Developing young children's vocabulary is essential for later reading success; thus, early childhood classrooms require a comprehensive vocabulary approach that teaches academic vocabulary. Yet even providing young children with child-friendly definitions of sophisticated words can be a challenge. First, the authors outline the components of a…

This teaching tip describes a translanguaging read-aloud protocol. In a translanguaging read-aloud, teachers and students interact with a text (either a bilingual text or a monolingual one) in multiple languages. Teachers plan explanations, questions, and other interactions in multiple languages to amplify and clarify the text. Teachers can adapt…

In this article, I share some of the findings from a community-engaged research project based at Autores Fuertes, a community literacy center, located in urban Philadelphia. Using an engaged, ethnographic case study approach, I conducted observations and interviews at the center, as well as taught translanguaging writing workshops. The findings…

Across the globe, students increasingly use literacies to cross boundaries, locally and globally, virtually and geographically, willingly and involuntarily. They cross these boundaries with versatile linguistic backgrounds that allow them to effectively navigate new school and life worlds. Many students who cross boundaries are students of color…

This article presents a case study of a dual-language learner (DLL) preschooler in three classroom conversations: whole group, small DLL group, and a teacher-child dyadic conversation. By comparing the student's interactions across three contexts, the authors show how dyadic conversations between teachers and students can foster the oral language…

Engaging in discussions of texts featuring diverse expressions of bilingualism is important at the elementary level to move away from historical conceptions of bilingualism focused on language proficiency and instead embrace a translanguaging view focused on linguistic practices. To successfully engage in these conversations, understanding…

The field of reading instruction has long valued storytelling for literacy development, but what kinds of stories are bi/multilingual students exposed to at school? Through the cognitive phenomena of conceptual metonymy and metaphor, this article links language to identity and exposes practices that act to fracture the identities of…

In this Teaching Tips article, we discuss our efforts to create and utilize translanguaging interactive read-aloud videos as part of a community-wide reading program focused on the reading and discussing of a shared book. Offering translanguaging spaces for bilingual readers in area elementary classrooms and the community, these videos were…

Translanguaging pedagogies support student writers in expressing themselves using their full language repertoires, writing for authentic audiences, and connecting to their identities. However, many teachers, particularly those who identify as "monolingual" and teach in English-medium classrooms, may not know how to introduce…

Using running records as a lens to facilitate multilingual students' language and literacy development can help teachers recognize and build on students' linguistic capital. The authors analyzed 123 running records of Spanish-speaking first graders to begin to identify the types of language-related errors they made when reading. Using an assets…

Classrooms act as linguistic sieves when they continue to accept only dominant forms of English as the "correct" and "appropriate" language choice for all students. Students who speak other languages, such as African American Language or Spanish, are often encouraged to use those languages on the playground or at home but not…

Vocabulary development plays a critical role in young dual language learners' success in school. As teachers become aware of how they use language in the classroom, systematically teach specific words in a variety of ways, and learn about dual language learners' level of English acquisition and sociocultural experiences, they can help…

In this paper, we explore the affordances of literature-based, arts-infused and digital media processes for students, as multimodal practices take centre stage in an English Language Arts unit on fractured fairy tales. The study takes up the challenge of addressing multimodal literacy instruction and research in ways that utilize a range of…

This article reports on a study of how third-grade bilingual students drew from everyday resources, particularly popular culture, in science classes and how the use of these resources shaped how they made sense of academic texts. Six months of data collection in an urban Midwestern school demonstrated that students--especially English-language…

Notes that contemporary poets are writing sensitive and imaginative poetry that offers children insights into life and fun. (FL)