Teachers’ beliefs related to language choice in immigrant students’ homes




Alisaari Jenni, Sissonen Salla, Heikkola Leena Maria

PublisherElsevier

2021

Teaching and Teacher Education

103347

103

1

10

1879-2480

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2021.103347

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0742051X21000718

https://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/53711025



This study investigates how Finnish teachers regard immigrant families’ home language policies. Of the
teachers who responded, 53.3% believed it best for parents to speak their first languages at home, and
31.7% believed that both first language and language of instruction should be used at home. A minority of
the teachers believed that only Finnish should be spoken at home. The teachers’ justifications for their
beliefs reflected Ruiz’s (1984) orientations in language planning: language-as-right, language-as-resource, and language-as-problem, with most teachers oriented toward language-as-resource. Thus,
many teachers’ beliefs align with the current educational stance of supporting multilingualism.


Last updated on 2024-26-11 at 15:55