Conditions and effects of the work with translanguaging – seven teachers’ experiences

The overall purpose of the study is to investigate how Swedish teachers work with translanguaging. Specifically, how the teachers put the concept of translanguaging into practice and what experiences, effects and challenges that practice has resulted in. The data collection method used for this study was semi-structed qualitative interviews with teachers who use translanguaging in their multilingual classroom. The interviews were transcribed before a thematic analysis was conducted on the interview material to obtain central themes and interesting aspects. The result of the study shows that the teachers use general working methods that are adaptable to suit many different purposes in different subjects when teaching translanguaging. The teachers’ pupils will for example work in groups divided by their strongest language, with tasks concerning translation and comparison of different languages. The result also shows that the dedication of teachers and their positive attitude towards multilingualism is a condition for the introduction of translanguaging. Regarding effects of translanguaging, the teachers have primarily seen effects on the pupils’ motivation and an improved possibility to strengthen the pupils’ identities. Concrete effects on the pupils’ learning is not mentioned by the teachers except by the three teachers who work with pupils newly arrived in Sweden. These three teachers have seen an improvement on their pupils´ language skills in Swedish. Finally, the teachers problematize the support of school management, colleagues' attitudes and society's norms. The results show that these three factors can either be positive for the introduction of translanguaging or pose a challenge, depending on whether there is support available and whether the attitudes and norms are positive or negative