Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Date of Degree

2-2026

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Program

Urban Education

Advisor

Cecilia Espinosa

Committee Members

Debbie Fine

Michelle Fine

Beverly Falk

Subject Categories

Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education | Language and Literacy Education

Keywords

Bilingual Education, Early Childhood Education, Emergent Bilinguals, English Language Learners, Neoliberalism, Translanguaging

Abstract

The United States is home to more international immigrants than any other country in the world with about a quarter of its children learning two or more languages while growing up. This study explored teachers’ experiences with children's home languages as they learned English for the first time in a kindergarten classroom. In kindergarten, children build their emergent literacy skills as they enter the beginning stages of reading, when children use letter sounds to decode words. Because teachers have largely been left out of the debate about policy formation and curriculum on teaching reading, this study focused on teachers’ experiences teaching literacy in an urban school amidst the Science of Reading (SOR) curricular mandates. The research highlights how neoliberalism, or the privatization of public services, has shifted curriculum to teach literacy as less about meaning making within a specific culture, to literacy as more of a linguistic transaction. The subject population is two kindergarten English language learner teachers and their classrooms in a Midwestern urban school that is majority recently arrived immigrant or refugee, or emergent bilingual students. Qualitative research data gathered from 2023–2025 came from various informal and formal in-depth interviews on the use of children's home language, teaching methods, curriculum, and district policy related to emergent literacy and beginning reading. Approximately 8 weeks of classroom observations were conducted to capture the contextual use and purpose of home language while teaching English. Data found the free use of children’s home language in the school and classroom promoted friendship, oral language development, and translanguaging. Because the district measured student performance with the same standards and assessments as their monolingual peers, the teachers followed a rigorous teaching and assessment schedule to keep up with the standards. As a result, formal bilingual instruction was limited to one-on-one sessions with bilingual paraprofessionals and occasional teacher use of children’s home languages for procedural purposes. The research can inform teachers, schools, districts, and communities on best literacy practices for emergent bilingual students.

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