Language teacher cognition on mobilizing learners’ multilingual resources: A case study from a content and language integrated classroom in Australia

Strategic use of learners’ multilingual resources in a content and language integrated learning (CLIL) classroom enables learners to employ all of their linguistic repertoires to make sense of what they learn to construct and demonstrate new content and language understanding and skills. This study examines a CLIL teacher’s cognition – what they know, believe, think, and do – on allowing multilingual practices among learners with limited foreign language proficiency. An in-depth analysis of the qualitative data collected from a Japanese/Humanities CLIL teacher working in an Australian secondary school revealed two key findings. Namely, this study identified: (1) the influence of complex sociocultural factors in shaping a language teacher’s pedagogic decisions and actions – specifically, when and how to mobilize learners’ multilingual resources; and (2) the positive impact of teacher pedagogy in enabling students to become resourceful and agentic to work through challenging tasks persistently to achieve the desired outcomes as perceived by the teacher. It concludes by providing an implication arising from the findings, highlighting the need for re-orienting and developing language teachers’ professional knowledge and practice to leverage students’ multilingual resources while addressing complex contextual demands in their teaching.