Teachers’ perceptions and practices of translanguaging for emergent bilinguals in U.S. multilingual classrooms

Abstract

Building on the framework of translanguaging both as individuals’ flexible language practices and classroom pedagogy, this article reports on a case study that examined perceptions and practices of pedagogical translanguaging among a group of teachers from elementary school classrooms with emergent bilingual learners in a Mid-Atlantic U.S. school district. The analysis shows a range of transformations in the teachers’ perceptions and practices as well as their perceived and structural challenges in implementing pedagogical translanguaging for content-integrated literacy instruction. The findings point towards the complexity of pedagogical translanguaging in superdiverse classrooms and address the need for expanded empirical research on pedagogical translanguaging.