“Coming Up With New Ideas Across Languages!” Co-Constructing Biliteracy Pedagogies With Collaborating DLBE (Dual Language Bilingual Education) Teachers

• In Event: Bridging Languages: Innovative Approaches to Bilingualism and Biliteracy in Diverse Contexts

Abstract

Grounded in sociocultural theories of teacher learning and holistic biliteracy instruction, this study examines how teachers learn biliteracy pedagogies and integrate the DLBE goals through collaboratively planning and implementing a bilingual unit. We analyzed educator discourse from collaborative meetings across a ten-month partnership with a DLBE team to identify pedagogically productive talk that transformed teachers’ practices. Findings shed light on how through engaging in joint productive activities, educators began to notice and build on their students’ bilingual assets, reconceptualize their separate classrooms as a single bilingual learning space, and collaboratively integrate biliteracy instruction. We offer implications for supporting bilingual teachers' ongoing learning and collaboration to ensure more equitable biliteracy instruction connected to DLBE goals.

Authors

• Sandra Natalia Gutiérrez, University of Maryland

• Melinda E. Martin-Beltran, University of Maryland

• Amanda D. Cataneo, University of Maryland