Multimodal, embodied practices in culturally sustaining, translingual group read-alouds for young emergent bilinguals

• In Event: Translanguaging, Multimodality and Affect in School and Community Learning Ecologies

Abstract

Objective

Early childhood literacy activities such as group storytelling plays a fundamental role in language development and literacy socialization. The present paper analyzes group read-alouds video-recorded at a bilingual Spanish-English Head Start preschool to understand how children can be actively engaged in story read-alouds through translanguaging pedagogy.

Theoretical framework

The study employs a theoretical framework of translanguaging pedagogy through examining “the multiple discursive practices in which bilinguals engage in order to make sense of the world ” (García 2009). The author draws from culturally sustaining pedagogy (Paris & Alim 2017) to understand how students’ preexisting, rich home and community linguistic and cultural knowledge can contribute to translingual, culturally sustaining literacy practices in the classroom. Further, the study expands on previous research centered on children’s aesthetic experiences and enchantment during group read-alouds led by teachers (Cekaite & Björk-Willén 2018) and relies on a co-operative action approach drawing from multimodal conversation analysis (Goodwin 2018) to understand how the teachers steer and capture students’ attention and co-participation in the storytelling event.

Data Source

The paper analyzes group read-alouds video-recorded at a bilingual Spanish-English Head Start preschool as part of an eight-month ethnography.

Method

The study examines two literacy activities involving multimodality via touch, directed gaze, gesture, and props along with frequent translanguaging. It relies on multimodal conversation analysis (Goodwin 2018) to understand how the teachers steers and captures students’ attention and co-participation in the storytelling event.

Results

In the first episode, a teacher is conducting an oral story time narrating a story told to her by a Mexican teacher of her own years ago in which an angel slashes a cloud in order to make it rain water on a wilted flower. The teacher weaves literary commentary and discussion likening the students’ personal bodily experiences (e.g. looking “wilted” and feeling thirsty) to events in her story narrative. The second episode shows a group literacy development activity employing “story wands”—physical star-shaped toys with literary comprehension questions prompting summarization, detailed recall, and opinion formation. The wands’ questions are written in English, and the teacher verbally relays these to students in both English and Spanish as she points to the students with the wands. She also frequently translanguages as she dialogues with students to develop their answers, shifting languages to index shifts in addressee or story footing (Goffman 1981) or within one-on-one interactions to maximize students’ co-participation in the read-aloud. The coordination of shifting languages as the teacher directs herself toward different addressees and story-telling footings and voices helps achieve an engaging performance and invites the co-involvement of the children.

In both episodes, students’ co-participation in the storytelling and affective alignment are manifested in the children’s enthusiastic verbal and embodied responses to the teachers’ comprehension questions querying story actions, in their format tying (Goodwin 1990) to the teacher’s speech and gestures, and in their gaze and displays of excitement.

Significance

The study facilitates deeper understanding of group read-alouds as sequentially unfolding, interactionally-achieved processes and underscores the role of translanguaging, affect, and multimodality in this achievement.

Author

• Mallory Paige Woods, University of California - Santa Barbara