of their entire linguistic repertoire and the pedagogy that makes use of these unique linguistic repertoires of bi- and multilingual students to foster learning, comprehension and academic achievement (Celic & Selzer, 2011; Otheguy, García, & Reid, 2015). The use of a translanguaging pedagogy in multicultural and multilingual settings proves beyond useful to disrupt linguistic hegemonies and socio-politically constructed named languages by giving bi- and multilingual students a voice and space to prosper, learn and develop their bi- and multilingual identities (García, 2019). The need of a translanguaging pedagogy becomes necessary in countries such as the small trilingual Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg. The culturally and linguistically highly diverse country with its three official languages (Luxembourgish, French, and German) sees a staggering gap between the school achievements of native and non-native children, forcing even the government to implement mandatory multilingual education in preschools (PISA, 2019). The development of Luxembourgish, familiarization of French and valorization of the home languages of the children have become an official requirement for preschool teachers since 2017. Given that 64 % of four-year olds in Luxembourg do not speak Luxembourgish at home, multiple projects and courses have launched to aid teachers in the practical application of this new law (MENJE, 2018). Thus, we developed our professional development course in translanguaging for preschool teachers in Luxembourg to support their work with multilingual children and their families. The disruption of the linguistic hegemony in Luxembourgish classrooms was implicitly carried through three distinct objectives of the project : (1) 18-hours professional development course in translanguaging to 38 preschool teachers from June to December 2019 divided into 7 sessions (multilingual ecology, home-school collaboration, multilingual brain, multilingual oracy and literacy), (2) active inclusion of children’s families to foster home-school collaboration through parents’ questionnaires and interviews and the promotion of partnerships between families and teachers in the course, and (3) support of children’s linguistic, socio-emotional and cognitive development and engagement in the classroom through early literacy and numeracy tests in the school and home languages, and video observations of classroom activities and interactions. As the goal of social justice was thematized implicitly throughout the course given that most teachers are monolingually and monoculturally biased to be confronted with the topic of cultural imperialism and linguistic hegemony head-on, we tried to assess the teachers change in attitudes through the use of focus group and questionnaires at the beginning and the end of the course. This is the present focus. As the voluntary participation in a translanguaging course would already suggest, the preliminary results of our project show an overall openness of the participating teachers towards other languages and cultures and an awareness of the need of inclusion of the home languages of the children for the benefit of their development and well-being. The results from teacher questionnaires show that there was a significant increase in positive attitudes towards multilingualism (t(35) = -3.83, p < .001) and significant decrease in exclusive interest in Luxembourgish (t(35) = 3.45, p < .001), after the course. This openness and awareness do, however, not automatically translate into social justice as only a very small number of teachers was open to the idea of disrupting linguistic hegemonies and in the video observations unconsciously put all the languages at a same level. The majority of the participants did change their views about their multilingual students (from deficit to richness) realizing that the inclusion of children’s home languages and cultures is a valuable tool for comprehension, learning and socio-emotional development instead of only being a stepping-stone until full mastery of Luxembourgish is achieved. Yet, their strong focus on the development of Luxembourgish and its absolute untouchable status as the language that receives the most recognition did not change. Beside the linguistic superiority of Luxembourgish, even linguistic hierarchies became blatantly obvious during video observations, showing just how much work still needs to be done for teachers to truly interiorize the potentially harmful consequences of linguistic hegemonies and hierarchies. It is our responsibility as researchers to continue to work with teachers, and involve parents, children, and their communities. Change in attitudes and raise of social responsibility and justice is a process. At this point of our project, we see it in fragments, and it is important for all of us not to disrupt it. If we do, the networks that we created will dissolve and the positive impact on multilingual children’s lives and their families could disappear. Therefore, we see two opportunities to continue the work on translanguaging pedagogy by: (1) organizing an additional training for teachers in which we will analyze the video observations to focus on power relations, and (2) organizing a teacher/parent conference in which we will facilitate the discussion on translanguaging pedagogy. Educational and social contexts are rapidly changing and we believe that our professional development course in translanguaging pedagogy is contributing to the process of adaptation to these changes by explicitly inviting us to be more socially responsible and fair. The Conference will give us the opportunity to present the final results and future directions of the project. References Celic, C., & Selzer, K. (2011). Translanguaging: A CUNY-NYSIEB Guide for Educators. New York: CUNY-NYSIEB. García, O. (2019). Translanguaging: a coda to the code?, Classroom Discourse, 10(3-4), 369-373, doi: 10.1080/19463014.2019.1638277 Ministry of National Education, Childhood and Youth [MENJE]. (2018). Les chiffres clés de l'Éducation nationale: statistiques et indicateurs - Année scolaire 2016-2017 [Key numbers of the national education: statistics and indicators – School year 2016-20167]. Retrieved from http://www.men.public.lu/fr/actualites/publications/themes-transversaux/statistiques-analyses/chiffres-cles/index.html OECD (2019). PISA 2018 Results (Volume I): What students know and can do. PISA, OECD Publishing: Paris. doi: https://doi.org/10.1787/5f07c754-en Otheguy, R., García, O., & Reid, W. (2015). Clarifying translanguaging and deconstructing named langauges: A perspective from linguistics. Applied Linguistic Review, 6(3), 281–307. [less ▲]

Multilingual practices and literacies in Luxembourg: perspectives from teachers, parents and children

Scientific Conference (2021, April 21)

Multilingual education in early years in Luxembourg: a paradigm shift?

in International Journal of Multilingualism (2021)

This paper is based in Luxembourg where a multilingual programme has been implemented in early childhood education in 2017. The research project examines the language use in daily communication and ... [more ▼]

This paper is based in Luxembourg where a multilingual programme has been implemented in early childhood education in 2017. The research project examines the language use in daily communication and literacy activities of educators and parents in day care centres, as reported by educators in two online-questionnaires. The findings show that the educators and parents use multiple languages when communicating, singing and reading with children in the centres. In addition to French and Luxembourgish which dominate, they use five other languages. Their reported multilingual practice reflects their beliefs that speaking and reading in several languages promotes language learning. However, while the programme is multilingual, a range of home languages are marginalised. The educators produce a language hierarchy in the centres which the parents reproduce. While collaboration with parents can be effective in bringing home languages into day care centres, educators need to be aware of language hierarchies and ideologies. [less ▲]

The role of LEGO in numeracy development: A case study

in Xu, Shuang Shuang; Marsico, Giuseppina (Eds.) Where culture grows: Social ecology of a Chinese kindergarten (2021)

Translanguaging course for preschool teachers to disrupt inequalities

Presentation (2020, November 12)

The highly linguistically and culturally diverse reality of Luxembourg and its school system pose a great challenge to students, families, and teachers alike. This reality tends to produce one of the ... [more ▼]

The highly linguistically and culturally diverse reality of Luxembourg and its school system pose a great challenge to students, families, and teachers alike. This reality tends to produce one of the largest differences in reading performance between Luxembourgish and language minority children compared to other countries (PISA, 2019), which creates inequalities in students’ academic trajectory. Translanguaging as a pedagogy has been established to overcome these inequalities by disrupting language hierarchies and giving language minority children a space and voice to learn and prosper (García, 2019). To address the inequalities and help implement a translanguaging pedagogy in preschool, our project : (1) offered a professional development course in translanguaging to 40 teachers, (2) involves children’s parents to foster home-school collaboration through questionnaires and interviews, and (3) cultivates children’s linguistic, cognitive, and socio-emotional engagement in the classroom through linguistic tests and video observations. We also used focus groups and questionnaires at the beginning and the end of the course. The 18-hour course in Translanguaging (June to December 2019) aimed to challenge the teachers’ perception about multilingualism and equality in their classroom. Through the preliminary results of the focus groups, questionnaires and field notes, we were able to observe some positive changes in the teachers’ attitudes and beliefs about their language minority children such as realizing that language is a tool of communication. Teachers were also more positive about home-school collaboration. However, despite our continuous creative efforts, some teachers still maintained their traditional monolingual stance and conviction of parents’ lack of education and interest. Most of the teachers did, however, not completely overcome a monolingual bias and this remains our main focus in the remaining points and follow-ups of our project. References García, O. (2019). Translanguaging: a coda to the code?, Classroom Discourse, 10(3-4), 369-373, doi: 10.1080/19463014.2019.1638277 OECD (2019). PISA 2018 Results (Volume I): What students know and can do. PISA, OECD Publishing: Paris. doi: https://doi.org/10.1787/5f07c754-en [less ▲]