Our Language Community

Grade Level: Kindergarten

Subjects: Language Arts and Social Studies

To create a classroom and school community where all language resources are valued and important, this unit designed for kindergarten students, Our Language Community, aims at challenging and disrupting norms about language: 1) that one named language is more important or valuable than another (for example, English in the United States); 2) English needs to be the sole language of schooling; and 3) there is only one correct way to speak and write any given language. The unit focuses on students' identities and language use, the diversity of community languages, and our love of our languages. Students conduct a survey to discover which languages their classmates speak at home. Students use this information to create multilingual home language posters and books. Through childrens literature, students are empowered to use and be proud of all language tools at their disposal. After learning about the power and diversity of language, students create a welcoming and inclusive linguistic classroom community by conducting a Linguistic Landscape Action Project in which they label classroom items in their many home languages. To act for change, the students and teacher collaborate on a letter to the school principal advocating for permission to label common school items and areas in the languages of the school community. This integrated unit meets core content standards in English Language Arts and Social Studies.