Code-Switching Patterns in the Writing-Related Talk of Young Emergent Bilinguals

Abstract

This qualitative study examined code-switching patterns in the writing-related talk of 6 emergent Spanish-English bilingual first-grade children. Audio recordings, field notes, and writing artifacts documenting participant activities and language use in Spanish and English writing workshops were gathered over the course of 6 months and analyzed for code-switching prevalence, form, content, and purpose in relation to the writing process. The percentage distribution of oral code switching across the two linguistic contexts suggests a sociolinguistic imbalance between the two languages, wherein English played a prevalent role in the creation of Spanish texts, but Spanish did not appear to have the same utility in the development of English texts. Four general categories of code-switching functions emerged, indicating emergent bilingual writers' (a) evaluation and self-regulation skills, (b) sociolinguistic and sociocultural competence, (c) metalinguistic insights, and (d) use of code switching to indicate a shift in topic, person, or syntactic form. These findings intimate children's capacity to exploit their developing bilingual linguistic repertoire for a variety of academic and social purposes and illuminate the potential of code switching as a cognitive and linguistic resource in the process of writing.

Navigating Hybridized Language Learning Spaces Through Translanguaging Pedagogy: Dual Language Preschool Teachers’ Languaging Practices in Support of Emergent Bilingual Children’s Performance of Academic Discourse

“…By enacting a flexible bilingualism and implementing a coordinated bilingual pedagogy, the teachers in this classroom set up a collaborative space for dynamic bilingualism and meaning making in which they modeled and legitimized a wide range of linguistic resources for thinking, communicating, and constructing meaning (Gort, 2012;Martínez, 2010;Orellana & Reynolds, 2008). This was achieved both through coordinated, parallel monolingual discursive practices and through a more flexible, bilingual pedagogy that included code-switching, translation, bilingual recasting/revoicing, and language brokering, and varied depending on the teacher partnership, the discourse function, and teachers' perceptions of children's language developmental needs and preferences.…”

“…This was achieved both through coordinated, parallel monolingual discursive practices and through a more flexible, bilingual pedagogy that included code-switching, translation, bilingual recasting/revoicing, and language brokering, and varied depending on the teacher partnership, the discourse function, and teachers' perceptions of children's language developmental needs and preferences. These various forms of languaging reflect a more concurrent and integrated use of languages and language varieties and a pragmatic multilingual approach to maximizing understanding and performance across different contexts and purposes that challenge traditional language compartmentalization policies and practices in bilingual education (Baker, 2010;Durán & Palmer, 2013;Fortune, Tedick, & Walker, 2008;García, 2009;García & Leiva, 2014;Gort, 2012;Gort & Pontier, 2013). Together, the two focal teacher pairs interpreted and enacted the dual language program's policy of language distribution in ways that created a space for integrated bilingualism and reflected the multicompetence, reality, and experiences of emergent bilingual children as they construct meaning, shape their experiences, gain knowledge, and make sense of their world through multilingual discursive practices (Baker, 2011;García, 2009García, , 2011.…”

Preparing Teachers for Plurilingualism through Language Awareness

“…However, it is possible that a clearer definition of expected target language use, particularly when implementing a new approach to instruction, may have relieved some of the tension experienced by the teacher. Cummins (2005, as cited in Gort, 2012) provides guidance in this regard, as he posited that :…”

“…Given the needs of standards-based instruction (Troyan, 2012), CBI , immersion education and CLIL (e.g., Gort, 2006Gort, , 2012Gort & Pontier, 2012), which has investigated the code switching that occurs in bilingual classrooms, for guidance in responding to this question. Certainly, a growing number of researchers in foreign language education have underscored that an awareness of the functions of language among language teachers is critical in enabling what Cammarata and Tedick (2012) refer to as a linguistic «awakening» (p. 260-261) as they become more aware of the demands of balancing content and language.…”

“…Such awareness among language teachers is only one component of a wider, more comprehensive plurilingual awareness that develops teachers' understanding of the cultural and linguistic diversity among the learners in their classrooms (e.g., . As implied by García (2010) in her foreword to a recent volume on developing plurilingual competencies in teachers, this effort in Europe could be informed by the ongoing research and teacher development (García, 2009(García, , 2010Gort, 2006Gort, , 2012Gort & Pontier, 2012) that positions learners as «emergent bilinguals…who potentially could develop dual language and literacy abilities if supported in their immediate environments, including home and school» (Gort, 2012, p. 46). Certainly, the work of designing preparation programs that develop language teachers who can support the development of language awareness and a plurilingual identity is a top priority for all of us involved in language teacher development.…”