“Nobody Notices You, So You Are Invisible”: Recognition of Bilingual Teachers in Schools

Abstract

ABSTRACT Our interest in this study is to investigate how bilingual teachers are recognised in Norwegian schools. The working conditions of bilingual teachers differ between countries, and in the Norwegian context, a bilingual teacher assists minority language-speaking students during lessons, using the students mother tongue and Norwegian. We have observed eight BTs during their regular workdays, and then interviewed them. Although there are some exceptions, we find that most of the informants have few opportunities to collaborate with class teachers, they have challenging working conditions and unpredictable working days. Based on these findings we claim that the informants lack recognition in school. Nevertheless, we find that the bilingual teachers are recognised by their students and their parents. Our assumption is that the strong monolingual discourse in Norwegian educational policy challenges the school when it comes to offering minority language-speaking students an equal and adapted education.