Teacher Agency in Bilingual Spaces A Fresh Look at Preparing Teachers to Educate Latina/o Bilingual Children

TLDR: The authors make the case for developing materials for teachers that reflect both up-to-date theoretical understandings of language practices in bilingual communities and a more critically contextualized understanding of the power dynamics that operate in bilingual classroom contexts.

Abstract: This review poses an increasingly common—and increasingly urgent—question in the field of teacher education: How can teachers best be prepared to educate Latina/o bilingual learners? The answers that we offer here challenge some of the prevailing assumptions about language and bilingualism that inform current approaches to teacher preparation. To work effectively with bilingual learners, we argue, teachers need to develop a robust understanding of bilingualism and of the interactional dynamics of bilingual classroom contexts. Unfortunately, the conceptions of language and bilingualism portrayed in much of the teacher-directed literature fall short of offering teachers access to such understandings. In this review, we will make the case for developing materials for teachers that reflect both more up-todate theoretical understandings of language practices in bilingual communities and a more critically contextualized understanding of the power dynamics that operate in bilingual classroom contexts. We recognize that helping teachers come to these more robust understandings of bilingual language practices and the interactional dynamics of bilingual contexts implies an ideological shift for educators—and teacher educators—in the United States. Having made the case for rethinking how we talk to teachers about bilingualism in classroom contexts, we will venture to explore why this matters: What will teachers be better positioned to do once equipped with these understandings? It is our contention that such understandings will better position teachers to manage their classrooms for equity and learning for all students. Indeed, these more robust understandings of language and interaction are necessary if teachers are to capitalize on the flexibility and intelligence displayed by bilingual students as they engage in hybrid