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Pedagogical translanguaging in digital environments. Teaching and learning with tablets in a multilingual Norwegian classroom

  • Dag Freddy Røed ORCID logo EMAIL logo and Kristin Vold Lexander
Published/Copyright: October 21, 2025
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Educational Linguistics
From the journal Educational Linguistics Volume 4 Issue 2

Abstract

Owing to increasing linguistic diversity in Norwegian classrooms, the national curriculum requires teachers to incorporate a resource perspective on multilingualism in their teaching Many of these classrooms have also become heavily digitized. Few studies, however, have concerned themselves with how these two developments interact, that is, how teachers utilize tablets for educational achievement in linguistically diverse classrooms. This study analyses in detail how two teachers in a multilingual fourth-grade classroom in Norway use tablets as an integral part of their didactic design to incorporate students’ heritage languages and funds of knowledge into the language arts class. The data consists of classroom observations, interviews with teachers and students, and selected screen recordings from students’ tablets. Applying a key incident approach, the analysis demonstrates that teachers make use of the opportunities offered by the tablets for pedagogical translanguaging practices and that the students respond by mobilizing various aspects of their semiotic repertoires. The students also expressed enjoyment during the design, in particular when drawing on their parents as resources and when taking on the role of language experts during metalinguistic conversations in class.

Keywords: digital technologies; translanguaging literacies; multimodal text creation; heritage languages as resources; funds of knowledge; teachers as knowledge generators
Corresponding author: Dag Freddy Røed, Department of Scandinavian Language and Literature, University of Inland Norway – Hamar Campus, Hamar, Norway, E-mail:

  1. Research ethics: The study was approved by Sikt – Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research (reference number: 318535).

  2. Informed consent: Informed consent was obtained from all individuals included in this study.

  3. Author contributions: All authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this manuscript and approved its submission.

  4. Conflict of interest: Authors state no conflict of interest.

  5. Research funding: None declared.

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Received: 2025-09-09
Accepted: 2025-09-23
Published Online: 2025-10-21
Published in Print: 2025-12-17

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Editorial
  3. Introduction: critical multimodal literacy. Advancing educational linguistics in teacher education
  4. Research Articles
  5. Engaging the stuff of words: language materiality and symbolic power
  6. Overview of the emergence of an academic register in non-written languages: the case of sign languages
  7. Social transformation and liberating language education in challenging times: Southern voices and perspectives
  8. Pedagogical translanguaging in digital environments. Teaching and learning with tablets in a multilingual Norwegian classroom
  9. English language teaching in the digital age: narrative across the media, multiliteracies, and blogs
  10. Use of a robot in an imaginary space. Robot-assisted language learning with a friendship booklet (carnet d’amitié)
  11. Regular Article
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https://doi.org/10.1515/eduling-2025-0019
Keywords for this article
digital technologies; translanguaging literacies; multimodal text creation; heritage languages as resources; funds of knowledge; teachers as knowledge generators

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Editorial
  3. Introduction: critical multimodal literacy. Advancing educational linguistics in teacher education
  4. Research Articles
  5. Engaging the stuff of words: language materiality and symbolic power
  6. Overview of the emergence of an academic register in non-written languages: the case of sign languages
  7. Social transformation and liberating language education in challenging times: Southern voices and perspectives
  8. Pedagogical translanguaging in digital environments. Teaching and learning with tablets in a multilingual Norwegian classroom
  9. English language teaching in the digital age: narrative across the media, multiliteracies, and blogs
  10. Use of a robot in an imaginary space. Robot-assisted language learning with a friendship booklet (carnet d’amitié)
  11. Regular Article
  12. English tutors’ emotions, agency, and identity development in the aftermath of China’s Double Reduction policy
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