THE IDENTITY TEXTS PROJECT
THE IDENTITY TEXTS PROJECT
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THE IDENTITY TEXTS PROJECT
The ‘Identity Texts Project’ supports teachers who want to improve the literacy and language outcomes of their students especially students who could be defined as having a Language Background Other Than English (LBOTE) or of speaking English as an Additional Language or Dialect (EAL/D) and therefore speaking one or more languages other than English.
REPRESENTING LANGUAGE AND IDENTITY: TRANSLANGUAGING POETRY PEDAGOGY
This paper reports ethnographic, participatory research in which secondary English teachers asked ‘What if?’ and reimagined their EAL/D classrooms. They looked to translanguaging and the writing of poetry – translanguaging poetry pedagogy – to create ‘space’ to support a dynamic process in which students employed flexible use of all their languages (Allard, 2017) in the production of identity text poems (Cummins & Early, 2011).
The resulting translanguaging space (Li Wei, 2014) and the symbolic propensities of poetry facilitated powerful representations of the students’ experiences and supported them to negotiate their cultural backgrounds. The research findings reinforce the need for resources and pedagogies that honour the languages and identity of all students.
'WHAT IF? CREATIVE PEDAGOGY FOR DIVERSE CLASSROOMS'
What if we encourage students to use all their languages when learning in English? Many students experience challenges in English classrooms that prioritise monolingual practices, and where teachers' use of engaging, inclusive pedagogy is often diminished in response to high stakes testing and other pressures (Berliner, 2011; Dutton & Rushton, 2018b). This interactive workshop showcases creative strategies from our 'Identity Texts Project' that develop students' linguistic and cultural resources and help them represent their languages and identity.
