This article investigates bilingual teachers' place in schools’ professional community and how participation or lack of participation has influence the development of their professional identity. This study is a follow-up of two previous studies on conditions for cooperation and participation for bilingual teachers in Norwegian schools (Fjeld & Spernes, 2015; Spernes & Fjeld, 2017).

There are immigrants in all Norwegian municipalities (Statistisk sentralbyrå [Statistics Norway], 2013), and we can therefore assume that the vast majority of municipalities provide adapted training for students with limited Norwegian knowledge. Research shows that minority language students receive increased learning outcomes when the mother tongue is used in educational context (see, for example, Cummins 1984; Salameh 2012; Willig 1987). According to the Education Act, minority language students, both in primary and secondary education, have the right to bilingual education until they have "[...] sufficient language in Norwegian to follow the usual education in school . "(opplæringsloven [Education Act], 1998, § 2-8 / 3-12). This teaching is to be provided by teachers who master the students' mother tongue and Norwegian, and preferably have pedagogical competence (Forskrift til opplæringsloven [Regulations for Education, Section] 14-5, 1998). Schools that succeed in developing professional fellowship, where teachers systematically analyze their own practices and develop knowledge in collaboration with colleagues, provide a better education opportunity for students (see Mendez, 2015; McCallum, 2013). The Ministry of Education also emphasizes this connection between teachers' systematic cooperation and good quality of education: “On par with other professionals, teachers join a professional community. Well-functioning professional fellowship is essential for the teacher to be able to develop his / her teaching practice throughout the career. Developing quality in teaching has the best conditions where the teachers collaborate” (Kunnskapsdepartementet [Ministry of Education], 2017, p. 26). The school authorities assume that all teachers are part of schools’ professional fellowship. Previous research shows, however, that bilingual teachers do not participate in this in line with ordinary class teachers (Fjeld & Spernes, 2015; Spernes & Fjeld, 2017; Vedøy 2017). The purpose of this study is to find how bilingual teachers themselves experience their place in the professional community and how participation or lack of participation is important for the development of their teacher- identity. Thus, the study will not examine the validity of positive correlation between bilingual teachers' participation in professional fellowship and the learning outcomes of minority language students. The assumption is based on general research on the importance of professional fellowship for student learning, as mentioned above. We ask: How do bilingual teachers experience their participation in the school's professional fellowship, and what does this participation or lack of participation in the development of their professional identity mean? The first question gives the study a descriptive design, and in response to this, we allow the voices of the informants to be expressed in thick descriptions through individual, semi-structured interviews. The interviews will partly be based on observations from the field of practice. The second question has a causal approach, where we, based on theory of professional identity, seek to explain how teachers' participation or lack of participation can affect the development of their teacher identity. Initially a research overview of bilingual teachers' participation in the school's professional community is given with a clarification of our contribution with this study. The study's theoretical analysis- tools are then explained: Wenger’s (2004) theory of participation in practice fellowship as well as Hargreaves and Fullan's (2014) operationalization of the concept of professional capital. This study is based on observations and interviews with a selection of bilingual teachers and a survey of all bilingual teachers in a municipal municipality in Eastern Norway.

The Norwegian Education Act (opplæringsloven §2.8, 1998) gives minority language students the right to bilingual education if needed. Bilingual teachers, with educational competence, is preferably to provide the teaching (Forskrift til opplæringslova 2006). In practice, this means that students are given 1-2 lessons a week, alone or in small groups, together with a bilingual teacher that master their mother tongue. The bilingual teachers are helping the students to master the subjects using the mother tongue. The informants in this study are seven bilingual teachers. The bilingual teachers were teaching on a varying number of different schools. One of the teachers taught on the same school a whole day once a week, but on two schools the other days. The other bilingual teachers were changing schools twice or three times a day and every day during the week. They were teaching in both primary and junior high school (secondary school), and they had to teach all subjects. All the informants were immigrated to Norway as adults. They also had in common that they were socialized into a school culture different from the Norwegian. Five of the bilingual teachers were educated as teachers from their home country, but two of them had other professions than teachers. They were employed as assistant-teachers. This means that they had no time to preparation or evaluation. The study is based on data from observation and qualitative interviews. We observed the bilingual teachers when they were teaching in junior high school, mainly in situations together with one or two students that spoke the same language as the teacher. So far we have observed five bilingual teachers. We did observations in five schools, and we observed one of the teachers in three different schools. Notes were written throughout and after the observations. We have not conducted the interviews, but they will take place approximately one month after the observations. We have an inductive approach. The interview guide is semi-structured, based on the notes from the observation. The interviews will be recorded. The interviews will be done in Norwegian language, and eventual quotations, which will be used in the article to confirm the informants’ statements, will be translated into English. The analysis is conducted continuously throughout the process (Hammersley & Atkinson, 1996), but the analysis section will be written when all data are collected.

So far we have conducted 5 observations in 5 different schools and also had informal conversations with the bilingual teachers before and after the observations. No interviews have been made so far. It is therefore too early to say anything certain about results, but based on the four observations, we see that: 1. The collaboration between bilingual teachers and class teachers is limited to mail activities and short exchange of information before the lessons start. 2. The bilingual teachers’ access to the schools’ didactic and methodological resources is limited 3. Bilingual teachers have little academic influence. They work largely as "fire extinguishers" and translators. 4. Most of the bilingual teaching takes place in secluded rooms, outside the ordinary classroom. The learning activities are limited to the social interaction between the bilingual teacher and the student.

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