This book provides a multifaceted, multilayered examination of the processes and challenges language teachers face in constructing their professional identities in multilingual contexts such as Hong Kong. It focuses on how professional and personal identities are enacted as individuals cross geographic, educational, and socio-cultural boundaries to become English language teachers in Hong Kong. It explores the construction of language teachers’ professional identities from multiple perspectives in multiple settings, including pre-service and in-service teachers from Hong Kong, Mainland China, and Western countries. Understanding the difficulties and challenges these language teachers face in their identity and professional development is of relevance to teachers and teacher educators, as well as those interested in becoming language teachers in multilingual contexts.

This collection examines a diverse range of approaches to multilingualism in teacher education programmes across Europe and North America. The authors investigate how pre-service teachers are being prepared to work in multilingual contexts and discuss the key features of current pre-service teacher education initiatives that address the increasing linguistic and cultural diversity evident in classrooms in their respective countries. The focus is not only on migrant-background learners but includes students from Indigenous, autochthonous and heritage language backgrounds, and speakers of minoritised regional varieties. The chapters contextualise, both historically and ideologically, the specific initiatives and measures taken in the participating countries. They also reveal the complexity of each educational context and the role that history, language policies and institutional and programmatic priorities play in the development and implementation of a multilingual focus in teacher education. In exploring how pre-service teachers are being prepared to work in multilingual contexts, the authors take a critical view of how multilingualism itself is conceptualised within and across contexts. The book highlights the valuable impact that explicit instruction on theories of multilingualism, pedagogies in multilingual classrooms and lived realities of multilingual children can have on the beliefs and practices of pre-service teachers.

It is clearly illogical to search for one good, universal solution for multilingual education when educational contexts differ so widely due to demographic and social factors. The situation is further complicated by the motivations of learners and teachers, and by attitudes towards multilingualism and ‘otherness’. The studies in this volume seek to investigate not only whether certain solutions and practices are ‘good’, but also when and for whom they make sense. The book covers a wide range of Western multilingual contexts, and uncovers common themes and practices, shared aims and preoccupations, and often similar solutions, within seemingly diverse contexts. In addition to chapters based on empirical data, this book offers theoretical contributions in the shape of a discussion of the appropriateness of L1-Ln terminology when discussing complex multilingual realities, and looks at how the age factor works in classroom settings.

The chapters in this book all address the significance of the relationship between the aims and methods of language teaching and the contexts in which it takes place. Some consider the implications for the ways in which we research language teaching; others present the results of research and development work.

This book offers an international account of the use of linguistic landscapes to promote multilingual education, from primary school to the university, and in teacher education programs. It brings linguistic landscapes to the forefront of multilingual education in school settings and teacher education, expanding the disciplinary domains through which they have been studied. Drawing on multidisciplinarity and placing linguistic landscapes in the field of language (teacher) education, this book presents empirical studies developed in eleven countries: Australia, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Mozambique, The Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, Spain, and The United States. The chapters illustrate how multilingual pedagogies can be enhanced using linguistic landscapes in mainstream education and are written by partners of the Erasmus Plus project LoCALL “LOcal Linguistic Landscapes for global language education in the school context”.

This collection examines a diverse range of approaches to multilingualism in teacher education programmes across Europe and North America. The authors investigate how pre-service teachers are being prepared to work in multilingual contexts and discuss the key features of current pre-service teacher education initiatives that address the increasing linguistic and cultural diversity evident in classrooms in their respective countries. The focus is not only on migrant-background learners but includes students from Indigenous, autochthonous and heritage language backgrounds, and speakers of minoritised regional varieties. The chapters contextualise, both historically and ideologically, the specific initiatives and measures taken in the participating countries. They also reveal the complexity of each educational context and the role that history, language policies and institutional and programmatic priorities play in the development and implementation of a multilingual focus in teacher education. In exploring how pre-service teachers are being prepared to work in multilingual contexts, the authors take a critical view of how multilingualism itself is conceptualised within and across contexts. The book highlights the valuable impact that explicit instruction on theories of multilingualism, pedagogies in multilingual classrooms and lived realities of multilingual children can have on the beliefs and practices of pre-service teachers.

By bringing together research, theory, and best practices from a variety of contexts (ESL/EFL, foreign language, bilingual and immersion education), this book contributes to building meaningful professional dialogue among second-language teacher educators.