Search

Community language schools have grown to become significant educational language providers worldwide. Schools operate as global grassroot initiatives (Liddicoat and Taylor-Leech [2014]. "Micro Language Planning for Multilingual Education: Agency in Local Contexts." "Current Issues in Language Planning" 15 (3): 237-244.), and the last 20 years has seen a steep incline of important research in these schools, exploring their aims, purposes, practices, and how they serve their communities. A sturdy body of research is thus emerging, focussing primarily on schools within large immigrant communities of Asian background. This study aims to contribute to our understanding of the aims and purpose of these schools by drawing on findings from a study situated within with in a smaller, immigrant community. Taking a poststructural approach to language learning, this ethnographic study drew on investment theory (Norton [2010]. "Identity, Literacy, and English-language Teaching." TESL Canada Journal 28 (1): 1-13; [2013]. "Identity and Language Learning: Extending the Conversation." 2nd ed. Bristol: Multilingual Matters; Norton and Toohey [2011]. "Identity, Language Learning, and Social Change." "Language Teaching" 44 (4): 412-446) and in particular imagined communities (Anderson [1983]. Imagined Communities. London: Verso; [1991]. "Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism." Rev ed. New York: Verso) and cultural capital (Bourdieu [1985]. "The Social Space and the Genesis of Groups." "Social Science Information" 24 (2): 195-220) to understand students' reasons for attending a Swedish community language school in Australia. Seven students (aged 12-16) were interviewed. Findings from the thematic analysis that students were able to re-invest their heritage language proficiencies as bilingual markers of distinction, thus liberating themselves from monoglossic ideologies often underpinning these schools (e.g. Blackledge and Creese [2010]. "Multilingualism: A Critical Perspective." London: Continuum).

This study explores community language school teachers' access to classroom resources and school facilities within a framework of educational equity. Community language schools are significant language education providers that exist worldwide. In Australia, as elsewhere in the world, these schools often borrow a classroom at a mainstream school to hold lessons on weeknights and weekends. Nonetheless, they are often perceived as marginalized in wider educational contexts and emerging evidence suggest tense relationships between community language schools and mainstream educators. This study explores community language school teacher's access to educational tools and resources when borrowing a classroom at a mainstream school. It is situated in the context of New South Wales (NSW) where approximately 3000 teachers teach community languages to more than 30,000 students on weekends and weeknights. 167 community language school teachers responded to a survey about their access to classroom resources and school facilities during teaching. Findings showed that there were significant differences across schools in terms of access to resources, in particular technology. This brings to the forefront issues of unequal opportunity within broader educational contexts. This paper then argue that such inequalities continue to reinforce marginalized positions of community language schools.

In the past decade, there has been increased scholarly interest in the purpose and functions of community language schools, also known as heritage, supplementary or complementary schools. In particular, previous studies have focused on schools operating in minority communities deriving from Asian and Eastern-European countries, showing that notions of identity and belonging to a "mother country" are key purposes of these schools. However, community language schools in Australia operate in minority communities with diverse cultural, historical, social and migration histories and findings from other studies may not be generalisable to other community language schools. To broaden our understanding of the aims and purpose of these schools and to allow for meaningful comparisons, this study focuses on parents reasons for enrolling their children at a Swedish community language school in Australia, often described as a "high-shift," "non-visible" minority community. Seven parents were interviewed. Findings show that reasons for perpetuating Swedish language derived from notions of identity and belonging, but that parents also aimed for their children to invest in Swedish language as cultural capital valuable in Sweden, Australia and elsewhere.

Community language schools are complementary schools set up and run by minority communities in Australia. They aim to assist in intergenerational language and identity transmission, but previous research has indicated that these schools position their students in monolingual ways that contradicts how bilingual speakers use their language in contemporary society. As a result, it has been proposed to teach these students through bilingual practices. Drawing on findings from research into the learning sciences, this study aims to explore how students construct their participation in a monolingual learning environment when taught online. Two students aged 14-16 taught in a blended mode (every second lesson online and every second lesson in a classroom) video recorded themselves during their online lessons. Data were analysed using multimodal interaction analysis. The results show how student agency increased outside of the learning environment where students repositioned themselves as peripheral learners and drew on scaffolding with humans and technology through bilingual practices to construct new knowledge.