Putting translanguaging into practice: A view from England

Our understandings of multilingualism have changed significantly over the last 50 years. Whilst there is broad agreement of the positive benefits of multilingualism, we are still debating how best to harness and make use of multilingualism with respect to curriculum and pedagogy in different contexts. Many teachers find themselves working around tensions between monolingual educational policies and multilingual classroom realities. Translanguaging offers us potential new and flexible ways of responding to the needs and practices of multilingual students and addressing gaps between policy and classroom realities. In this paper, we explore the opportunities and constraints of adopting translanguaging practices in publicly funded schools in England where greater school-based curriculum autonomy is being mooted. Our discussion is informed by an analysis of policy documents and teacher interview data, which allowed us to begin to map out an agenda for change with regard to the realisation of translanguaging pedagogies within state-funded educational contexts in England.