Growing and Flourishing With Latinx Novice Teachers: The Role of Heritage Language Learners in Bilingual Teacher Education Programs

• In Event: Sheraton Roundtable Session 14
  In Roundtable Session: Bilingual Education's Reemergence in California: Bilingual Teachers Adapting, Responding, and Resisting

Abstract

Objectives
Dual language programs are quickly growing, and school districts are recruiting highly qualified, bilingual K – 12 teachers to place in these programs. In California, with passage of Proposition 58 - which allows students’ home languages back into the classroom - there is a need to fill other primary language programs with bilingual teachers. Given the Latinx demographic profile of California, there is a growing and specific need for Spanish-English bilingual teachers. Many school districts are filling the need for bilingual teachers by recruiting in Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Spain (Henderson, 2015). A generation of teachers that also need to be considered in recruitment are teacher candidates who identify as: “Latinx” in complicated and dynamic ways; Spanish language heritage learners; and K - 12 students who attended Bilingual and mandated English-only programs throughout the 1990s (Garcia & Kleifgen, 2010). This study seeks to understand the language needs and classroom practices of this specific teacher-candidate population.

Theoretical Framework
Latinx experience racial microaggressions, and specifically racist nativist microaggressions, through ideologies, policies, and discourse that attack bilingual education, bilingualism, and immigration - which operate as code words for “Latinx” and “Mexican” (Trucios-Haynes, 2000, Perez Huber, 2011). This paper analyzes the complex and powerful ways the teachers have responded to forms of linguistic racism, including their own internalized racism through the lens of racist nativist microaggression and resistance theory (Solorzano. & Delgado Bernal, 2001).

Methods & Data Sources
The study takes place within the context of a teacher education program in Southern California where over 70% of the candidates identify as Latinx. Twenty-four teacher candidates participated in this study during their first semester of the teacher education program. All of the teacher candidates identify as Latinx in different ways, such as Mexican-American, Honduran and “one hundred percent Mexican”. It is significant to note that 23 out of 24 teacher candidates were enrolled in public K – 12 California schools during a time period when three voter-initiated state propositions (Propositions 187, 209, and 227) were introduced that embodied racist nativist, anti-immigrant ideologies. I use narrative autobiographic writing, individual interviews, and ethnographic classroom observations to answer the following research question: How do Latinx language heritage learners describe their own language development in K – 16 schools, and how do these experiences impact their classroom language decisions?
Results & Significance
Preliminary analysis of the students’ narratives show the participants’ internalized negative feelings around their use of Spanish. Many report speaking in Spanish only during their childhood and into their first year of school when then they experienced feelings of shame in speaking Spanish in public. Participants who were separated from Spanish by school policies, report feelings of shame for not being able to speak in Spanish with family members and Latinx community members. The findings from this study hold significant implications for teacher preparation programs. As the Latinx teacher candidate population continues to grow, bilingual teacher preparation programs must recognize the complex ways students may have internalized beliefs about Spanish and be prepared to provide necessary support.

Author

• Elexia Reyes McGovern, California State University - Dominguez Hills