Introduces the concept of language socialization by providing case studies from various classrooms around the world.

The book focuses on schooling and language learning of five Korean elementary school aged children in the United States. On designing qualitative methods, observations of the children in a Korean language school as well as two English learning classrooms offered descriptions of their school experiences and two language practices. In addition, interviews with teachers, the children s mothers and the children provide added background information and extended the observations. A thematic analysis led to further interpretation and understanding about the differences in the three classrooms in which the children learned Korean and English: the ways instruction was delivered, the ways the individual children demonstrated their language learning, and the cultural context in each educational setting. The study found that the Korean language school and English speaking public schools were essential for the children to improve their language proficiency in two languages as well as to learn different cultural and educational expectations.

This volume, Research Methods in Language, offers an overview of the wide range of methodological approaches to language and education across the axes of micro and macro-linguistic and social levels of analysis, as well as the multiple connections between them. The four sections each offer •Several reviews of different broad areas or subfields •Articles with a more narrow focus or demonstrating the application of an approach •International scope •Diversity of scholarly perspectives The resultant breadth and depth of theoretical and methodological research perspective makes this a unique and highly valuable resource. This is one of ten volumes of the Encyclopedia of Language and Education published by Springer. The Encyclopedia bears testimony to the dynamism and evolution of the language and education field, as it confronts the ever-burgeoning and irrepressible linguistic diversity and ongoing pressures and expectations placed on education around the world.

Language as Cultural Practice: Mexicanos en el Norte offers a vivid ethnographic account of language socialization practices within Mexican-background families residing in California and Texas. This account illustrates a variety of cases where language is used by speakers to choose between alternative self-definitions and where language interacts differentially with other defining categories, such as ethnicity, gender, and class. It shows that language socialization--instantiated in language choices and patterns of use in sociocultural and sociohistorical contexts characterized by ambiguity and flux--is both a dynamic and a fluid process. The study emphasizes the links between familial patterns of language use and language socialization practices on the one hand, and children's development of bilingual and biliterate identities on the other. Using a framework emerging from their selection of two geographically distinct localities with differing demographic features, Schecter and Bayley compare patterns of meaning suggested by the use of Spanish and English in speech and literacy activities, as well as by the symbolic importance ascribed by families and societal institutions (such as schools) to the maintenance and use of the two languages. Language as Cultural Practice: *provides a detailed account of the diversity of language practices and patterns of use in language minority homes; *offers educators detailed information on the language ecology of Latino homes in two geographically diverse communities--San Antonio, Texas, and the San Francisco Bay Area, California; *shows the diversity within Mexican-American communities in the United States--families profiled range from rural families in south Texas to upper middle class professional families in northern California; *provides data to correct the prevalent misconception that maintenance of Spanish interferes with the acquisition of English; and *contributes to the study of language socialization by showing that the process extends throughout the lifetime and that it is an interactive rather than a one-way process. This book will particularly interest researchers and professionals in linguistics, anthropology, applied linguistics, and education, and will be useful as a text in graduate courses in these areas that address language socialization and learning.

This is a descriptive qualitative study that explored Korean and English learning for Korean transnational immigrant children living in the United States. The study design included qualitative methods. Observations of five children in a Korean language school offered information about how they were taught Korean to retain their heritage language and culture. Additional observations of two of the children in their respective local public schools offered descriptions of their experiences learning English and U.S. public school culture. Interviews with the three teachers in these classrooms, as well as with three of the children's mothers, added background information and extended the observations. A thematic analysis process led to further understanding about the differences in the three classroom learning environments and described the ways instruction was delivered, the ways the individual children demonstrated their language learning, and the cultural context in each setting. The study found that the Korean language school and English speaking elementary schools were essential for the Korean immigrant children to improve their language proficiency in two languages as well as to learn different cultural and educational expectations.

Drawing on sociocultural theories of learning, this book examines how the everyday language practices and cultural funds of knowledge of youth from non-dominant or minoritized groups can be used as centerpoints for classroom learning in ways that help all students both to sustain and expand their cultural and linguistic repertoires while developing skills that are valued in formal schooling. Bringing together a group of ethnographically grounded scholars working in diverse local contexts, this volume identifies how these language practices and cultural funds of knowledge can be used as generative points of continuity and productively expanded on in schools for successful and inclusive learning. Ideal for students and researchers in teaching, learning, language education, literacy, and multicultural education, as well as teachers at all stages of their career, this book contributes to research on culturally and linguistically sustaining practices by offering original teaching methods and a range of ways of connecting cultural competencies to learning across subject matters and disciplines.

The goal of this text is to help teachers in diverse classrooms understand the importance of students’ culture, languages, and schooling experiences to curriculum, assessment, and student achievement. Readers will learn about aspects of specific cultures and languages that are important to their understanding of their students, and they will discover that cultures that are often considered similar may not be so (and why they aren't). Finally, the text focuses on how teachers can integrate languages and cultures into classrooms and how to account for students' backgrounds and funds of knowledge when devising tasks. The text starts with an introduction to language and culture that presents a research?based explanation of why these concepts are important for teachers to understand (Chapter 1). Then, the middle 28 chapters each address one country/culture. Each chapter starts with a school scenario in the US. Part 2 of each chapter includes evidence?based demographic and background data on the country, including historical events that may have an impact on our students and their families. Part 3 includes a look at education, schooling, and culture, including famous people, contributions to the world, personal characteristics, important religious information, focal customs, and other aspects that are important to cultural insiders. Part 4 is about language and literacy traditions and how they relate to the culture, a number of words that teachers can learn (e.g., yes, no, thank you, please, hello), how the language is different from and similar to English, and what those differences and similarities might mean for English language learners from that culture. Part 5 comprises advice, resources, and ideas for teachers (for example, if it is an oral culture, the teacher might consider working with students on oral storytelling before transitioning to written stories, or incorporate both using technology). Each chapter also contains recommended readings and resources and short exercises that extend the chapter information. The final chapter presents parting notes for teachers and additional suggestions for addressing diversity.

An exploration of language socialization from very early childhood through to adulthood, not only in often-studied communities in Canada and the United States, but also in Australia, Bolivia, Egypt, India and Slovakia. The global perspective gained by the inclusion of studies of communities representing every inhabited continent provides readers with an indication of the richness of the field as well as a guide for future work.

This wide-ranging survey of issues in intercultural language teaching and learning covers everything from core concepts to program evaluation, and advocates a fluid, responsive approach to teaching language that reflects its central role in fostering intercultural understanding. Includes coverage of theoretical issues defining language, culture, and communication, as well as practice-driven issues such as classroom interactions, technologies, programs, and language assessment Examines systematically the components of language teaching: language itself, meaning, culture, learning, communicating, and assessments, and puts them in social and cultural context Features numerous examples throughout, drawn from various languages, international contexts, and frameworks Incorporates a decade of in-depth research and detailed documentation from the authors’ collaborative work with practicing teachers Provides a much-needed addition to the sparse literature on intercultural aspects of language education

Eva Alcón Soler Maria Pilar Safont Jordà Universitat Jaume I, Spain The main purpose of the present book is to broaden the scope of research on the development of intercultural communicative competence. Bearing this purpose in mind, English learners are considered as intercultural speakers who share their interest for engaging in real life communication. According to Byram and Fleming (1998), the intercultural speaker is someone with knowledge of one or more cultures and social identities, and who enjoys discovering and maintaining relationships with people from other cultural backgrounds, although s/he has not been formally trained for that purpose. Besides, possessing knowledge of at least two cultures is the case of many learners in bilingual or multilingual communities. In these contexts, the objective of language learning should then focus on developing intercultural competence, which in turn may involve promoting language diversity while encouraging English as both a means and an end of instruction (see Alcón, this volume). This is the idea underlying the volume, which further sustains Kramsch’s argument (1998) against the native/ non-native dichotomy. Following that author, we also believe that in a multilingual world where learners may belong to more than one speech community, their main goal is not to become a native speaker of English, but to use this language as a tool for interaction among many other languages and cultures.