Combing English-Only Policy &Translanguaging as a language Practice
What The United States does not have an official national language policy describing
specific language policies and practices for schools. However, many states have passed language
policy legislation that ensures the status of English-only policy over other languages. In the mean
time, 26 states in the United States have declared English as their official language. Obama’s
Elementary and Secondary Education (ESEA 2010) focuses on developing various educational
programs as dual- language programs, transitional bilingual education, sheltered English
immersion, or other language instruction programs. Such programs are effective, however,
researchers have demonstrated that international students have experienced linguistic challenges
in classroom settings; thus, translanguaging is welcomed as a desirable educational practice.
Translanguaging refers to a pedagogical practice where students switch languages for the
purposes of reading, writing or for productive use. However, it goes beyond what has been
termed code switching, although it includes it.
Why
Practitioners and researchers have demonstrated that translanguaging is a viable
instructional practice because it promotes a deeper understanding of subject matter. For instance,
researchers argued that Chinese international students have experienced challenges in American
universities, which is mainly caused by language deficiency. As a result, such difficulties have
negative impact on their lecture comprehension and academic achievement. Translanguaging is a
successful language practice that facilitates learning, supports communication and improves
bilingual and ESL students’ lecture comprehension.
How Translanguaging is an effective pedagogical practice that helps bilingual and ESL
students develop and reinforce both their first and second languages. Researchers mentioned that
translanguaging has been adopted as a key modern concept in bilingual classrooms and
communities. There are some effective ways that make the classroom environment multilingual.
For example, by using collaborative group work, individual conferences and multilingual
partners, translanguaging extends and deepens the understanding of academic lectures.
Moreover, translating difficult terms in the content and code-switching to their home-language
are efficient methods to be used in the academic lectures.
Recommendation Educators should develop and co-construct a teaching practice
that helps to improve students’ pedagogical learning. Both bilingual and monolingual teachers
can carry out translanguaging strategies as powerful ways for ESL students to use their homelanguage as a resource to maximize their comprehension potential. It is suggested
translanguaging strategies can be carried out by different educators in many different classroom
contexts as monolingual general education classrooms, bilingual classrooms, English as a second
language classrooms, even foreign language classrooms. Implementing the language policy and
proficiently incorporating translanguaging will make content instruction comprehensible.