Shifting Language Practices: Multilingual Students and the Power of Place

• In Event: Mentoring Multilingual Refugee-Background Learners in Virtual Spaces: Sustaining Opportunities for Mutualistic Learning During COVID-19

Abstract

Purpose & Perspectives

In many U.S. schools, such as in Michigan, English is considered the dominant language, and, for many of these schools, proficiency in English marks a successful student (Read by Grade Three Guide, 2020). To meet this goal, multilingual students, often labeled language minorities or English learners, are expected to reserve their minoritized language for non-academic purposes (Vogel & Garcia, 2017). As a result of these deficit-based perspectives of multilingualism and pushes for “standardized” English-only pedagogy (Smith, 2016), multilingual learners have struggled in U.S. schools. In Agnew’s three fundamental aspects of place, school is a place where (1) students are physically surrounded by English-only beliefs/practices, (2) students are a part of a school community, and (3) students create a sense of self congruent in the school (place) they are in (1987). Meanwhile, in Canagarajah’s definitions of place, they couple the physical contextualization of place alongside the self-determined creation of space (2013). Using both these perspectives on place, I consider the varying sociolinguistic landscape (Blommaert, 2013) of in-person schooling versus remote schooling, in which physical place and in-person interactions influenced a multilingual, immigrant-background student’s language choices.

Methods

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most schools were closed, in which the stay-at-home order in Michigan guaranteed that no one would be learning or teaching in-person from March 2020 until at least a year later, March 2021. This included all extra-curricular activities, and thus, everything went remote. To provide context, the following paper came about from my involvement as a mentor with a local non-profit organization working with refugee families in the community. My study was conducted in partnership with youth who were mostly from refugee and multilingual backgrounds. In this case study, I analyzed the remote mentorship pairing between a second-generation immigrant doctoral student in education and a tenth-grade student who recently (four years ago) immigrated to the United States from Afghanistan. Beyond their transnational backgrounds, both the mentor and mentee come from multilingual backgrounds. Drawing upon Freire’s critical pedagogy (Freire, 2000) and Agnew’s definition of “place” (Agnew, 1987), I explore the sociolinguistics of remote pandemic learning. As such, I investigated the following questions: (1) How has schooling at home affected language practices for multilingual students? and (2) What do these language practices imply about current language policies in U.S. schools?

Findings & Significance

Through the analysis of weekly Zoom mentoring sessions, mentee artifacts, and written reflection memos, I explore the presence of multilingualism in remote learning. Unrelated to the learning that occurs with classmates and teachers, this study explores the nurturing of one’s linguistic abilities when in environments where they have more opportunities to be multilingual. The findings of this study revealed the changes in language practices of students when remote, such as the increased fluidity throughout the day between the language of instruction (English) and home languages (in this case, Pashto and Dari). Ultimately, the results of the study highlighted the significance of physical learning places on multilingual students in an educational system that privileges the English language.

Author

• Ayah Issa, Michigan State University