Latine emergent bilinguals’ translanguaging in family literacy practices in Texas

Abstract

This study focuses on the home (bi)literacy practices of six bilingual Latine elementary school emergent bilingual students in South Texas. The research study is based on linguistic brokering and translanguaging to provide insights into the complexities of biliteracy development in their family context. The corpus of data includes participant observation field notes, audio and video recordings from home visits, interview transcripts, and written work by the children. The study reveals the diverse linguistic environment in the students' homes, which includes Spanish, English, Mexican Spanish, Central American Spanish, and South American Spanish. The research also explores how the students' translanguaging practices at home helped them develop their biliteracy skills while aiding their family members and improving family well-being. Moreover, the study examines how the students used digital literacy practices to maintain long-distance family relationships. These findings have important implications for researchers and educators leveraging home translanguaging, (bi)literacy practices, and knowledge to bridge the home-school divide.