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Home language maintenance, literacy and school-based learning

Updated: Sep 15


If you hear the word ‘bilingual’, what comes to your mind?


Bilingualism is difficult to define. We often go with a feeling more than anything. That person is bilingual. I’d like to be bilingual, but I’m not there yet.


An interesting point here is that we tend to think about speaking first. Are you bilingual if you can read Plato in Ancient Greek, for example? Would writing a (living) language but not speaking it make you bilingual?


Speaking often comes first when we think about bilingualism, but then we can take it for granted that people also write in the languages they speak. In Australia (as in so many other contexts), we probably think this way because we live in a highly literate society. 


This can have a strong influence on how we think about students’ home languages. Teachers who instigate written activities that draw on home languages can quickly find less home language literacy amongst their students than they might expect.


It may seem as if it’s too challenging to leverage students’ language knowledge in class in this case. But including aspects like visuals and audio really helps. For example, students might generate a conversational audio version of their home language for a particular project, and write English in a more formal way. 


So multimodality opens up different possibilities. But drawing on multimodality doesn’t mean that teachers need to give up on encouraging home language literacy practices. Attention to these practices can be a powerful way to help with home/community language maintenance efforts.


Writing in a heritage/home language suffers intergenerational attrition even faster than speaking. So reinforcing the importance of home language literacies in their own right - as well as leveraging them for learning at school - is a valuable exercise. 


Is it the teacher’s responsibility to support home language maintenance? The simple answer is no, at least, not yet in Australian schools. But, indirectly yes, depending on how much importance you attribute to the social and emotional support of students.


What about if families don’t care about maintaining the written form of their home language(s)? 


It can be easy to assume that they don’t care if students don’t know how to read and write in a home language. If parents did care, surely they would prioritise this? 


But it’s not that simple. English is the language that children need to learn in Australia in order to interact with others in society and to do well. This means people may think that focusing on reading/writing in a home language will distract from learning English. Children may also resist learning in favour of fitting into an English-speaking world or because it includes extra study time (in a community language school).


Teachers can help motivate students to learn more of their home language by actively valuing it. And home language literacy practices can present plenty of learning opportunities, including in the learning of English. 


When thinking about how home language literacies can be included in teaching and learning at school, it’s useful to consider both human and technological resources. 


The students themselves are a good place to start. But there are other human resources, such as parents. Including parents in activities that draw on home languages (without obliging them to participate) can help to build parent-school relationships. Schools may feel like daunting, alien places to parents who are not confident with their English. Home language activities encourage parental engagement and contribution to their children’s learning at school.


Of course, parents need to understand what is happening. They can wonder why their child is suddenly using Arabic at school even though there’s no dedicated Arabic class. Explaining that using home languages helps the learning of English is very important.


There can be staff at school - multicultural teaching aides and other teaching assistants - who can help a lot with languages that are most commonly used by students in the school.


Technological resources like Google Translate and ChatGPT are also improving all the time. AI is certainly not the last word on what sounds natural in a language. But it’s useful as a springboard for discussion.


The most important aspect of bringing home language practices into the classroom is to build an environment where language practices are constantly affirmed and play a meaningful role in activities and projects. Part of this affirmation is the teacher’s own willingness to learn. Another part is not expecting the same input/output from all students in the classroom. 


Learning takes place together. It’s a collaborative effort. Students may bring a particular language into class by asking their parents. We’ve seen students really enjoy learning more of their home languages. They also learn from their classmates. 


But if we think of the word ‘bilingual’ as something that people are: speakers/writers of two languages, the actual home language practices of students can be rendered invisible. 


By creating spaces where these practices become more visible, teachers can play a valuable role in home language maintenance. And literacy is an important part of this.



Related reading

Turner, M., Keary, A., & Tour, E. (2023). Home language literacy practices: learning opportunities for primary EAL students. Australian Educational Researcher, 50(5), 1513–1531. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13384-022-00566-9




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