Promoting Pedagogical Translanguaging Practices Through a Digital App on Bilingual Math Literacies Learning

• In Event: Translanguaging, Trans-Semiotizing, and Social Semiotic Rehabituation in Plurilingual and Pluricultural Education

Abstract

This paper responded to bilingual students’ need for post-secondary integrated content and language remedial support for meeting the learning challenges in a compulsory English-medium mathematics subject. Little research has been conducted on the analysis of a bilingual mathematics “concept + language mapping” (Lin, 2018; He & Lin, 2019) digital app and the validated use of pedagogical translanguaging in a remedial mathematics subject. Qualitative research methods are adopted to trace how a bilingual digital app designed to leverage students’ prior mathematics knowledge in Chinese-medium secondary schools enhances the trans-semiotizing experience in a mathematics bridging course offered to 1,500 students to bring about cross-lingual transfer of thematic patterns (Lemke, 1990) of mathematics through different levels of translanguaging support (Lin, 2019).

Author

• Esther Ka-man Tong, CPCE, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University