Many Indigenous Latinx students in Spanish/English dual language programs in the US speak languages that are often not valued or taken advantage of in the process of learning Spanish and English. This participatory critical (collective) autoethnography explores the possibilities of handwriting lessons as a vehicle for the incorporation of K'iche'…

Developing young learners' language awareness is becoming an important educational goal in a rapidly globalised world characterised by linguistic and cultural diversity. Drawing upon previous research in the field, the article highlights the importance of promoting language diversity and nurturing language awareness from an early age. We present a…

Language separation policies in two-way bilingual education (TWBE) reflect ideologies of double monolingualism (Heller, 1995) and ignore the sociolinguistic realities of bi/multilingual students (García & Lin, 2017). This case study investigates the design and implementation of collaborative multilingual identity text projects (Prasad, 2018)…

Within educational research, there has been an increased interest in recent years to develop learners' language awareness (LA) in the context of plurilingual education. Recommendations and intentions are given pointing to the benefits, but there are few concrete tools for how it can be carried out in practice. The article seeks to contribute to…

At the intersection of social studies and world language curricula are opportunities to explore students' prior learning with vocabulary-rich content designed to support language acquisition goals. "Funds of knowledge" is defined as socio-cultural, economic, and historical knowledge from home and community settings. The instructional…

This study examined the oral language use and classroom involvement of 1,124 preschool children in the United States, focusing on three home languages: English, Spanish, and Burmese. Two-way ANOVA analysis revealed distinct patterns among the language groups. Burmese-speaking children were more likely to listen to teachers and engage in academic…

Introduction: This article investigates an early STEM family engagement program offered during the pre-kindergarten (pre-k) year. Pre-k is an important juncture for community organizations to support children's STEM engagement and parental involvement in informal STEM learning. We evaluated a program called Teaching Together STEM, which offers a…

Students' attitudes in first-grade dual language immersion (DLI) classes were compared with those of similar students in mainstream English classes. Results for the sample of 81 Latinx students indicated that for attitudes toward activities in Spanish, including reading and speaking in public and with relatives, both ELLs and non-ELLs in DLI had…

Research Findings: Using a nationally representative sample of Head Start recipients, this study compared Head Start classroom contexts and English language and literacy skill trajectories for Spanish-speaking dual-language learners (DLLs) and English speakers from preschool through kindergarten. It also examined whether Head Start classroom…

What are the material-semiotic relationships between a language policy and a table game activity in a bilingual preschool? Using Actor-Network Theory (ANT), the aim of this article is to explore this question, working with both human and nonhuman aspects of the activity, symmetrically, at the same level. The game playing activity takes place at a…

This study investigates how eight public, centre-based preschool teachers working with low-income children are using different activity settings and content foci to support one aspect of academic language: vocabulary development. Findings indicate that, on average, when teachers engaged children in teacher-led, whole group activities, read-alouds,…

Home language experiences are important for children's development of language and literacy. However, the home language context is complex, especially for Spanish-speaking children in the United States. A child's use of Spanish or English likely ranges along a continuum, influenced by preferences of particular people involved, such as parents,…

Early education programs in the United States are experiencing an increase in the number of English learners and, consequently, an increase in dual-language programs that best serve the needs of these children. Dual-language programs enable children to communicate orally and in written forms in both their native languages and in English. This…