Heritage Language Classroom Research Articles

Exploring Instructor Feedback Provision in Heritage Language and Mixed Heritage-Second Language Classrooms

The effects of feedback on second language (L2) learning has garnered extensive attention in the field of second language acquisition (SLA). Relatively little attention, however, has been given to the effects of feedback in the heritage language (HL) classroom (e.g., Atoofi, 2013) or instructors’ motivations to provide feedback in classrooms features heritage speakers (cf. Gurzinski-Weiss, 2016). The present study seeks to explore instructors' feedback practices and cited reasons for feedback choices in HL and mixed HL-L2 classrooms. Four instructors who taught Spanish as a HL and mixed HL-L2 Spanish classes participated in this study. Data were elicited using background questionnaires, video recordings of classroom meetings, and semi-structured interviews. Analyses of instructor-provided feedback episodes in recorded classroom meetings revealed that instructors provided explicit positive assessments (e.g., muy bien "very good") at high rates, and this type of feedback was more frequent in HL classrooms than mixed classrooms. Interviews with instructors revealed that instructors cited distinct, learner-related reasons for providing feedback to heritage speakers as opposed to L2 learners in their classrooms.

Pathways of Development in Child Heritage Speakers' Use of Spanish Demonstratives

Scholars have argued that restricted language input slows language acquisition, but the pathway of development may remain the same. The current study investigated the influence of amount of Spanish input on Spanish demonstrative usage among 19 U.S. child heritage speakers, ages 3;4–8;7. Demonstratives are among the first grammatical features to emerge in children’s language, but we know little about their acquisition by heritage speakers. Previous research shows that monolingual Spanish-speaking children rely heavily on este/esta ‘this’ andonly later learn to vary between demonstrative forms, using este/esta primarily for proximal referents and ese/esa ‘that’ for distal referents. As such, we hypothesized that child heritage speakers who experience restricted Spanish input would rely on este/esta for a prolonged period of time. 586 demonstratives were elicited during a puzzle completion task and were coded for referent location (proximal, distal). Contrary to our hypothesis, less Spanish spoken at home negatively correlated with proportion of este/esta-usage. Children exposed to abundant Spanish in the home patterned like adult monolingual Spanish speakers, producing este/esta for proximal referents and ese/esa for distal referents. By contrast, children who experienced restricted input in Spanish produced mostly ese/esa, regardless of spatial location of the referent. The results suggest that restricted input in Spanish yields a developmental trajectory with overgeneralization of ese/esa rather than este/esta. Importantly, we argue thatthe identification of two groups of child heritage speakers who exhibit different developmental pathways lends itself to differentiated instruction in the heritage language classroom.

Understanding and Addressing Linguistic Aggressions in the Spanish Heritage Language Classroom

Understanding and Addressing Linguistic Aggressions in the Spanish Heritage Language Classroom

Understanding the oral and written translanguaging practices of emergent bilinguals: Insights from Korean heritage language classrooms in the US, ChaehyunLee, New York and London: Routledge, 2021, xvi+198 pp., ISMB: 978‐0‐367‐55509‐2 (hbk)

Understanding the oral and written translanguaging practices of emergent bilinguals: Insights from Korean heritage language classrooms in the US, ChaehyunLee, New York and London: Routledge, 2021, xvi+198 pp., ISMB: 978‐0‐367‐55509‐2 (hbk)

Learning and Not Learning in the Heritage Language Classroom: Engaging Mexican-origin Students by Adilia K. Helmer

Reviewed by: Learning and Not Learning in the Heritage Language Classroom: Engaging Mexican-origin Students by Adilia K. Helmer Sarah Kersten Albrecht Helmer, Adilia K. Learning and Not Learning in the Heritage Language Classroom: Engaging Mexican-origin Students. Multilingual Matters, 2020. Pp. 251. ISBN 978-1-78892-762-8. Helmer’s recently published book, Learning and not learning in the heritage language classroom: Engaging Mexican-origin students, is an ethnographic work set in a charter high school in the southwestern United States. Helmer, a Teaching Professor in the Writing Program at UC Santa Cruz with interests in Latinx engagement and related pedagogies, continues in the style of Valdés’s (2001) Learning and not learning English: Latino students in American schools and fills a research gap as few studies on heritage language learners (HLLs) focus on the high school level. Additionally, her study builds on prior research on HLL motivation, using narrative, interviews, and analysis in each chapter to evocatively lay out the immediate causes and longer term effects of HLL disengagement, the need for teacher and administrative training, and the need for administrative vision and commitment. The book’s seven chapters are organized with chapter 1 as an introduction to the ethno-graphic setting, chapter 2 as an orientation to the study, and chapters 3, 4, and 5 as analyses of classroom observations. Chapter 6 offers recommendations for heritage language (HL) teaching, and chapter 7 places the study into the current context of the school and schooling. The first chapter briefly introduces the study’s inception, its desert southwest and new charter school setting, some of the school’s key HLL, teacher, and administrative participants, and the book’s organization. Chapter 2 begins with observations of the school’s first days and details how these observations led to research questions about HLL engagement. These questions are grounded by a thorough explanation of the ethnographic contexts, methodologies, and theoretical frameworks used throughout the book, including its successful blend of microethnography, which describes the charter school’s institutional culture and language practices, and critical ethnography, which problematizes power imbalances in the teaching of Spanish as a heritage language to Mexican-origen students. [End Page 140] Chapter 3 focuses on the resistance of 16 HLLs in a class with a non-native Spanish-speaking teacher. The chapter begins with discursive examples to show the students’ non-participation in class based on their lack of respect for the teacher’s perceived language ability and the teacher’s cultural disconnect with her students. This results in significant tension between the teacher and students, some inappropriate course material, and student unwillingness to engage when content is relevant. Explorations of the larger language context in which students are resisting and of the theoretical frameworks of imagined (rather than authentic) communities and student performance strikes follow. These frameworks are then used to explain student rejection of their teacher as not part of their community and their refusal to engage. Chapter 4 also focuses on the resistance of six original and six new students in an HLL class, this time with a native Spanish speaking teacher who connects with students’ language and culture but who is not trained as a teacher and who cannot manage the class or select appropriate material. The larger context of HLL characteristics is then explored, including identity insecurity and language. Theory therefore centers on the complex intersection of HLL language and identity, with ethnic identity construction being used effectively as a framework to examine the relationship between positive identity development and HL acquisition. Given the complexity of this learning environment, the author claims that systematic language policies must be implemented at school and district levels in order for HLLs to succeed. In chapter 5, Helmer observes a Humanities class with most of the same cohort of students. In this class, the students participate, are respectful to the teacher, and find the content relevant. This behavior is in contrast to the student responses in the HLL classroom. Helmer finds that student engagement is first based on respect for the teacher, then on perceived relevance of course content. She supports these findings with theoretical investigation of teacher ethos and experiential learning. Chapter 6 examines language...

Learning and Not Learning in the Heritage Language Classroom: Engaging Mexican‐Origin Students. Kimberly AdiliaHelmer. Blue Ridge Summit, PA: Multilingual Matters, 2020. x + 251 pp.

Learning and Not Learning in the Heritage Language Classroom: Engaging Mexican‐Origin Students. Kimberly AdiliaHelmer. Blue Ridge Summit, PA: Multilingual Matters, 2020. x + 251 pp.

The Scale of Modernity in the Heritage Language Classroom

ABSTRACT Discourse and identity practices in heritage language contexts have received significant attention in applied linguistics in recent years. One line of research in this realm has sought to adopt scales, the spatiotemporal niches within which social identification and learning take place. This article problematizes modernity as a scale of its own and investigates it in the context of the heritage language classroom discourse at a German high-school in Berlin. Microethnographic analyses of 10th-grade classroom interactional data reveal how Turkish heritage language students appropriate Turkish modernity and debate identity models around it while at the same time bringing to the table German/Western modernity and its contents. The article sheds light on the multiplicity of heritage language identities and situates scales as an important determinant in their construction.

Between Inheritance and Commodity: The Discourse of Japanese Ethnolinguistic Identity among Youths in a Heritage Language Class in Australia

ABSTRACT This paper explores how the discourse of Japanese ethnolinguistic identity differently affected three youths in a heritage language class in Australia. Based on a case study involving these informants, I show how the discourse was contested, reproduced, and appropriated. More specifically, I show how language was disaligned from ethnicity and construed as a commodity. This, however, did not make ethnicity irrelevant. It was reconnected with language to give it added value and authenticity. The discourse of ethnolinguistic identity and the discourse of commodification were thus articulated—or expressed together—by some of the youths to construct an interstitial space between these discourses, which allowed them to reap the benefits of their putative inheritance, while exempting themselves from its obligations. The paper thus sheds light on the polycentricity of heritage language classrooms, and on the multiple, layered discourses that operate in such spaces.

‘It’s not my Chinese’: a teacher and her students disrupting and dismantling conventional notions of ‘Chinese’ through translanguaging in a heritage language classroom

ABSTRACT Translanguaging theory re-conceptualizes the linguistic systems and practices of multilinguals as well as multilingual classroom pedagogies. While many studies have documented translanguaging in bilingual classrooms, there is little discussion about how translanguaging can advance the field of heritage language education. This paper shares findings from a qualitative investigation of a Mandarin heritage program in the U.S. enrolling ethnic Chinese students from various Chinese language backgrounds. Drawing on ethnographic fieldnotes and interviews, we argue that the teacher’s flexible use of linguistic resources provided the basis for productive classroom exercises among heritage students who struggled with Mandarin as an imposed identity. Through activities that enabled students to use multiple Chinese languages, students critically examined the diversity of Chinese languages within the U.S. context. This, in turn, facilitated their Mandarin learning in the classroom, as they actively engaged in disrupting and dismantling conventional notions of ‘Chinese.’ The teacher also reflected on her translanguaging practices and the challenges she faced in class. While Mandarin is currently heavily emphasized in the language teaching arenas, translanguaging as a pedagogical heuristic helps create space to liberate the voices of these language minority students who are often left out under the generic category of heritage ‘Chinese’ speakers.

Classroom socialisation: repair and correction in Japanese as a heritage language

ABSTRACT This paper explores the classroom socialisation of a mundane institutional language policy regarding the use of the target language: Japanese. Based on audiovisual recordings in a Japanese as a heritage language (JHL) classroom, it analyses episodes when teachers initiated repair on children’s novel English loanwords (i.e. English-based words pronounced in Japanese but not widely accepted and used), in ways that treated them (or sometimes the social actions performed through them) as problematic. Through a multimodal analysis of other-initiated repair turns and the sequences in which they were lodged, it examines how students responded, and whether and how teachers engaged in correction. In aiming to bridge research on classroom discourse using conversation analysis (CA) and language socialisation, the paper argues how repair and correction are practices for conveying the school language policy to ‘speak only in Japanese’. It also argues that these practices have the potential for socialising students beyond the classroom, to membership into (an imagined) Japanese society where monitoring one’s language use as a bilingual Japanese-English speaker may be important because the excessive use of English loanwords can become an object of others’ negative attitudes and evaluations.

Working With Diversity in the Spanish Heritage Language Classroom: A Critical Perspective

This article reflects on the notion of diversity and its implications for the Spanish Heritage Language (SHL) classroom. In doing so, I follow proposals on SHL education, multilingualism, multiculturalism and sociolinguistics that call for a critical, dynamic and historical perspective on diversity. I elaborate on the relevance of such approch for the SHL classroom, and the new pedagogical possibilities it brings to our work. The final goal is to provide teachers with conceptual tools to generate inclusive learning environments where we all —heritage and foreign language learners, along with teachers— engage in critical discussions about our place in today’s diversity, and how we are all contributing to the future of the Spanish language in our communities.

Form-Focused Instruction in the Heritage Language Classroom: Toward Research-Informed Heritage Language Pedagogy

Heritage language speakers have been recognized as a special group of language learners, whose knowledge of and experiences with the language, as well as their motivations for (re)learning their home language, differ drastically from that of an average learner of a second language. Current heritage language pedagogical approaches mainly focus on the development of communicative (or functional) abilities of the heritage learners; however, heritage speakers continue to struggle with structural accuracy and complexity of their speech and, thus, often fail to develop higher levels of proficiency in their heritage language. In this paper, we propose that focus-on-form needs to be an integral part of teaching heritage learners from the start of instruction. We base our argument on the results of extensive linguistic research on heritage Russian and on insights from the currently available pedagogically oriented classroom and laboratory-based research on heritage learners. We formulate and discuss instructional methods that help educators develop heritage learners’ attention to grammatical form and ability to recognize form-meaning mappings; foster conceptual understanding of grammar, and increase their metalinguistic awareness. Given consistent parallels across different heritage languages, the methodologies developed for Russian learners readily apply in other heritage language classrooms as well.

Critical language awareness in the heritage language classroom: design, implementation, and evaluation of a curricular intervention

ABSTRACT As Spanish heritage courses multiply all over the United States, the need to reexamine the curriculum and pedagogical approaches that are most appropriate to meet instructional goals is becoming increasingly pressing. Although several researchers have called for developing students’ critical language awareness (CLA) in the Spanish heritage classroom, this model has yet to make its way fully into the curriculum. A CLA approach is essential to help students become aware of issues of language and power and the privileging of certain dialects over others. Spanish language maintenance in the United States cannot be achieved unless learners develop this awareness in order to challenge dominant language ideologies that have been reproduced through education. This paper presents the design, implementation, and evaluation of a four-module curriculum designed to develop Spanish heritage learners’ CLA. The modules address (1) language variation and diversity; (2) language ideologies and linguistic prejudice; (3) Spanish in the United States and bilingualism; and (4) language maintenance. Pretest and posttest results show the curriculum effectively improved students’ level of CLA. Pedagogical implications and recommendations are discussed.

Unpacking the oral translanguaging practices of Korean-American first graders

ABSTRACTThis qualitative study utilized sociocultural and heteroglossic perspectives to examine the oral translanguaging practices of four Korean-American first-graders in a Korean heritage language (HL) classroom. The research method was discourse analysis. The students attended all-English American schools during the school week and a Korean HL school on Saturdays. All four students drew from their integrated linguistic resources to translanguage for sociolinguistic, metalinguistic, metacognitive, and sociocultural purposes. The three students who preferred English and who had older siblings translanguaged more and for a wider range of translanguaging practices than the student who preferred Korean and who had a younger sibling.

Functions of Translanguaging Performed by Korean-American Emergent Bilinguals

In this article, I employed a qualitative discourse analysis method from a heteroglossic perspective to investigate first-grade Korean American bilingual students’ translanguaging practices in a Korean heritage language (HL) school. Although the instruction was delivered exclusively in Korean in the HL classroom, the students were allowed to use English and translanguage if they needed. The transcripts of audio-recordings of students' spoken language were the main resources for this qualitative study. I first examined the incidence of the students' translanguaging. In performing the analysis of translanguaging function, I adopted Jakobson's [1] six functions of language (directive, expressive, referential, phatic, metalinguistic, and poetic). The findings showed that the function of students' translanguaging was documented in the five following categories: referential, directive, expressive, metalinguistic, and poetic. The close analysis revealed that 14 different subsidiary functions were further discovered under the five functional categories. The functional analysis of the students’ translanguaging performance indicates that their translanguaging was not accidental or deficient, but they were sophisticated, systematic, and purposeful. The findings imply that engaging in translanguaging when communicating even in a monoglossic classroom setting (such as an HL classroom) is considered as a natural phenomenon among bilingual students as they were activating and developing their bilingualism through everyday translanguaging practices. The article provides implications for teachers of bilingual learners.

Written feedback in heritage Spanish classrooms

Abstract Although feedback is a well-established and widespread technique in L1 and L2 writing, little is known about written feedback practices in Spanish heritage language (SHL) classrooms. This study examines how written feedback is used in SHL courses across the United States. Professors, instructors, graduate teaching assistants, program directors, and students who had taught, directed, or taken an SHL course completed online questionnaires about instructional practices and their perceptions of the feedback provided on writing assignments. Both instructors and students reported that written comments, correction codes, circles/underlines, and correct forms were frequently provided. Instructors indicated the most challenges when providing feedback on organization, grammar, and orthography. Nevertheless, students reported that every kind of feedback that they received was useful and comprehensible. Although further exploration of writing in the SHL classroom is needed to more concretely delineate best practices, the current findings suggest that several effective feedback practices are already in place.

Teacher's code-switching and bilingual children's heritage language learning and cognitive switching flexibility.

To code-switch or not to code-switch? This is a dilemma for many bilingual language teachers. In this study, the influence of teachers' CS on bilingual children's language and cognitive development is explored within heritage language (HL) classes in Singapore. Specifically, the relationship between children's language output, vocabulary development, and cognitive flexibility to teachers' classroom CS behavior, is examined within 20 preschool HL classrooms (10 Mandarin, 6 Malay, and 4 Tamil). Teachers' and children's utterances were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed for CS frequency and type (i.e., inter-sentential, intra-sentential). 173 students were assessed with receptive vocabulary and dimensional card sort tasks, and their vocabulary and cognitive switching scores assessed using correlational and mixed effects analyses. Results show that inter-sentential and intra-sentential CS frequency is positively and significantly related to children's intra-sentential CS frequency. Overall, findings revealed that teachers code-switched habitually more often than for instructional purposes. Neither inter-sentential nor intra-sentential CS was significantly related to children's development in HL vocabulary, and intra-sentential CS was found to positively and significantly relate to children's growth in cognitive flexibility. These findings reveal the multi-faceted impact of teacher's CS on children's early development.

Critical language awareness for the heritage context: Development and validation of a measurement questionnaire

Critical language awareness (CLA) is increasingly identified as a central component of the Spanish heritage language (SHL) classroom (Leeman, 2005; Martínez, 2003; among others). As a minority language, SHL is subject to sociopolitical, cultural, and economic forces that devalue its status. It is devalued in the eyes of the public, as a legitimate U.S. language, and as something worthy of being maintained. It is essential that students receive instruction not only in the heritage language, but also on the contextual factors that affect the Spanish-English sociopolitical relationship in the United States. Such instruction will enable learners to begin resisting heritage language loss by questioning language ideologies that promote English monolingualism and standard, monolingual Spanish as the ideal norm. The aim of this study was to develop a questionnaire with adequate psychometric properties to measure CLA in the SHL context. The respondents were 301 students enrolled in SHL courses in four U.S. universities. The questionnaire results were submitted to a series of statistical analysis to investigate how well the instrument meets the criteria of reliability and validity specified in this study. The final 19-item instrument had adequate psychometric properties and detected change in the CLA of students in a class where CLA was taught.

Wuli and stance in a Korean heritage language classroom: A language socialization perspective

This study examines stances evoked by a Korean teacher's use of the pronoun, wuli (we/our), in a heritage language classroom. Close analysis of recorded classroom interaction reveals that the frequent use of “wuli chingwutul” (our friends), “wuli plus first name”, and wuli for “you” evokes the stance of solidarity between the teacher and students. By mitigating face-threatening acts of directives and imperatives, the teacher's stance-taking works to encourage students’ active engagement. The normalized use of wuli in the teacher's discourse marks its absence for a shift in her stances from solidarity to authority and distance. These contrasting stances serve to socialize students into both pedagogically appropriate classroom behaviors and culturally appropriate linguistic practices. The results highlight ways in which speaker stances make up a significant aspect of language learning and socialization, calling for further studies on how bilingual children interpret and take up various stances in dynamic contexts.

Language ideologies and identities in Kurdish heritage language classrooms in London

Abstract This article investigates the way that Kurdish language learners construct discourses around identity in two language schools in London. It focuses on the values that heritage language learners of Kurdish-Kurmanji attribute to the Kurmanji spoken in the Bohtan and Maraş regions of Turkey. Kurmanji is one of the varieties of Kurdish that is spoken mainly in Turkey and Syria. The article explores the way that learners perceive the language from the Bohtan region to be “good Kurmanji”, in contrast to the “bad Kurmanji” from the Maraş region. Drawing on ethnographic data collected from community-based Kurdish-Kurmanji heritage language classes for adults in South and East London, I illustrate how distinctive lexical and phonological features such as the sounds [a:] ~ [ɔ:] and [ɛ]/[æ] ~ [a:] are associated with regional (and religious) identities of the learners. I investigate how these distinct features emerge in participants’ discourses as distinctive identity markers. More specifically this article examines how language learners construct, negotiate and resist language ideologies in the classroom.