Leveraging Students’ Communicative Repertoires as a Tool for Equitable Learning

Abstract

Leveraging is often described as the process of using the home and community languages of children and youth as a tool to access the “academic” or “standard” varieties of languages valued in schools. In this vein, researchers have called on practitioners to leverage the stigmatized language practices of children and youth in schools for their academic development. In this review, we interrogate the notion of leveraging commonly used by language and literacy scholars. We consider what gets leveraged, whose practices get leveraged, when leveraging occurs, and whether or not leveraging leads to robust and transformative learning experiences that sustain the cultural and linguistic practices of children and youth in our schools, particularly for students of color. We review scholarship steeped in Vygotskian-inspired research on learning, culturally relevant and culturally sustaining pedagogies, and bilingual education research that forefront the notion that the language practices of children and youth are useful for mediating learning and development. We conclude with a discussion of classroom discourse analysis methods that we believe can provide documentation of transformative learning experiences that uncovers and examines the linguistic resources of students in our twenty-first-century classrooms, and to gain a common language around notions of leveraging in the field.

Noticing for Equity to Sustain Multilingual Literacies

“…We have offered a lens for understanding students' rich, multilingual literacies, such as those illustrated in the vignettes, as learning resources. We argue that explicit attention to history, race, language, and justice can shift pedagogical stances: It can help teachers leverage students' resources for learning (Martinez, Morales, & Aldana, 2017) and act in ways that sustain students' repertoires of practice (Gutiérrez & Rogoff, 2003). We recognize that pedagogical shifts are rarely easy and that teachers may need support in developing the lenses we propose here.…”

When a heritage speaker wants to be a Spanish teacher: Educational experiences and challenges

“…Although data were collected from a just small number of participants, albeit from two sites, several important implications can be suggested. First, because Latinos/as view concerns about their own use of formal registers as a barrier to becoming language teachers (Briceño et al, ), it is essential that they complete coursework that (1) elucidates differences in register without invalidating their way of speaking, and (2) leverages their home and community language as a tool to access academic or standard varieties (D. Martínez, Morales, & Aldana, ). Second, to support HSs’ language awareness, Spanish and methods faculty should be encouraged to participate in professional development on HL pedagogy and sociolinguistics, in order to help these students further develop their language skills.…”

Designing a Community Translanguaging Space Within a Family Literacy Project

“…In their review of leveraging, Martinez, Morales, and Aldana (2017) noted that for many students, their linguistic resources and ways of communication from homes and communities are not aligned with those privileged in schools. Such a mismatch allows little room for students to use a familiar set of communicative repertoires (Rymes, 2014) for classroom learning.…”