Multilingual students’ use of translanguaging in science classrooms

Abstract

This study describes multilingual students' authentic use of their first and second languages in a translanguaging science classroom, from a sociocultural perspective. The study is ethnographic, and has followed some lessons each month in a translanguaging science classroom at a primary school for three years. The observed lessons were documented by four video cameras and four audio recorders, while field notes and different types of students' texts and other teaching materials were also collected. In order investigate how language operates, and to realise the meaning semantically, we analysed the students' use of both first and second language to tie paradigmatic relations, and how they move in linguistic loops between languages and discourses. The results illustrate the ways in which a translanguaging science classroom constitutes a resource in joint negotiations of the scientific content and its related language for multilingual students, and benefits the students' ability to relate and contextualise the science content to prior experience. The creation of translanguaging science classrooms, in which students' experiences and diverse cultural and linguistic resources interweave with school science, and in which multilingual students are enabled and encouraged to use all available language resources, has important implications for science education. ARTICLE HISTORY

The continuity of learning in a translanguaging science classroom

“…This implies that the students' discursive mobility (Nygård Larsson 2011), their ability to move between discourses, increases when they use both Swedish and Arabic. Moreover, analyses show how the students often use both Swedish and Arabic to clarify semantic relationships between scientific words and concepts in this practice (Karlsson et al 2018). The students commonly express the subject-specific words in Swedish, while the descriptive, clarifying, interconnecting words and phrases describing the semantic relationships often are expressed in Arabic.…”

“…A translanguaging practice is a space for teaching and learning through multimodal interactions and semiotic inter-relationships (such as oral and written language, signs, gestures and symbols). According to Karlsson et al (2018), a translanguaging science classroom constitutes a third space in science education, in which students and teachers can use all available languages resources in a pragmatic and functional way to relate the science subject matter to prior experience in all meaning-making processes. In this way, third spaces in science education can be important for continuity in science learning for those students who have limited opportunities to understand and express themselves in the language of instruction.…”

“…Both conversations between students and conversations between teachers and students were of interest. In the second phase, the participants' use of first and second languages was analyzed, based on results from previous analyses: moving in linguistic loops when relating the scientific content to prior experience (Karlsson et al 2016), and realizing meaning semantically (Karlsson et al 2018). In the third phase, we used PEA to clarify and understand how the participants' use of first and second languages may affect their ability to appropriate the ways of speaking, thinking and acting in the science classroom and how this can affect the continuity in the classroom activities.…”

“…In a translanguaging science classroom-TSC (Karlsson, Nygård Larsson and Jakobsson 2018)-in which both teachers and students can use all available language resources in all meaning-making situations (García and Wei 2014), multilingual students are provided greater opportunity to relate and contextualize the science subject matter to prior experience (Karlsson, Nygård Larsson and Jakobsson 2016). In addition, students' ability to understand the semantic relationships between scientific words and concepts seems to increase (Karlsson et al 2018), which is important when relating these in larger thematic patterns (Lemke 1990). Furthermore, another study, conducted by Zeynap Ünsal, Britt Jakobson, Bengt-Olov Molander and Per-Olof Wickman (2017), indicates that translanguaging practices in multilingual science classrooms increase the ability of students with limited possibility to express themselves in the language of instruction to argue, discuss and explain their ideas.…”

Language ideologies in science education

“…Palmer, Martínez, Mateus, and Henderson () found that two bilingual teachers modeled translanguaging and celebrated it as a resource for academic content learning. In a study of a public school science classroom, Karlsson, Larsson, and Jakobsson () found that translanguaging promoted students’ abilities to relate to the science content and contextualize it within relevant areas of knowledge. Translanguaging is gaining attention in linguistics circles, but it has not become a part of mainstream science education conversations or professional development initiatives yet.…”