From Undergraduate Coursework to Elementary Classroom Instruction: Early Career Teachers Enacting Translanguaging Pedagogies

• In Event: Supporting Multilingual Learners’ Literacies Through Translingual Practices and Pedagogies

Abstract

Purpose and Framing
While schools in the United States are increasingly linguistically diverse (“English Learners,” 2024), the pre-service teacher (PST) population continues to be dominated by white, monolingual English speakers (“Characteristics of Public School Teachers,” 2023). Since these PSTs typically feel ill-equipped to support their linguistically diverse students (Taylor et al., 2016), teacher preparation plays an important role in helping PSTs apply culturally sustaining practices, such as translanguaging, in their classrooms. Therefore, this study explores how recent teacher education graduates enacted translanguaging pedagogies and asset-based perspectives on multilingualism in their first- and second-year classrooms.
In framing this study, we consider translanguaging a pedagogical framework that encourages students’ dynamic and expansive language use (García, 2009), as well as a perspective that asks PSTs “to consider how they prioritize, rather than dissuade, linguistic diversity in their classrooms” (McCreight, 2025, p. 145).

Methods of Data Collection and Analysis
Data for this paper was collected as part of a larger study with elementary pre-service teachers focused on their recognition of personal linguistic bias and incorporating translanguaging practices into their teaching. Participants included fourteen PSTs (n = 14), 12 of whom self-identified as white women and two as women of color. All participants were English speakers, and the two women of color also reported speaking black language (Baker-Bell, 2020). Of the original 14, nine participants agreed to follow-up interviews during their first two years as full-time classroom teachers. Transcripts of these semi-structured interviews served as the primary source of data for this analysis. Additional qualitative data sources collected include field notes and both written and oral participant reflections following in-class translanguaging activities. Inductive thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006; Braun & Clarke, 2012) was used to identify themes in the data while simultaneously examining underlying assumptions through multiple rounds of coding and collapsing these codes into overarching themes.

Findings and Importance
First, we found early career teachers reported implementing translanguaging pedagogies and welcoming linguistic diversity not as an add-on to their work, but as central to their jobs as classroom teachers. Enactments ranged from choosing texts in languages other than English to creating multilingual signage and encouraging translingual contributions to their students’ written work. Second, the teachers interviewed had adopted a critical lens toward mandated curricula and tests. Teachers shared frustration with the monolingual and English-only biases of these standardized policies and practices, often echoing the asset-based positions they had discussed in their college course as undergraduates. Relatedly, teachers rejected binary categories of right and wrong language use and articulated more expansive understandings of language as they described their classroom practices and policies.
These findings demonstrate the potential long-term impact of PST preparation programs, including translanguaging discussions and pedagogies in methods coursework. In the transition from pre-service to in-service teaching, participants’ shifts in their perceptions of and concrete strategies for supporting linguistically diverse students held across time and contexts. This consistent transfer and continued growth provide a basis for others to build such translanguaging practices into their own classes.

Authors

• Jennifer Anne McCreight, Kent State University

• Jackie Ridley, Kent State University