Faculty of Education - Research Publications
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ItemA Q methodological study into pre-service Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers' mindsets about teaching competencies(De Gruyter, 2024)A teacher’s mindset significantly affects their engagement, development, teaching quality, and well-being. This is crucial for pre-service teachers acquiring competencies for effective teaching. While research often focuses on English language teaching in Western contexts, little explores non-Western language teaching mindsets. Given the intersections of associated social, cultural, and linguistic variables with mindset, this study investigates Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) pre-service teachers’ mindsets on teaching competencies. The study utilized Q methodology, which is a philosophical and conceptual framework for examining subjectivity, and post-sort questionnaires with 39 pre-service teachers in China. The research findings provide important insights into the diverse and contradictory mindsets of pre-service CFL teachers, and the ideologies influencing beliefs as to what constitutes effective language teaching in the Chinese socio-cultural and socio-political context, providing insights into how teacher training programs need to be tailored to challenge and extend the complex mindsets held by pre-service language teachers.
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ItemEarly childhood educators’ viewpoints on linguistic and cultural diversity: A Q methodology analysis(Elsevier BV, 2024-02)Language and linguistic diversity play a key role in disparities in academic achievement. With around 25 % of preschool children in Australia communicating in a language other than English at home, developing a greater understanding of early childhood educators’ viewpoints towards, and engagement with, children's linguistic and cultural resources is vital. This research project asks how educators in early childhood settings view children's linguistic and cultural diversity. Employing Q methodology, the study investigated subjective viewpoints among educators at the early childhood level in Australia. Three distinct viewpoints were identified, shedding light on the complexities of language and culture related issues, as well as some of the challenges for EC educators in responding to the diverse needs of children. The findings reinforce the need for tailored pre-service and in-service professional learning that supports the development of teacher identity as well as their theoretical and pedagogical knowledge of multilingual language development.
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ItemExamining plurilingual repertoires: A focus on policy, practice, and assessment in the Australian context(Routledge, 2023-08-04)This chapter discusses policy, practice, and assessment research pertaining to plurilingualism in the Australian context, with a focus on mainstream classrooms. In the recent past, Australian language policy was pioneering in its support and promotion of the maintenance and acquisition of languages other than English. However, since the late 1980s, languages and education policy have predominantly been characterised by a relentless move towards monocultural and monolingual conceptualisations of language and literacy in curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment across Australian education systems. Discussion centres on the role of educational policy and practice and the affordances and challenges offered when plurilingualism is placed at the centre of teaching and learning in mainstream Australian classrooms. The chapter considers the linguistic, cognitive, and social benefits that can be derived from recognising and harnessing students' plurilingual repertoires, and the competing tensions of predominantly monolingual, monoglossic educational policies, curricula, and assessment frameworks. The central contention is that assessment practices are failing to keep pace with conceptual and pedagogical progress in the education system and are perpetuating reductive interpretations of language and literacy that continue to limit the effectiveness of current pedagogical change.
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ItemOwnership of English: Insights from Australian Tertiary Education Contexts(Taylor and Francis Group, 2023)This study investigates the perception of English ownership among multilingual students in Australian universities. Using qualitative interviews, it explores ownership through four aspects: expertise, inheritance, usage, and identification. The findings suggest that linguistic ownership is tied to language proficiency and self-identification as an expert. Despite students' confidence in English use, being labelled as 'non-native' speakers hinders their sense of ownership. The research highlights ongoing issues related to English ownership, the validity of its variations, and the pervasive influence of the 'native speaker' concept despite efforts to dismantle it. This is largely due to students' experiences with educators who are viewed as guardians of a more 'legitimate' English. The study recommends educators foster awareness of diverse English uses and avoid reinforcing native-speakerism ideologies.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableLanguage Ideology and the Learning of Languages in the Early Childhood Context(Routledge, 2022-01-01)In 2019, the Victorian government introduced the Early Childhood Language Program (ECLP), whereby children in selected Early Childhood (EC) settings play and learn through a language other than English for between 3 and 15 hours per week. Although a small range of bilingual and language programmes do exist at the EC level in Australia, this programme is pioneering in its scope as well as its support for the supernumerary provision of language educators to support language learning at over 150 EC centres. In this chapter, we look at critical questions around language ideologies that shape language choice and programme implementation in EC educational contexts and settings, which arose as we developed and implemented the training programme for the language educators. These issues are examined through the lens of two languages or language groups with complex histories in Australia - Auslan and Victorian Aboriginal Languages - in order to raise critical issues in relation to language and power, who languages belong to, and how their users or custodians are positioned in the deployment of language as a resource in EC settings. We argue that it is imperative that a deep understanding of socio-political and socio-linguistic histories of languages and the teaching and learning of these languages inform the work of researchers, in order to mitigate and avoid the perpetuation of injustices and obstacles experienced by these language communities.
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ItemFrom the periphery to centre stage: The mainstreaming of Italian in the Australian education system (1960s to 1990s)(Cambridge University Press, 2022-11-11)This article examines the complex drivers of change in language education that have resulted in Australia having the highest number of students learning Italian in the world. An analysis of academic and non-academic literature, policy documents, and quantitative data helps trace the trajectory of the Italian language in the Australian education system, from the 1960s to the 1990s, illustrating the interaction of different variables that facilitated the shift in Italian's status from a largely immigrant language to one of the most widely studied languages in Australia. This research documents the factors behind the successful mainstreaming of Italian into schools, which, in addition to the active support it received from the Italian community and the Italian government, also included, notably, the ability of different Australian governments to address societal transformation and to respond to the emerging practical challenges in scaling up new language education initiatives in a detailed and comprehensive manner.
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ItemPlurilingualism and language and literacy education(SPRINGERNATURE, 2022-11)Abstract In this paper, we discuss the place of plurilingualism in Language and Literacy Education. The article problematises English-only, monolingual-centric assumptions upon which much of Australia’s current literacy education policy discourse has been based, to instead advancepluriliteraciesas an alternate, more generative lens through which to view literacy learners, literacy learning, and literacy capabilities. The paper begins with tensions inherent in how policy “imagines” learners in Australian schools, and the problem of imposing English-only, monolingual-centric notions of literacy when multilingualism is increasingly more the norm than the exception in many mainstream Australian classrooms. We consider how a pluriliteracy perspective on literacy education offers a more appropriate approach to addressing learners’ developmental literacy needs, with particular attention to students’ identity and agency. Finally, we consider effective implementation of plurilingual approaches to language and learning, with a focus on the intersection of ideology, practice, and policy.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableEditorial: Languages in Early Childhood Education(Deakin University, 2021-11-30)In the context of ever-changing global movement of peoples in and between countries, linguistic diversity, and diversity in modes of communication and expression have become increasingly vibrant and visible (D’warte & Slaughter, 2021). These changes have also been reflected in research scholarship into languages acquisition where monolingual-centric assumptions have been disrupted by heteroglossic perspectives that view the linguistic repertoire of any individual, including the very young child, as complex – shaped by the “linguistic, cognitive, social and emotional” characteristics of the individual (Seltzer & García, 2020, p. 2). In orienting this to the classroom, Cummins & Early (2011) argue that the relationship between language and identity cannot be untwined but that indeed, a critical precondition for learning involves recognising and engaging with the cultural and linguistic knowledges and learning experiences of students.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableLeveraging Languages for Learning: Incorporating Plurilingual Pedagogies in Early Childhood Education and Care(Deakin University, 2021-11-30)Abstract: Children are members of families and communities, and the languages learnt within these contexts contribute to a child’s sense of “belonging, being and becoming” throughout life (Department of Education Employment and Workplace Relations, 2009). Encouraging children to bring their home languages into early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings exposes all children to additional languages and supports key outcomes of the Early Years Learning Framework for Australia (EYLF; DEEWR, 2009). This article looks at the relationship between key tenets of the EYLF and conditions that support a plurilingual approach within ECEC settings, arguing that multilingualism can be encouraged and effectively supported within these environments. The authors outline Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological theory of development which continues to be influential in Australian ECEC, emphasizing the importance of proximal processes in child development. Examples are provided of educator behaviours set out in the EYLF that encourage linguistic diversity and promote language learning. The influence of three key variables on the valuing of languages is discussed, namely language ideologies, teacher beliefs and attitudes, and plurilingual pedagogies. Recommendations relating to the positive positioning of languages and the integration of plurilingual pedagogies into Australian ECEC contexts are provided.
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ItemThe Role of Membership Viewpoints in Shaping Language Teacher Associations: A Q Methodology Analysis(Wiley, 2021)The complexity inherent in the TESOL field can present challenges for Language Teacher Associations (LTAs) in undertaking internal-facing roles such as professional learning including networking, conferences and publications, as well as external-facing roles such as advocacy work with stakeholders, and curriculum reform, among other issues (e.g., Elsheikh & Effiong, 2018b; Lamb, 2012; Paran, 2016). LTAs must be cognizant of and responsive to changing socio-political, policy, funding factors influencing TESOL provision, as well as the changing pedagogical needs of educators working across sectors. This study investigates the factors which influence and shape English as an Additional Language (EAL) education across a local (state based) EAL context and considers how these findings can inform the activities and practices of LTAs. Q methodology, which combines the use of qualitative and quantitative data, is employed to provide insights into current, deeply held perspectives of educators in relation to EAL provision. Findings provide insights into contextual variables which impact on EAL provision in adult education and school-based contexts, including intensive English education for refugee and migrant children. This in turn provides an opportunity to consider implications of these findings for LTA activities and practices, in particular, in relation to professional learning, leadership and advocacy.