Session Information
31 SES 03 A, Teacher impact on multilingual and diverse learners
Paper Session
Contribution
The population of Iceland has become increasingly ethnically diverse in recent decades as a result of immigration. The diversification of Iceland’s population is reflected in student populations at all education levels. In 2020, 15.6% of all preschool children (Statistics Iceland, 2021a) and 12% of all compulsory school (age 6-16) pupils had heritage languages other than Icelandic (Statistics Iceland, 2021b). Over 100 heritage languages are currently spoken by children of compulsory school age in Iceland.
This paper derives from the research project Language policies and practices of diverse immigrant families in Iceland and their implications for education that aims to critically explore the language policies and practices of diverse immigrant families and how these impact their children’s education. The project is directed by the following research questions:
- How do these families maintain and develop their children’s multiple language use?
- How do children participate in developing their family language policies and how is children’s agency represented in multilingual contexts in diverse families and schools?
- How do these families, their children’s schools, teachers and heritage language (HL) teachers interact and cooperate in relation to their children’s language learning?
- What kinds of linguistically appropriate practices and culturally responsive practices are found in the participating schools?
The additional aim of the research project and this paper is to investigate how the findings can be applied to improve multilingual educational practices in preschools and compulsory schools.
The theoretical framework of the study includes family language policy and bi- and multilingual education theories. According to King et al. (2008), the research field of family language policy (FLP) focuses on on how languages are learned, managed and negotiated within families. It brings together research on multilingualism, language acquisition, language policy and cultural studies. Schwartz (2018) has further discussed agency in interactions between children, teachers and parents. She points out that there is a growing interest in exploring bilingual children‘s agency in interaction with adults and peers. Furthermore, children‘s assertion of agency in language use and socialisation at home in multilingual families has been explored by Said & Zhu (2017). The findings of their research indicate that the children are aware of the language preferences of their parents and assert their agency through their linguistic choices to achieve their interactional goals.
Theory and research within bi- and multilingual education emphasise how policies, attitudes and teaching practices that are not developed with equity in mind can have a negative impact on learning outcomes and well-being of children with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds (Chumak-Horbatsch, 2012; Cummins, 2001, 2004). Developing educational spaces that take into account and build on children’s and parents’ multilingual, multi-literate and multicultural lives requires active educational partnerships of schools and immigrant families to support their bi- or multilingualism and counteract their marginalization (Ragnarsdóttir, 2018). Such developments also require teacher education that takes into account the multilingual, multi-literate and multicultural lives of children and students and trains teachers to respond to these realities. Robinson and Díaz (2006) note that some children and their families who come from minority socio-cultural backgrounds are perceived as being culturally or linguistically deprived. Therefore, they argue that it is crucial that early childhood educators build on the cultural, linguistic and social capital of children, families and staff from diverse backgrounds. This includes facilitating children’s and families’ active participation.
Method
The project is a qualitative research study. Data was collected from spring 2020 to autumn 2021 in semi-structured interviews with immigrant parents in nine families, as well as teachers and principals in their children‘s preschools in three municipalities in order to explore how the parents maintain and develop their children’s multiple language and what linguistically and culturally responsive practices are found in the participating schools. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were used for data collection as they focus on the experience of the participants and using interview guides developed by the researcher. Semi-structured interviews were chosen to elicit the views of the participants as clearly and accurately as possible (Flick, 2006; Kvale, 2007). To explore the participation and agency of the children in developing the language policies in their family and school settings, data was collected in observations in the children’s pre- and compulsory schools in 2022, and through drawings and dialogue with children in the families. The age of the children is 5-7 years old. Finally, parents were asked to write regular diaries with examples on their children’s multiple language use at home. Data collection through observations in the schools and with the children was delayed until 2022 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Interviews with the children's compulsory school teachers will be conducted in 2022. The languages spoken by the families in the project at home are diverse; Polish, Romanian, Hungarian, Latvian, Serbian, Spanish and English, and some of the parents have different heritage languages and use English for communicating at home. The individual interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed through thematic analysis (Creswell, 2009) using Atlas.ti software for coding the interviews. The interviews were coded using the complete coding approach with researcher-derived codes applied to the data (Braun & Clarke, 2013). The project follows the usual practices of ethics in relation to research on Humans: Respect of the rights, interests and dignity of the participants and related persons. The research was carried out in accordance with the Data Protection Authority; the Act no. 90/2018 on Data Protection and the Processing of Personal Data and the Guidelines for Research Ethics (2020). An informed consent form was prepared in Icelandic and English, languages understood by the prospective participants and presented to them. A child-friendly consent form was presented to the children. An informed consent was obtained from all participants.
Expected Outcomes
The findings indicate that although the participating families have different language policies, they value their children’s language repertoire and use diverse tools to support language development. On the other hand, some parents expressed their concerns related to the relatively high linguistical pressure that is put on their children who use up to four different languages on a daily basis, including heritage languages, Icelandic and English. The teachers in the study were all interested in supporting the children’s multilingualism, while many of them lacked knowledge, training and support in implementing multilingual and culturally responsive practices in their schools. Findings indicate that the children in the study are active agents in developing language policies and practices in their families. In the school settings they appear to have fewer opportunities and appear to lack agency in developing their multilingualism, largely due to the lack of knowledge and training of the teachers. In conclusion, the findings indicate that preschools and compulsory schools in Iceland can more thoroughly build on families’ and children’s diverse linguistic and cultural resources, facilitate children’s language-based agency and develop strong partnerships with parents with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. Furthermore, the findings indicate that there is lack of clear policy on multingual education on both state and municipal level. The findings also reveal a need for multilingual teacher education and professional development of teachers in the areas of culturally and linguistically responsive teaching.
References
Chumak-Horbatsch, R. (2012) Linguistically appropriate practice: A guide for working with young immigrant children. University of Toronto Press. Cummins, J. (2001) Bilingual children’s mother tongue: Why is it important for education? Sprogforum (7)19, 15-20. Cummins, J. (2004) Language, power and pedagogy. Bilingual children in the crossfire (3rd ed.). Multilingual Matters. Flick, U. (2006) An introduction to qualitative research (3rd ed.). Sage. King, K. A., Fogle, L. & Logan-Terry, A. (2008) Family language policy. Language and Linguistics Compass (2)5, 907-922. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1749-818X.2008.00076.x Kvale, S. (2007) Doing interviews. Sage. Ragnarsdóttir, H. (2018) Building empowering multilingual learning communities in Icelandic schools. In P. P. Trifonas & T. Aravossitas (Eds.), Handbook of research and practice in heritage language education. Springer International Handbooks of Education, Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44694-3_44 Robinson, K. H. & Díaz, C. J. (2006) Diversity and difference in early childhood education: Issues for theory and practice. Open University Press. Said, F.F., & Zhu, H. (2019). “No, no Maama! Say ‘Shaatir ya Ouledee Shaatir’!” Children’s agency in language use and socialisation. International Journal of Bilingualism, 23(3), 771-785. Schwartz, M. (2018). Preschool bilingual education: Agency in interactions between children, teachers, and parents. In Preschool Bilingual Education (pp. 1-24). Springer, Cham. Statistics Iceland. (2021a) Children in pre-primary institutions having another mother tongue than Icelandic 2020. https://px.hagstofa.is/pxen/pxweb/en/Samfelag/Samfelag__skolamal__1_leikskolastig__0_lsNemendur/SKO01104.px/table/tableViewLayout1/?rxid=38163b40-acd5-423b-b2a1-e8db323eaab3 Statistics Iceland. (2021b) Pupils in compulsory schools having another mother tongue than Icelandic 2020. https://px.hagstofa.is/pxen/pxweb/en/Samfelag/Samfelag__skolamal__2_grunnskolastig__0_gsNemendur/SKO02103.px/table/tableViewLayout1/?rxid=694cbe62-8bc4-4357-b362-8aab6b5d141b
Search the ECER Programme
- Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
- Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
- Search for authors and in the respective field.
- For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
- If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.