Enriching preservice teachers' translanguaging stance and practices toward emergent bilingual learners through virtual professional development

Abstract

Understanding and affirming the assets of emerging bilingual learners (EBLs) and resources are often not part of preservice teacher (PST) preparation, particularly for preservice secondary teachers (Newman et al., 2010). The authors of this article designed two Grand Seminars to support PSTs to begin to develop a translanguaging mindset and to help them to apply what they have acquired to content language teaching through reading and reflection on The Book of Unknown Americans. The purpose of the seminars was to prepare PSTs with equity‐ and asset‐ based mindsets and practices to support EBLs, such as translanguaging. This study focuses on how the PSTs began to take up translanguaging as a mindset, or stance, yet required more time and development to engage in translanguaging as a pedagogy. One research question guided the design, presentation, and analysis of the data: In what ways do PSTs manifest a translanguaging stance? Implications for TESOL and all educators are provided to support PST understanding of EBL demography at their practicum placements and its connection to pedagogy.