20-22 April 2015, Falun, Sweden Spaces for translanguaging in diverse language learning situations Supporting very young learners in transition from home to school: Translanguaging in a French nursery school class with emergent bilingual children. Latisha MARY latisha.mary@univ-lorraine.fr Université de Lorraine ESPE de Lorraine ATILF (CNRS), UMR 7118 Équipe Didactique des Langues et Sociolinguistique (CRAPEL) Andrea YOUNG, andrea.young@espe.unistra.fr ESPE de l Académie de Strasbourg, Université de Strasbourg Groupe d'etudes sur le Plurilinguisme Européen (GEPE) EA 1339 LiLPa Linguistique Langue Parole
Origin of the study/ Local context n Pre-school priority education zone n Class of 19 children n Languages spoken at home: Albanian, Arabic, Creole (la Réunion), French, Serbian, Turkish n 7/19 children speak Turkish at home n One full-time classroom assistant n Teacher, 35 years of experience, 31 in multilingual classrooms, 18 in preschool, French-speaking, some knowledge of other languages (English, Turkish, Spanish)
National setting n Top down n Centralized n Normative n Monolingual habitus (Gogolin, 1994) n Language hierarchy (Hélot, 2007) n Limited knowledge about bilingualism (Young & Mary, 2010) n Fear of insufficient command of French (Mary & Young, 2010)
Methodology, data collection n Qualitative, ethnographic, case study of one classroom n Longitudinal (September 2014-ongoing) n Regular, bi-monthly class visits n Fieldnotes, video, photographs n Interviews (teachers, parents, classroom assistant, intercultural mediator, student teachers)
Teacher s image of the child (Malaguzzi, 1994; UNESCO, 2010) Children perceive and integrate the value attributed to their languages (Moons, 2010; Gkaintartzi & Tsokalidou, 2011; Thomauske, 2011; Cummins, 2003) n Faced with negative attitudes it is difficult to construct a harmonious «identité métisse qui concilie deux appartenances culturelles ancrées dans une bonne estime de soi et qui intègre deux systèmes de représentations du monde» (Rezzoug et al., 2007).
Translanguaging spaces Translanguaging: n n n constructs a social space for bilingual individuals within families and communities that enables them to bring together all their language and cultural practices Creates a space allowing multilingual individuals to integrate social spaces (and thus language codes ) that have been formally practiced separately in different places which has its own transformative power because it is forever ongoing and combines and generates new identities, values and practices (Garcia & Wei, 2014, 23-24)
When/why does she translanguage? When? n Spontaneous, unplanned n Formal/Informal n One-to-one/group n Basic, Immediate needs n Discipline issues n During storytelling n Doing jigsaw puzzles n Singing songs & rhymes n Drawing pictures... Why? n Focus children s attention n Scaffold their learning & knowledge of French n Engage them in literacy practices n Reassure/comfort them n Get information n Make connections between languages n Build on prior knowledge n Value their home language and culture
First day at school, 2nd September 2014 Teacher translanguaging with two Turkishspeaking children
What is the teacher doing when translanguaging? n Demonstrating that preschool is not just a French-only zone n Providing a safe space for children to freely express themselves (in language of choice) n Building trust n Legitimising the home language n Building self-esteem n Linking French-to home language n Teaching for transfer across languages
Bilingual picture book
30th September 2014 Teacher activating vocabulary
What is the teacher doing when translanguaging? n Teaching for connections between languages n Teaching to communicate recognition and acceptance of children s languages n Their language is viewed positively within the school context n Valuing plurilingualism in the eyes of all the children n Reversing roles the teacher becomes a learner
Implications for policy n Translanguaging allows children to use ALL their resources to communicate and to make meaning teachers to scaffold children s learning even if they are not themselves bilingual children to construct harmonious plural identities and to build confidence (sense of self) children to participate and to engage even when their knowledge of the school language is limited
Kiitos Takk! Kia ora Tesekkür ederim 谢 谢 Ευχαριστώ Merci Thank ye! Dank u wel $#"ا ᖁᔭᓇᐃᓐᓂ Amesegënallô latisha.mary@univ-lorraine.fr andrea.young@espe.unistra.fr
Practitioners feedback on proposed curriculum for preschool n En outre, le projet de programme est considéré comme insuffisant en ce qui concerne la prise en compte des enfants à besoins spécifiques : enfants en situation de handicap, enfants dont la langue maternelle n est pas le français, alors qu il s agit là de problématiques très importantes à l école maternelle. (Ministère de l Éducation nationale, de l Enseignement supérieur et de la Recherche Dgesco, Synthèse de la consultation nationale sur le projet de programme de l école maternelle: 24-25)
New curriculum for September 2015 L'enfant, quelle que soit sa langue maternelle, dès sa toute petite enfance et au cours d'un long processus, acquiert spontanément le langage grâce à ses interactions avec les adultes de son entourage.(men, 2015, p.7) À partir de la moyenne section, ils vont découvrir l'existence de langues, parfois très différentes de celles qu'ils connaissent. Dans des situations ludiques (jeux, comptines...) ou auxquelles ils peuvent donner du sens (DVD d'histoires connues par exemple), ils prennent conscience que la communication peut passer par d'autres langues que le français : par exemple les langues régionales, les langues étrangères et la langue des signes française (LSF). (MEN, 2015, p.8)