School language policies: a case for research-informed, cohesive policies

Language plays a crucial role in education; yet, on a daily basis teachers and school leaders must navigate a complex web of competing and often conflicting priorities in relation to various dimensions of language education. This includes supporting students’ first language and literacy development, sustaining the teaching of foreign languages in the curriculum and considering the role of other community or home languages spoken by students. However, while issues of language are undoubtedly relevant to all teachers, school-level language policies, which aim to provide explicit guidance underpinned by a clear set of principles, are too often conspicuous by their absence. For example, teachers are often left to their own devices to decide whether and how to allow space for other languages in the classroom; questions arise such as whether to use the first language in the foreign language classroom, or whether to ‘allow’ migrant students to use their home language as a resource for learning. This paper, therefore, aims to provide an overview of some of the key theoretical perspectives on multilingualism in the classroom and to consider some practical implications for schools when developing research-informed language policies. It will draw briefly on some preliminary findings from a project which analysed school policies relating to language across a representative sample of 998 secondary schools in England. A case will be made for teachers and researchers to collaborate to develop research-informed, cohesive school-level language policies which incorporate all dimensions of languages in schools.

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