Language ideologies of preschool teachers and translanguaging practices in classrooms.

Translanguaging has been described as a natural practice amongst multilinguals although it remains uncommon in formal and informal educational institutions (Creese & Blackledge 2010). By contrast, Kirsch (forthcoming) has shown that preschool children in trilingual Luxembourg translanguaged frequently during collaborative storytelling on iTEO, an iPad app which allows for the recording and editing of oral language. The 4-year-old emergent multilinguals studied here drew on their entire semiotic repertoire in order to communicate and to make meaning. They used Luxembourgish, their family language and features of other languages picked up from their peers. In order to understand these translanguaging practices, we consider it necessary to examine the underlying pedagogies which are, in turn, influenced by the language ideologies of the teachers (Gkaintartzi & Tsokalidou 2010).
The present paper examines the language ideologies of two preschool teachers in Luxembourg and relates them to the translanguaging practices in their classrooms. The data stem from the qualitative, small-scale, longitudinal study iTEO (2013 – 2017) which used a mix-method approach comprising video and audio recordings, interviews, questionnaires and the collection of documents (e.g. written stories, pictures). The data show that the teachers understand language learning as a dynamic social process and have positive attitudes to multilingualism. They embrace language and cultural diversity in their classroom, promote translanguaging, and actively collaborate with parents in order to communicate and share their language practices.