Translanguaging in the Social Studies Classroom to Understand Complex Texts

• In Event: 68.037 - Translanguaging With Multilingual Students: Learning From Classroom Moments

Abstract

Students in the US are increasingly being held to higher standards as part of education reform initiatives, yet there has been limited focus on how to adapt instruction for our increasingly diverse school population which includes substantial and growing numbers of emergent bilingual students. This study examines how we may use translanguaging to support emergent bilinguals and ensure their success within a rigorous standards-driven curriculum.

Translanguaging allows bilinguals to use their full linguistic repertoire across the home and school language(s). Taking up translanguaging in the classroom involves the process of students and/or teachers using multilingual discursive practices as “sense-making” for teaching and learning (García, Johnson, & Seltzer, 2017).

In this study we designed a lesson to introduce a historical and complex primary document, The Declaration of Independence, to develop emergent bilingual students’ higher-order thinking skills and build content knowledge. The lesson was designed, implemented and analyzed to better understand how, when and why translanguaging was taken up or resisted by students and teachers. The teacher planned for the intentional use of English or Spanish, the lesson design also provided space for the use of the students’ entire linguistic repertoire. Spanish and English texts allowed students to use their bilingualism to help them comprehend complex words, sentences and/or ideas. Students were encouraged to work collaboratively and translanguage through purposeful home language groupings.

The study was conducted in an 8th grade self-contained transitional bilingual social studies classroom of emergent bilinguals from Spanish-speaking backgrounds. The lesson and the student-group discussions were recorded and then transcribed. The authors analyzed the transcripts for evidence of how, when and why translanguaging was taken up by students and teachers. Student work was categorized in relation the intentional language use and fluid language use.

Translanguaging was used by students in higher-order thinking and the comprehension of texts. Students demonstrated a strong understanding of extremely dense passages which they were able to construct by translanguaging. Students readily listened in English and responded in Spanish, as well as read and discussed parallel texts in English and Spanish. Students remained on task in their small groups and demonstrated strong collaboration skills, as well as peer-to-peer accountability. Students discussed the complex texts, making notes of the events through dialogue and were conscious to do “the most we can”, feeling empowered in using their full linguistic repertoire to participate in the lesson, as well as support one another. After the lesson, several students expressed how the use of translanguaging increased their understanding and built their self-confidence as active learners.

The lesson in this study demonstrates that rigorous standards don’t need to be discarded or lowered, but rather the instruction and support must be adapted to the unique learning strengths, needs and abilities of emergent bilingual students. As more and more of our students come from homes where languages other than English are spoken, we must identify strategies and approaches that leverage and build upon children’s bilingualism rather than blindly instruct students as though they were English monolinguals.

Authors

• Brian A. Collins, Hunter College - CUNY

• María Cioe Peña, CUNY Graduate Center