Purpose of the Study

This study is aimed at reviewing the related studies in a systematic manner to portray the type of in-service teacher training on multilingualism and multilingual practices offered in the reviewed studies and the outcomes of the in-service teacher training programs depicted in these studies. In-service training in the related studies is offered to P-12 teachers who teach students from pre-kindergarten to 12th grade. The aim of this review is a very first approach to shed light on the international state of in-service programs in an internationally relevant field, multilingualism. The current study intends to answer the following two research questions; however, in this paper the results of the first research question are presented. Analysis is in progress and all the results will be shared in the conference.

1- What type of in-service teacher training on multilingualism has been offered to P-12 teachers?

2- What are the outcomes of the in-service teacher training programs reported in the reviewed studies?

Background

Migration flows have increased around the world since the early 1990s (Duarte & Gogolin, 2013) and there has been a substantial change in the nature of migration since then (Gogolin, 2011). The ‘superdiversity’ term, which denotes that diversity needs not only to be seen from the ethnicity viewpoint but also with regard to additional variables affecting where, how, and with whom people live, was offered to represent the results of these flows and changes in migration (Vertovec, 2007). More specifically, the reflections of superdiversity can be found on education systems, schools, teaching, and learning (Gogolin, 2011). Linguistic diversity can be regarded as one of these reflections with the increasing profusion of linguistic diversity in schools and classes that embody a variety of languages. However, the monolingual education in many countries challenges the resultant linguistic diversity (Putjata, 2018). 

On the other hand, in many immigrant-receiving countries, there is a big school achievement gap between students with a migration background and native students in that native ones can achieve much better than migrant ones. Teachers are considered one of the prominent factors in schools that influence student achievement (Sanders & Rivers, 1996). However, a large number of teachers do not feel prepared enough to cater for the needs of multilingual students and to help them improve their academic progress (Becker-Mrotzek et al., 2012). Even when teachers were aware of the linguistic needs of their students, teachers did not always consider students’ home languages as a learning source, and they emphasized their lack of knowledge and training on integrating home languages into their instruction (Alisaari et al., 2019).

Bearing the central mediator role of teachers in mind, it is argued that if teacher learning is strengthened, student learning can improve. These improvements in teaching hinge on teachers’ involvement in professional learning (Freeman, 2001) which can be provided through in-service teacher training and professional development. In-service training for teachers can be associated with an improvement in teacher practices and student achievement (Buczynski & Hansen, 2010). According to Courtney (2017), direct instruction, classroom observation, training practice, and self-evaluation are the components of an effective in-service training programme. 

There are a variety of studies conducted on developing teachers’ beliefs about and attitudes towards linguistic diversity, multilingual practices to support multilingual students, and linguistic awareness through in-service teacher training and professional development programs. Given that the plenitude of practicing teachers without expertise to teach multilingual students has made scholars call for a need to focus on in-service teachers’ abilities (Gándara & Maxwell-Jolly, 2006), this review study will present an overview of the in-service teacher training programs on multilingualism and multilingual practices to teacher educators.

This systematic review study focuses on research projects dealing with in-service teacher training on multilingualism and multilingual practices. Article Selection Process In our review, we used ERIC and Web of Science databases that comprise high-quality studies. The search strings with asterisk and Boolean operators were used for the literature search that are (“multilingualism” OR “linguistic diversity” OR “multilingual education” OR “linguistically diverse”) AND (“professional development” OR “in-service training” OR “teacher training” OR “teacher education”). The first set of these keywords was searched in the “Title” while the following set of keywords was searched in “All Text”. The last date of access to the databases was 8th of January, 2021. The first search yielded 238 results in ERIC and 366 results in Web of Science database. After searching the databases, several inclusion criteria were used to identify eligible articles. Those inclusion criteria are (1) peer-reviewed articles, (2) articles published in academic journals, (3) articles written in English, (4) studies whose focal point is in-service teacher training on multilingualism and multilingual practices, and (5) studies that provide precious description of the structure of training programme. The conference proceedings, theses, editorials, reviews, theoretical and conceptual articles, and the articles written in other languages were excluded. After running the first three, eligibility criteria on the databases, the literature search returned with 454 articles in total (160 articles from ERIC search and 294 articles from Web of Science search). A cross check was performed, and 53 duplicated articles were eliminated. Then, titles and abstracts of the remaining 401 articles were screened and 20 eligible articles were found. In the last phase, the full texts of the studies were scrutinised and article selection procedure was finalized with 12 eligible articles. Data Analysis Qualitative content analysis is employed to ascertain meaning of the qualitative material, which is the journal articles in this current study, in a systematic manner (Schreier, 2012). A coding frame was composed based on the research questions and this coding frame was modified after coding the journal articles. The preliminary results are presented based on the emergent themes and categories.

Type of In-service Teacher Training Offered In the reviewed articles, a variety of in-service teacher training programs are analysed. The type of in-service teacher training described in these articles is examined by researchers in terms of delivery and duration of in-service training. Delivery encompasses such components of in-service training as on-site practice, feedback or coaching by teacher trainers, teachers’ reflections on their development and experiences. With regard to on-site practice, 10 studies depicted various teacher training programs that provide in-service teachers with the opportunity to try out recently introduced multilingual approaches and strategies in teachers’ own classrooms (Cohen et al., 2012; Hadjioannou et al., 2016; Heineke et al., 2018; Kirsch et al., 2020; Krulatz et al., 2017; Lee et al., 2005; Lee et al., 2007; Lee et al., 2008; Putjata, 2018; Saavedra et al., 2009) while two articles did not provide us with sufficient information on whether on-site practice was covered (Gorter & Arocena, 2020; Wiese et al., 2015). In-service teachers’ on-site practices were accompanied by coaching or feedback offered by trainers in six articles. Further, in-service teachers reflected on their development and experiences after implementation of the training programs in nine articles; however, whether teachers reflected on their development was not clarified in three articles. In-service teacher training programs also differed in duration and were offered in different periods of time, including one day, two or three months, almost one year, two years, and three years. The exact duration was not explained in two articles.

* In this part, some of the references are presented. There are 9 more references which cannot be included because of word limitation. Alisaari, J., Heikkola, L. M., Commins, N., & Acquah, E. O. (2019). Monolingual ideologies confronting multilingual realities. Finnish teachers’ beliefs about linguistic diversity. Teaching and Teacher Education, 80, 48-58. Becker-Mrotzek, M., Hentschel, B., Hippmann, K., & Linnemann, M. (2012). Sprachförderung in deutschen Schulen – die Sicht der Lehrerinnen und Lehrer: Ergebnisse einer Umfrage unter Lehrerinnen und Lehrern [Language facilitation at German schools – The teachers’ point of view: Results from a survey among teachers]. Mercator-Institut für Sprachförderung und Deutsch als Zweitsprache. Buczynski, S. & Hansen, C.B. (2010). Impact of professional development on teacher practice: Uncovering connections. Teaching and Teacher Education, 26(3), 599-607. Courtney, J. (2007). What are effective components of in‐service teacher training? A study examining teacher trainers’ perceptions of the components of a training programme in mathematics education in Cambodia. Journal of In‐Service Education, 33(3), 321-339. Duarte, J. & Gogolin, I. (2013). Introduction: Linguistic superdiversity in educational institutions. In J. Duarte & I. Gogolin (Eds.), Linguistic superdiversity in urban areas: Research approaches (pp. 1-24). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Freeman, D. (2001). Teacher learning and student learning in TESOL. TESOL Quarterly, 35(4), 608–609. Gándara, P., & Maxwell-Jolly, J. (2006). Critical issues in developing the teacher corps for English learners. In K. Tellez, & H. C. Waxman (Eds.), Preparing quality educators for English language learners: Research, policies, and practices (pp. 99-120). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Gogolin, I. (2011). The challenge of super diversity for education in Europe. Education Inquiry, 2(2), 239-249. Gorter, D. & Arocena, E. (2020). Teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in a course on translanguaging. System, 92, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2020.102272. Hadjioannou, X., Hutchinson, M. C., & Hockman, M. (2016). Addressing the needs of 21st-century teachers working with culturally and linguistically diverse learners. The CATESOL Journal, 28(2), 1-29. Kirsch, C., Aleksić, G., Mortini, S., & Andersen, K. (2020). Developing multilingual practices in early childhood education through professional development in Luxembourg. International Multilingual Research Journal, 14(4), 319-337. Putjata, G. (2018). Multilingualism for life – language awareness as key element in educational training: Insights from an intervention study in Germany. Language Awareness, 27(3), 259-276. Schreier, M. (2012). Qualitative content analysis in practice. Los Angeles: SAGE. Vertovec, S. (2007). Super-diversity and its implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 1024-1054.