Sociolinguistics and Language Education.pdf

28 Part 1: Language and Ideology
(King, 2004), among other studies. Variations in individual, family and
group experience, along with changes over time, continually alter linguistic
ideologies.
A growing body of research shows that sustained efforts to create environments
that include activities, artifacts and practices that constantly and
explicitly valorize the fi rst languages of learners in multilingual settings
outside as well as inside schools are key to learner and program success
(Suárez-Orozco et al., 2008). All such efforts include an ideological component
that acts to promote the value of the language used in home and community
settings and, simultaneously, to counteract the ambivalent or
negative messages of the larger, dominant culture (see also Duff, this
volume; Bayley & Schecter, 2003; Freeman, 1998; and Potowski, 2007).
These efforts take place within homes, as parents strive to assist children
with acquisition of language and literacy in fi rst, second and sometimes
even third languages. Zentella’s (2005) collection includes attention to
some forms of family assistance provided to their children by Hispanic
families in California (also documented in Chavez, 2007, and Delgado-
Gaitán, 2001) and New York; some are similar to those noted by Dagenais
and Moore (2008), who report on the support for development of Chinese
offered by Chinese parents with children in early French–English immersion
programs. Importantly, such family support is not confi ned to the
home, but extends to community settings such as play groups, public celebrations,
religious services and other venues where use of non-majority
languages could and would be natural. Concerned parents not only help
with homework and practice reading in more than one language, but they
also ensure that their children participate, to the extent possible, in social
activities, informal and formal, with other speakers of their own languages.
As family circumstances allow, they ensure that learners see and use audio
and print materials in their native languages and even enroll them in supplementary
schools using these languages (Peterson & Heywood, 2007).
Following Fishman’s (1991) dictum that school instruction alone cannot
effect full language profi ciency or inspire interest in genuine language
use, educational agencies concerned with language development and
revitalization have increased their impact through creation of attractive,
age-appropriate materials that have a life beyond the classroom. One
example is the English–Navajo bilingual newspaper published by high
school students at the Rock Point Community School (McLaughlin, 1992);
another is the development of a CD-ROM related to hockey, a sport popular
with many Ojibwe youth (Williams, 2002); another comes from a program
to revive and promote Welsh for use by families with infants and
very young children, which provided parents with a CD and bilingual
Welsh–English coloring and activity book, both of which could be used
repeatedly, whenever they might fi t into a family’s routine (Edwards &
Newcombe, 2005). All these innovative materials give children, young