Pre-service teachers’ questions about literacy instruction for multilingual learners

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As classrooms in the United States become increasingly linguistically diverse, teachers need to be prepared to provide equitable literacy instruction to multilingual learners (MLs). This paper explores the experiences of pre-service teachers (PSTs) in one elementary education course focused on literacy instruction for MLs, specifically asking: What questions do PSTs ask about literacy instruction for MLs? PSTs posed questions multiple times a week as part of their reading responses and post-class exit tickets, resulting in 1,375 questions for analysis. Open and pattern coding found that PSTs’ questions focused on: 1) students, 2) environment, 3) teaching practice, 4) self, and 5) language. Findings describe these categories as well as sub-categories for each type of question, using representative examples. We argue that these questions provide insight into the content knowledge, ideologies, and pedagogical practices of early-stage teachers preparing to work with MLs. Implications for teacher education are discussed.