Sue Weinstein is the MacCurdy Distinguished Professor of English at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, where she works in New Literacy Studies and English Education. She has 2 books, The Room Is on Fire: The History, Practice, and Pedagogy of Youth Spoken Word Poetry (2018) and Feel These Words: Writing in the Lives of Urban Youth (2009), both published by State University of New York Press. Sue also serves as the board president for Humanities Amped, a Baton Rouge-based nonprofit organization bringing critical and culturally relevant/sustaining pedagogies to local schools. Prior to graduate school, Sue taught high school English Language Arts in Cochabamba, Bolivia and Chicago, IL. She is passionate about poetry, her cats, and supporting all young people as they learn about themselves and their worlds
To Code-Switch or Not to Code-Switch: Wrangling Linguistic Politics in the Interest of Students
This semester, I’m teaching a graduate seminar titled Critical Literacies and Social Justice Pedagogies. The idea for the course came directly from my desire to read a bunch of new books, including Bettina Love’s We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom and April Baker-Bell’s Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy.
I had already skimmed Gholdy Muhammad’s Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy and thought that would go over well in a seminar of teachers of various sorts. A Facebook friend had previously recommended the graphic novel The Outside Circle by Patti Laboucane-Benson and Kelly Mellings, and upon reading it I realized it presented a culturally-sustaining approach to pedagogy, so onto the syllabus that went as well.
Another book I added to the syllabus was Self-Taught: African-American Education in Slavery and Freedom by Heather Andrea Williams, which I stumbled upon during a library search some years ago and have since used in several classes, because it offers a clear and compelling set of narratives about enslaved people and freed people resisting the limiting policies of a racist nation to gain an education. My students in Louisiana have been taught little about slavery, and less about active resistance (overt and covert) to enslavement and Jim Crow, so Self-Taught regularly angers them (about what they were not taught) and blows their minds. I rounded out the syllabus with some go-to readings along with visual and aural texts, and we were off!
We began the semester with We Want to Do More Than Survive, which I found to be an excellent book overflowing with historical information, impassioned argument, and a wealth of useful citations. The 11 graduate students in the seminar, some from the English department and some from Education, some K-12 teachers and some university graduate assistants who were either teaching their own undergraduate courses or assisting a professor in a large class, embraced this book as well. For this book and the texts that followed, I asked students to respond in an online forum to “anchor questions” designed to invite them into conversations and to do the “activating prior knowledge” thing that K-12 educators are taught. We also had a weekly class meeting on Zoom during which a student shared a presentation on a reading, followed by lively discussion.
Our second book was Linguistic Justice. It is here that I will focus most of this essay. The concept of linguistic justice (though I only recently learned the phrase) has long been central to my teaching and research. I often teach classes around this topic, like the one I taught in Fall 2020 entitled “Language, Power, Pedagogy.” I am fascinated by what humans do with language, by the ways we fill in gaps in our linguistic systems (think of our regional versions of the plural “you” that fill in our English plural-you gap: y’all, you guys, yins, youse…), by the ways we play with language that are innovative and pleasurable. I am also fascinated by, and deeply respectful of, the linguistic tactics marginalized populations use to maintain cultural identity and the possibility of coded in-group communication (think here of how Black English constantly innovates not only along generational lines but also because of this language’s regular cooptation by dominant culture – often in the service of capitalism).
In their forum posts, students responded enthusiastically to this book as well, though there were questions about what linguistic justice would look like on the ground of our classrooms, and concerns about how a valuing of all students’ home languages might conflict with imposed policies and curriculum. One student, currently a CA (classroom assistant) for a large undergraduate course, wondered how they might practice the tenets of linguistic justice as presented by Baker-Bell when teaching a small section of a course they had not designed. I recognized this situation as being not dissimilar to that of the student teacher, and having worked with many a pre-service teacher, I drew on that experience to reinforce for the student that teaching in someone else’s classroom, with someone else’s curriculum, rarely allows one to be the full teacher they will become when they are the teacher of record – in other words, to do what they could but not beat themselves up for what they couldn’t in the present situation.
The response that stayed with me, and kept tugging at the edge of my thoughts, came from Kristen, a current doctoral student in Education whom I had previously taught when she was an undergraduate English secondary education student. She had taught for several years since then, and we had kept in touch, so we were both excited to be back in class learning together. During our weekly Zoom meeting, as we dove into our conversation about Baker-Bell’s book, this student exclaimed in an exasperated tone, “Okay, I don’t know what to do here. Baker-Bell says we shouldn’t be teaching students to code-switch, but then I watched that poem about speaking 3 different kinds of English [Jamila Lyiscott’s hugely popular “3 Ways to Speak English,” which I use all the time in my classes], and she’s bragging about her ability to code switch! So do we teach code-switching or don’t we?!?”
In the moment, I suggested that we are dealing with complex subject matter, and will naturally find some contradictions as people who are differently situated try to work these issues out. But Kristen’s question has stayed with me, keeps nagging at me. As I try to get at the heart of her confusion, I keep landing on the idea that code-switching itself is neither problem nor solution. It is a practice in which we all engage as we circulate through different spheres with different kinds of people and for distinct purposes.
I think here of Gloria Anzaldúa’s book Borderlands/La frontera: The New Mestiza, and particularly the chapter “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” in which Anzaldúa lists 8 languages she and many other Chicanos speak (1987, p. 55):
- Standard English
- Working class and slang English
- Standard Spanish
- Standard Mexican Spanish
- North Mexican Spanish dialect
- Chicano Spanish (Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California have regional variations)
- Tex-Mex
- Pachuco (called caló)
For Anzaldúa, the latter 5 items in this list are the ones that feel most like home, while her 2 kinds of English and Standard Spanish are languages she performs for the world outside. They are not part of her primary literacy, which, according to James Gee, means she had to learn them more consciously/overtly than she did the other 5, and/but which also means (again according to Gee) that she may understand their structures more fully than she does her home languages, which she would have internalized through interactions and experiences rather than through overt learning. Similarly, there will always be languages that our students enter the classroom already conversant and confident in, and those they have not yet internalized. These will be different for different students – even those who seem to come from the same ethnic/racial/class backgrounds.
So, we teach. But here’s the thing: we can teach the structure of a language without teaching our students that a particular language is the only one that will gain them power (I think of power here as access – to jobs, housing, formal education, and the like). Code switching is something all speakers do, and something we absolutely can teach our about. It is something that writers and performers like Anzaldúa and Lyiscott describe in detail, and with pride. The pride, I think, comes from the fact that their home languages that are not like mainstream, white, middle-class English (what is called many things, including standard or standardized English, Standard American English, and the language of wider communication [in a gesture of irony, some substitute “whiter” for “wider” here]) and have been traditionally disrespected, literally called “bad,” “broken,” or “incorrect.”
So much of what looks like resistance to learning from students is, in fact, a reaction to an already-existing resistance from educators and other adults – resistance to the proliferation of Englishes, and a resistance to recognizing the value of these Englishes. In the school setting, this resistance to students’ home cultures (for this is what it is) is not practiced by white teachers and administrators only, as it is not white people alone who buy into performances of respectability.
Yet such adults have, frankly, missed the bus when it comes to language. It is simply not the case that only people who speak the dominant code get jobs, buy homes, pursue higher education, or in general, “succeed.” We are not telling students the truth, then, if we insist that they must speak the dominant code to access these things. To the extent that there is some truth to the power of the dominant code, that power exists because those in positions of relative power keep insisting on it. We reinforce the singularity of white, middle-class English as a technology for success when we keep claiming that it is such, even in the face of a multitude of counter-examples.
In the very heart of cultural maintenance – the university – the movement to bring non-standardized versions of English into the realm of scholarship has been happening for several decades, and we have only to look at our own academic fields to find versions of this. Keith Gilyard, a past NCTE president and CCCs chair, purposefully wrote his first book, Voices of the Self: A Study of Language Competence, in a mixture of codes; Bettina Love, whose book opened my seminar, certainly does so; Elaine Richardson, H. Sami Alim, and Christopher Emdin are just a few of many other examples.
Beyond academia, we can find a similar incorporation of non-standardized Englishes in the arts and in commerce. Indeed, we might explore with our students the many and ongoing efforts to accurately represent Black spoken English in writing, an effort at least 150 years old and that arose at least partially because of the profound misrepresentation of that language in minstrelsy. Why would such an effort be necessary if there is not something valuable about Black English? Why would so many feel such a need to represent it accurately/respectfully if it isn’t an integral part of US culture, used regularly in literature, in scholarship, and, again, in commerce?
If non-standardized Englishes are consistent linguistic systems that carry their own power and that are valuable as all languages are valuable, then the conversation around code-switching becomes one of choosing among equally valid codes for a variety of purposes. We can teach the dynamics of language by inviting our students to explore various Englishes by identifying their structures, their norms, their related paralinguistic practices. We can do all of this without insisting that, ultimately, only white middle class English matters to our students’ future success. We can discuss code-switching, the hows and whys of it, without insisting that some of our students have to do it all the time or else abandon hope. We can refuse to reinforce the outmoded idea that one version of English is better than all the others, which after all, is simply a coded way of saying that one version of English speakers, one version of Americans, is the best. What we can’t do is denigrate our students’ languages and cultural practices and then get angry when they seem not to want to learn from us.
Thank you for sharing on such a relevant topic Dr. Sue Weinstein. Code Switch or Not to Code Switch? I teach Language Arts to English Language Learners and quite guilty of telling students the same lines mentioned. Yes, in the past, at the beginning of the school year, I would give my students a speech about why they need to speak standard English. I told them that it’s the language of empowerment and that they need to speak it to get a job, to continue their education, and generally to be successful in life. I even gave them examples of real stories where individuals were denied jobs because they spoke in creole instead of standard English during interviews. In Belize the education policies and the curriculum promote the speaking of standard English in the classroom, so teachers abide by this policy.
What would linguistic justice look like on the ground of our classrooms? This is a very essential question. Being exposed to Social Justice Education, I realize the disservice and injustice done to students when they are not allowed to speak their native language or code switch in the classroom. Now, I allow my students to code switch from English to Creole and vice versa. I also discuss the variations of Spanish and English spoken in Belize. Indeed, code switching is not the problem, nor the solution. we can teach code switching. It certainly gives students more pride in their native language and more confidence to learn English. Not allowing code switching is silencing our ELL’s. Code switching is a way of getting them to speak up and survive in a world propelled by the dominant language.
“I don’t think this is right, but I find it necessary to do. I explained the concepts in Spanish to my students. That’s the only way I can help them understand it because they don’t know English,” explained the teacher. Her explanation signaled the issue of policy and practice conflict. Many times teachers struggle in aligning policy and practice for the best interest of the child. The dilemma exists in making a fair and equitable decision to ensure that one meets students’ learning needs. Selecting the appropriate code and scaffolding them to learn English to become Dual Language Learners is perhaps a positive path. It will enable the strengthening of the home language, foster self-esteem, and value their language wealth within mainstream society.
Additionally, they will acquire a second language to enter worlds where language differences once barred them. In Belize, many vacancies require an applicant to be bilingual in English and Spanish; therefore, it is necessary to foster both languages in school. However, this in itself creates a power struggle for the other languages spoken in Belize. Where does my language fit in the job market? Economic survival is essential and forces an individual to gravitate towards learning the power languages of English and Spanish. Despite recognizing the Creole language, many equate it as the ability to speak English which elevates its power. The Belizean language reality of Creole and English sometimes being synonymous illustrates the views of Jamila Lyiscott’s ‘3 Ways to Speak English’. It shows the power to articulate the same views, the same message, and the same meaning with different words, tone, enunciation, and pronunciation but nonetheless still effectively communicate to different audience and contexts.
The insistence on teaching in English causes language discrimination and points to racism. Aren’t we disenfranchising our students when we do not value our students’ language wealth? Aren’t we hampering our students’ academic success when we insist on instructing in a language that they do not understand? These are pedagogical questions that teachers struggle with each day.
Thank you for sharing Dr. Sue Weinstein. I love Kristen’s question. Do we code-switch or not? In Belize, our Language policy enforces that the language of instruction should be English. Some teachers have taken this to the extreme by not allowing students to bring their mother tongue to the classroom. However, I tend to disapprove of this practice. Belize’s population is diverse. We have students from different cultural backgrounds, and many of them fall under the category of ELLs.
I believe that students’ mother tongue has the same value as the English language. When teachers promote first language use in the classroom, it enhances the students’ learning experience while making cultural relevance pedagogy implications. When we force our students not to use their mother tongue, we are creating a form of linguistic injustice. We perceive them as passive learners instead of co-constructors of knowledge. Language is a part of a culture, and every student should get that opportunity to feel proud of who they are. I have witnessed students feeling ashamed of speaking their mother tongue because of fear of being bullied and others staying silent because they do not nurture their first language. Presently, the younger Garinagu are losing their language because they shy from speaking the language openly. Some educators enforce the misconception that English is the better language, and if they want to be successful, it is the language that they must use. While, Baker-Bell says we shouldn’t be teaching students to code-switch, my stance is why not develop and encourage or students to become multilingual learners. I view it as an additive that students can use to their advantage if teachers allow the code-switching space to occur. Code-switching will give students a sense that they are valued and respected and enhance their engagement in learning.
Thank you for sharing, enthralling message!!!!
Baker-Bell says we shouldn’t be teaching students to code-switch, but then I watched that poem about speaking 3 different kinds of English [Jamila Lyiscott’s hugely popular “3 Ways to Speak English,” which I use all the time in my classes], and she’s bragging about her ability to code switch! So do we teach code-switching or don’t we?!?” Sue articulated. This is an extremely debatable point based on my point of view. Based on my paradigm, Code switching occurs at all times in the right place and in the right time. This is integrated with our culture and our language communication discourse. As Jamila mentioned in her speech we speak 3 tongues – at home, at school and with friends. Each of these has their own rules and regulation based on the comportment being used making everyone to communicate successfully to convey information based on the content being discussed. This synopsis prominently shares that coaching students that Standard English/American or British English is the way to move forward we are guiding students on an erroneous path. We must make students be liberated to use their mode of communication to portray messages based on the discussion and discourse. This will be a teaching moments!!!!
In Belize, the official language is English. Teacher and students must communicate in Standard English at all times. When teachers and students communicate in their native languages it’s atypical and it must be corrected immediately to Standard English. However, after reading and articulating from the inferences being provided, I consider that code switching plays a vital role as a mode of communication and for learning to be fun. An easy flow of ideas will be pump into the discussion making integration with several tongues while the content is being learnt in an exciting approach.
Hi, Lalo,
The label “official language” is an interesting one. I recently read something Gwen wrote and she cited La Page (1972) who said Kriol is an index of being Belizean. This is an interesting tension.
Thanks for such an insightful post.
Is there anyway to be loyal to one without betraying the other? This question might seem a bit extreme, but language is a huge part of our cultural identity. It is cultural suicide to stop students from using their native language. I agree that being proficient in the English Language is certainly a priority but so is speaking in any other language. No language is superior to another and this is a very important concept we must convey to our students. The structure of our Belizean classroom is represented by diverse cultures, yet teachers are mandated to teach in standard English. As a former head of department, doing teachers appraisals, points were deducted when teachers would speak in Creole. We are conditioned to think that being able to speak English gives us some level of superiority. I believe that a child who can code switch is more advantaged than a child who speaks only English. The concept of switching between formal and informal language is a powerful technique. I am all for this language technique and have seen it work within my career as a Mathematics teacher. We all know that Math is a subject that is not favored by many students so many strategies must be utilized so students can fully grasp the concepts being taught. Particularly, since the majority of the students in the Belizean classrooms are English Language Learners and have to simultaneously learn the math concepts and understand the text. Given the multicultural dynamics of the Belizean classroom, I find it necessary to code switch. Like Lyiscott, I speak three different languages as well, I would dare to say I speak four- school, family, friends, and work. We are now in a technological era where our language is altered by digital text. It is interesting to note that this is not only an issue that we face in our schools, but it is a global issue as well.
Weinstein reiterates that at some point, we all code-switch. In Jamila Lyiscott’s – 3 Ways to speak English, she talks about the three different English types-when she speaks to her friends, families, and at school while still being articulate. Therefore, whether it is intentional or not, a code switch happens. Those languages are a part of whom we are-our identity kit. Rather than making students in our schools feel that American English or Standard English is the only way, educators must find ways to incorporate student’s primary discourse in language into our classrooms. Allow students to experience the mirrors of languages and still be articulate, as stated by Jamila Lyiscott. I recalled a classroom visit during which the teacher used students’ native language and Standard English to explain a concept. I found this experience unusual, but after reading Weinstein’s article, code-switching is how teachers can allow students to explore learning using the language they come with from home. A language that they internalized using experiences and actions. Additionally, when instructions in Standard English happen, a teacher may take the approach by allowing students to understand the relations between the structures and meanings to their “native” language, making the learning of Standard English more meaningful and becoming mirrors as well as windows. Weinstein says that language is dynamic and because the point of using language is for communication, then more appreciation for code-switching is needed.
Odelia, I love your example of teacher code switching. It’s such an effective approach, and I think the best teachers do this naturally as a way to connect with their students.
Thanks for such insights on code switching and the influence of academic language on ELLs.
Belize is uniquely situated in Central America and the Caribbean. It is the only English-speaking country in Central America because it is the only Central American country formerly known as British Honduras that was colonized by Britain. Hence, Belize shares a similar history with the Caribbean since Europe also colonized the Caribbean. Through this medium, the influence of the English Language, the hegemony of languages, became the official language of Belize. Today, the influence of the English Language still prevails as it is the language of academics, business, and the globe. Despite this, there are theories that engage the integration of languages to aid in improving communication, social interaction, and cognitive development of individuals. Through the use of code-switching and translanguaging techniques, individuals communicate in a freer manner. The use of translanguaging methods, allow ELLS to use their entire language repertoire to interact in the world they live in. This has great implications for ELLs in meaning making in the mainstream classrooms. Yet, before the necessary changes can be properly implemented in the classroom through teacher pedagogy, the national curriculum of Belize must be decolonized. Since teachers based the content of their lessons on a syllabus which is a document adopted from the curriculum, the change must start with the curriculum. While this can be argued, it is safe to say that teachers in Belize are wired to follow the norm rather than go against it. This is why there is a need for reform of the national education curriculum in Belize.
The level of importance placed of Speaking English in Belize can be overwhelming at times since individuals are often ridiculed for the slightest mistake when speaking or writing. This has a direct impact on the desire for individuals to want to share their ideas orally or in writing. Therefore, there is a need for acceptance of individuals using different languages to communicate. In schools in Belize, students are expected to speak in English from the time they enter the classrooms. Lessons for the most part are taught in English, and pressure is placed on students to dialogue and write in English when this is so different from their home language. Students who do not meet the standards or expectations of teachers are given deficit labels and are usually misdiagnosed as having some form of learning disability. Nonetheless, there are methods teachers can utilize through code-switching and translanguaging pedagogy that can revolutionize education in Belize.
Code switching is a natural process of moving between languages to communicate. Individuals often use this strategy when they are unable to find an effective word or statement in conversation. It is often used as well to discuss certain topics and content that are easier said in the L1 of the speaker. This statement speaks truth to many languages spoken in Belize. Two of such languages are Spanish and Creole which are the languages that are spoken the most in Belize despite the notion that Belize is the only English-Speaking country in Central America. The Spanish Language in Belize is unique in different districts. For example, Spanish speakers from up north (Orange Walk and Corozal) speak a slightly different Spanish from those in the West (Cayo). Some differences are based on influence of border countries, while others are based on immigration, integration and influence of other languages or the use of idioms which they cannot translate.
Creole, however, is more widespread than Spanish and has many variations. Creole has evolved to the extent that some words are no longer used or understood by the younger generation. Despite these differences, individuals who speak in Creole are able to understand each other since Creole is the home language of many students, it is also the social language used in schools among staff and students outside the classroom and also in the community. This brings into question why teachers do not use the Creole Language in the classroom as a meaning making technique during lesson engagement. While Spanish, is a subject taught across schools in Belize, Creole is not. However, there are more students who are fluent in speaking the Creole language than there are students who are fluent in speaking the Spanish language in schools across Belize.
Code- switching is a great method to use in lesson engagement. However, the use of translanguaging techniques is more powerful because it extends beyond just bouncing between two languages. Translanguaging shows how ELLs use language to make sense of the world. Through this method multilinguals use their abilities to communicate and make meaning of context in mainstream classrooms by integrating their wealth of knowledge. Translanguaging provides the same level or normalcy for ELLs that is usually experienced by monolinguals. Therefore, communication becomes effortless for ELLs.
Translanguaging pedagogy for teachers should be a requirement for teaching in the globally integrated world. There are so many strategies that teachers can use to engage students in culturally relevant lessons. Hence, a translanguaging approach to learning is a key element in improving the education system in Belize. Through the restructuring of the curriculum to include more courses that are students centered with a focus on inclusivity, the voice of students will resound.
Thank you for this thorough and thoughtful reflection, Melissa. It seems there are versions of this struggle in most countries and classrooms. It always pains me to know that young people are being discouraged, or even barred from, drawing on all of their linguistic resources.
Thank you so much for sharing such an insightful piece. For many Belizean students, their first language ranges from Kriol, Spanish, German, Mandarin, Garifuna, Hindi etc., and all these languages convene in one room before a teacher trained to give monolingual instruction. Many of our students enter the classrooms as strong multilingual speakers. Yet, our classrooms emphasize the English-only mantra which may be because of the remnants of British colonialism. So, our educational system fraught with colonial ideals and such undaunting dedication to the imperialism of the English language, has kept the colonial structure long after Belize became an independent nation in September 1981. The dominant language in Belize is Kriol, but we list our major language as English. This places the Kriol language in an almost inferior position next to the English language, and it is relegated there under the label “bad English” or “broken English.” However, our people speak Kriol across the country from the most northern part of the country, Corozal, to the most southern part of the country, Toledo; our people still speak Kriol. The highest-ranking political ministers and distinguished Belizean aristocrats whose positions often project superiority and the elegant visage that they have successfully assimilated into the ranks of British royalty, do understand, and speak Kriol. We all do this using code-switching because as a doctoral student, I fervently and effortlessly code-switch and all my colleagues possess this necessary survival skill at this point to just traverse the academic, the conversational, the casual, the business and the semi-formal and formal spaces. We need to code-switch and if as teachers we allow ourselves to code-switch to our benefit, then I suggest that we allow the students the opportunities to code-switch and create the space necessary for them to do so without academic prosecution. Therefore, I truly enjoyed reading this article because it shows that our classrooms have the same issues as other nations and that as a country, we should embrace the available information that will help to transition us into the positions of using our students’ first languages to the benefit of our educational system.
Thanks, Liz. I love your point about allowing our students the same flexibility and choice that we want for ourselves.
Wow, quite interesting! I thank you for sharing.
Much of our practice with Language here in Belize has been as a result of our history with colonialism. Like the rest of the world, the ability to use English as a primary discourse is considered at the highest echelons of the language system. This has brought a ‘language discrimination’ among groups. For example, our English language varies from English to Spanglish, to Creole and other minority groups. The idea of using these versions of languages can only serve as a springboard for mastery of English which is now encouraged in our schools.
As many of us already know, code-switching is an essential tool in learning a language. This approach does not only help linguistically, but culturally likewise as students begin to appreciate each other’s culture thereby narrowing the gap for discrimination.
I love all the Belizean energy here! The effects of colonialism are real and ongoing, as you point out, and language is a central site where they are felt. We must support our students in embracing the richness of their multiple languages.
Indeed, language is at the heart of all this. Our language policy recommends that teachers:
1. recognize that all students come to school with strengths in their home language;
2. plan language and literacy instruction that builds on students’ home language experiences, knowledge and skills, even when the that language is not the language of schooling;
3. where appropriate, provide initial language and literacy instruction in the a child’s home language;
4. where appropriate, evaluate students’ attainment of learning outcomes in the students preferred language;
5. in all situations, treat second-language learners respectfully and offer equal educational opportunities that honour basic general educational principles;
6. consider that bilingualism or multilingualism is desirable.
7. understand that the accumulated wisdom of research in the field of bilingualism suggests that while initial literacy learning in a second language can be successful, it is riskier than starting with the child’s home language— especially for those children affected by poverty, low levels of parental education, or poor schooling.
Reference:
Ministry of Education of Belize, (2007). Belize National Standards and Curriculum Web for Language Arts. (p.3).
Thank your for this thoughtful and thought provoking post. I am currently honored to learn with a group of Belizean literacy leaders, and some of us are in the midst of this discussion, similar to Kristen’s question, about code-switching, translanguaging, and culturally relevant/sustaining theory and pedagogy. As a former elementary teacher, I’ve been influenced by Jen McCreight’s Celebrating Diversity Through Language Study, from which I understand my own code switching better because, for me, it is relational, and that’s what I took from McCreight’s work. I get that sense from Jamila Lysicott’s 3 Ways to Speak English, too. Her work was new to me, so thank you for including it and Kristen’s question. I will invite my Belizean colleagues and McCreight to join this conversation and look forward to their contributions.
I enjoyed reading this article. It is a relevant question that requires much attention by our teachers and policymakers in the educational system. In our country, where students attend schools with different native languages, the language policy in Belize places tremendous pressure on children to become skilled users of language in School to ensure successful completion before moving on to the next level of education. As a former elementary principal, I recalled reassuring teachers that it was okay to code-switch in their classrooms so that students can truly understand. I, however, see a disconnect in some classrooms where teachers use code-switching to the extreme and allow the native language to take precedence. Unfortunately, this set the students farther away from achieving benchmarks set in the language policy and emphasizing that a particular language –American English is the language of power. This curriculum-driven mentality encourages teachers to be untrue to our students who grace our classrooms, which wealth through language. I agreed with Kirsten when she said the “conversation around code-switching becomes one of choosing among equally valid codes for a variety of purposes.”Teachers hold this valuable baton that can empower and prepare students to become users of several languages that allow them many opportunities, yet appreciating their native language, which I consider dominant, for meaningful and culturally relevant conversations.
Thank you, Sheri, for the suggestion of Jen McCreight’s book, which I haven’t seen. And I’m so happy to introduce educators to Jamila Lyiscott, who is herself a teacher educator at Amherst!