This article discusses the literature of writing with the arts with Latinx young writers. The authors drew on two theoretical concepts--placemaking and translanguaging--in order to reimagine writing pedagogy. A multiple case study design was employed with an afterschool program offered once a week for six weeks. Implications for language arts and…

The Family Backpack Project provided 249 low-income, prekindergarten children and their families with opportunities to read and listen to audio recordings of 3 sets of books in their homes. Families received English or dual-language texts (English plus Spanish, Arabic, Kurdish, or Somali) matched to their home languages. Children and their…

This ethnographic study explores the literacies of bilingual families living in the Rio Grande Valley on the U.S.-Mexico border. Murillo argues that immigrant families living on the border play an important role in their children's literacy development, but that their voices are seldom heard in schools due to powerful and persistent deficit views…

This teacher research study took place in a bilingual second-grade classroom in the southwestern United States. The study investigates the "cuentos" told during "platicas literarias"/literature discussions and explores how five young Latinas used their cuentos to communicate meaning through intertextual connections. These…

Language arts educators who teach Latino English language learners know that part of their job is to help students learn to distinguish between the vernacular varieties of Spanish (or Mandarin, or Portuguese, or Swahili), English they use at home, and the school varieties of language expected in the classroom and in other professional and…

In this article, the author examines the inquiry talk of a small group of bilingual children discussing the text "Oliver Button Is a Sissy". The children raised many questions about the story and about issues of gender. The major focus of this article is on the participants' inquiry talk and the context that mediated their talk. The author uses…

Describes a pilot language renewal program--Tachi as a Second Language--implemented in a California preschool. (RAE)

Discusses current research and issues concerning multilingual learners, and makes suggestions for school programs addressing bilingualism and multilingualism. (MM)

Presents overall conclusions from research and case studies of four children who showed indicators of emerging biliteracy and cultural sensitivity in a language arts class where the inherent link between culture and language was evident. Illustrates how the language arts instruction in a bilingual classroom affected children's growth in a second…

Examines language loss and associated losses experienced in American Indian communities. Discusses those who become lost in their encounters with languages of another culture. Considers the parts that teachers, schools, and communities can play to forge positive links between school and community so that American Indian children's language…

This article focuses on a collaborative project between two fifth-grade dual language teachers (English-Spanish) and a university researcher as they engaged children in a study of memoir. The bilingual children in these classes cultivated their genre knowledge by participating in the ways of writers of memoir through the careful adaptations the…

Family literature circles are literacy events that provide children with the opportunity to talk about a book in whatever language they choose at home prior to discussing it in English as required at school. These discussions help to create a context for language acquisition in the child's first and second language. While state law restricts one's…

Describes how a classroom teacher's experiences as a second-language learner (during a summer institute in Spain) helped her become a better teacher of her bilingual students. (RS)

Discusses the insights into learning to read derived from studying a foreign language later in life. Compares some phenomena of foreign language learning to similar reading phenomena observed in primary grade classrooms. (HTH)