En Comunidad: Lessons for Centering the Voices and Experiences of Bilingual Latinx Students

By Carla Espana,Luz Yadira Herrera

Drs. Carla España and Luz Yadira Herrera’s schooling and teaching journey reveal the power of educators to create either liberating or dehumanizing spaces and experiences for bilingual Latinx students.

En Comunidad brings bilingual Latinx students’ perspectives to the center of our classrooms. Its culturally and linguistically sustaining lessons begin with a study of language practices in students’ lives and texts, helping both children and teachers think about their ideas on language. These lessons then lay out a path for students’ and families’ storytelling, a critical analysis of historical narratives impacting current realities, ways to develop a social justice stance, and the use of poetry in sustaining the community.

As the largest group of bilinguals in the U.S., bilingual Latinx students need teachers to not just welcome them into their classrooms, but also to advocate with and for them, for their languages, and for their lives. En Comunidad offers classroom-ready lessons that amplify the varied stories and identities of Latinx children.
Each sequence of lessons follows a critical bilingual literacies framework for any educator teaching bilingual Latinx children and:
• focuses on issues of language, literacies, and power
• recommends carefully-curated texts and multimodal resources featuring Latinx voices
• centers a translanguaging pedagogy that honors bilingual Latinx students’ language practices.
“In this book, España and Herrera treat seriously the idea that the cultural and linguistic practices of Latinx children are legitimate and should be made central to their educational experiences. It is a must-read for all educators who work with Latinx students.”
―Nelson Flores, Ph.D., Penn Graduate School of Education