Multilingualism as legitimate shared repertoires in school communities of practice: students’ and teachers’ discursive constructions of languages in two schools in England

Abstract

The paper reports on the findings of a 12-month project within a broader research programme that looks at a group of East European students with English as an Additional Language (EAL) in England. The data are derived from interviews with the students and teachers in two schools. The findings show that EAL students had a keen interest in English. This attitude contrasted with their reluctance to use and talk about their home language, as a result of language loss and fear of being bullied. Teachers' attitudes towards languages were also mixed, ranging from support for 'free use of languages', to 'restricted use of home language', and to 'use of English only'. The paper further argues that multilingualism can be theorised as legitimate shared repertoires of school communities of practice. Practical implications are drawn which suggest that students' and teachers' voices should be acted upon and translated into school language policies.

Parental Perceptions and Decisions Regarding Maintaining Bilingualism in Autism

“…Only one parent in England mentioned language use at school, which indicates a lack of opportunities for children to use their home language at school: ‘most of the time, even the Polish students speak English amongst each other’ (Lena). Lena’s comments reflect Liu and Evan’s findings ( 2016 ) that bilingual students tend to prefer to communicate in the dominant language of the school setting, in this case English, and have less positive associations with their home language when at school.…”

Practitioners' perspectives and experiences of supporting bilingual pupils on the autism spectrum in two linguistically different educational settings

“…(2019), in which bilingual autistic children educated in more multilingual environments held more positive attitudes about being bilingual than those in more monolingual school settings. However, in both England and Wales, there was a sense that children gave English superior status in their lives than their home language, or Welsh, which is consistent with previous research (Thomas et al ., 2012; Liu & Evans, 2016).…”

A monolingual approach in an English primary school: practices and implications

“…Likewise, Bonacina-Pugh (2020), working with newly-arrived immigrant children in France, showed how a particular language was valued over others through claims of appropriateness to context. All these findings run counter to the recommendations of Liu and Evans (2016), who suggest that school language policies be developed where multilingualism can become a 'mediating cultural tool to empower individuals, ' making a difference 'as a social norm in a super-diverse society' (565).…”

“…The positive impact of linguistic minority pupils' use of their first or home language(s) (L1) upon aspects of their learning and schooled experience in L2 contexts is frequently highlighted in the research literature (e.g. Chalmers et al 2019;Liu and Evans 2016;Slembrouck, Van Avermaet, and Van Gorp 2018;. In educational policy and in EAL practice, however, this potential is not fully realised.…”