Representing Identity: The Importance of Literature and the Translanguaging Space for EAL/D Early Years Literacy Learning

Abstract

Quality literature is a natural fit when choosing resources to support learning in early years settings. This qualitative research reports how literary texts can be used to foster EAL/D students’ poetry writing and represent their identity. During professional learning, teachers were supported to select a range of engaging literary texts and design quality literacy experiences focused on thirdspace drama and other creative strategies. Students were afforded agency to respond to the texts and then employed Janks’ redesign cycle to craft identity text poems using their home language(s) and English. The lesson sequence generated a creative translanguaging space, and the poems highlight the richness of the students’ stories and give voice to their distinctive views of self and the world.