Teacher Questioning to Promote Extended Language Use for Preschool Emergent Bilinguals

Area of Science:

• Early Childhood Education
• Linguistics
• Bilingualism

Background:

• Emergent bilinguals (EBs) from Spanish-speaking households are a growing population in U.S. preschools.
• Limited research exists on language-rich discussions for EBs in English-dominant settings.
• Understanding teacher-student interactions is crucial for supporting EB language development.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine teacher questioning strategies and Spanish-English EBs' oral language use in preschool.
• To determine if and how teacher questions facilitate extended language opportunities for EBs.
• To investigate the role of Spanish in EBs' response composition.

Main Methods:

• Sequential-explanatory mixed-methods design.
• Analysis of audio recordings from seven preschool classrooms.
• Coding of teacher questioning strategies and student responses, including Spanish use.

Main Results:

• Closed-response and single-word-response questions supported EBs' extended language use.
• Student responses including Spanish utterances were predominantly extended responses.
• Spanish use is valuable for developing extended oral responses.

Conclusions:

• Equitable dialogue opportunities for EBs may require scaffolded questioning.
• Purposeful integration of Spanish in classrooms can enhance EB language development.
• Teacher strategies should intentionally support EBs' linguistic assets.