9

he Genealogy of Educational Change:

Educating to Capitalize Migrant Students1
Luisa Martín Rojo (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

Researching in multilingual and multicultural schools in Madrid

During the last two decades, the Madrid region, traditionally a destination for
migration from other parts of Spain, has become one of the preferred destina-
tions of workers from other countries, most of them from (and in this order)
Ecuador, Colombia, Romania, Peru, Morocco, Bolivia, China and the Dominican
Republic. According to data published by Madrid City Hall, students of foreign
origin now represent around 15 per cent of the total school population, while
in the city centre this igure rises to 34 per cent (see Plan Madrid de convivencia
social e intercultural [Madrid Plan for Social and Intercultural Relations]
2004–2008).2 In consequence, the cultural and sociolinguistic environment has
also evolved and school populations are less homogeneous than they used to
be. Recently, the economic crisis has changed migration trends, but in spite of
this the impact of linguistic and cultural diversity is still pervasive in Spanish
schools.
Within this context of increasing diversity, the issue of inequality has become
a signiicant focus of research in sociolinguistics and discourse studies due
to the crucial role played by schools, not only in competence-building and
social development, but also in normalization (i.e. in the construction of an
idealized norm of conduct which becomes taken for granted or ‘natural’ in
everyday life) and social mobility (i.e. allowing and restricting the movement of
individuals or groups up [or down] from one socio-economic level to another).
his signiicant role played by schools, as social institutions, is rooted in the
production and distribution of knowledge and other forms of symbolic capital,
which take place through educational practices. Bourdieu identiies three

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 196 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

dimensions of capital, each with its own relationship to class: economic, cultural
and social. hese three resources become socially efective, and their ownership
is legitimized through the mediation of symbolic capital. Economic and cultural
capital have their own modes of existence (money, shares; examinations and
diplomas), whereas symbolic capital exists only in the ‘eyes of others’. It inevi-
tably assumes an ideological function; it gives legitimized forms of distinction
and classiication a taken-for-granted character, and thus conceals the arbitrary
way in which forms of capital are distributed among individuals in society (see
Bourdieu, 1986).
By analysing the production and distribution of linguistic and cultural
resources, we can analyse the extent to which the function of schools contra-
dicts the principles of democracy and equity that schools are committed
to (see Heller [2007] and Martín Rojo [2010a] for a detailed analysis). My
own research has contributed to revealing the role of schools, and particu-
larly the management of languages and other linguistic resources through
linguistic practices in the classroom, in the rising dropout rate among migrants’
descendants at the conclusion of obligatory education and their premature entry
into the job market as unskilled workers (Martín Rojo, 2010a).
In order to study changes in progress in Madrid schools, from 2001 to
2009, I coordinated an ethnographic study to observe them, every day and
at close range. To do so, it was necessary to share the teaching and learning
space, to watch and to listen attentively, in order to identify behaviour patterns
and the attitudes underlying the views expressed. In exchange, we undertook
to involve ourselves in the life and problems of each school and to ofer the
results of our investigations in order to improve educational practices. We
thus began a journey in which our everyday presence in the classrooms, staf-
rooms, corridors and playgrounds, in which our participation in classes and in
conversations over cofee or during ater-class activities, gave rise to a mesh of
relationships through which information could be exchanged. As time passed,
the initial distance between us changed; the researchers came to be seen as
mediators between teachers and students, who regarded us as allies, coniding
their concerns and describing their impressions of the school experience.
his chapter focuses, precisely, on the changes that took place in the procedures
and methods of teaching the language of instruction to newcomer students at
Villababel, a secondary school in Madrid (Spain), where I did participant obser-
vation. Without ignoring other reasons for these changes, I shall pay particular
attention to the efects of the pervasive exchanges of points of view and educa-
tional stances among teachers, students and researchers during the ieldwork.

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 197

I shall also analyse the consequences of these changes. As in previous

research conducted in this ield, my aim was to explore the role played by
linguistic practices in constructing inequalities in schools – and in this respect,
the use made by speakers of linguistic resources in this construction. his
topic was raised continually by the researchers in interviews and commented
on in their observations of Villababel.2 As we will see in the following pages,
the changes made to the Spanish as a second language programme (SSL) were
closely linked to the question of how to overcome inequalities and to ensure full
access to education.
Without doubt, the increased circulation of people creates increasingly
frequent situations in which people coexist but do not share the same language
or language variety; they belong to diferent communities, which may have
diferent values, attitudes and communicative uses. At school, too, there are
students of diferent origins who may be members of diferent social and ethnic
groups, occupying diferent social positions, who may form part of a minority
or a majority, who have more or less prestige and who face greater or lesser
demands to converge with and adapt to the standards of other speakers and
groups (for an overview of previous studies in the ield and how they have
addressed this issue, see Martín Rojo, 2010b).
In previous studies (Martín Rojo, 2010a, 2010b), I analysed this distri-
bution of legitimized languages, knowledge and programmes, and how it is
negotiated within classroom interactions, paying particular attention to how
students seek to acquire capital (such as the legitimate language of the school)
to improve their situation and to learn. However, these capitalization moves
may be constrained or even impeded by other participants. In fact, in social
selection processes, the impact appears to be particularly strong when linguistic
educational programmes (e.g. Spanish as a second language programme) fail to
provide students with the resources they need to succeed in school (see Martín
Rojo, 2010a, 2013a). I termed this process ‘decapitalization’, by means of which
students’ access to the resources they need to succeed is not facilitated or is even
impeded (see Martín Rojo, 2010a, 2013a, 2013b).
An analysis of the processes of capitalization and decapitalization shows the
classroom to be an area of struggle in which all participants share a high degree
of agency. In fact, as Gómez Fernández (2011) shows, the integration of new
students into a class can be seen as a process of the progressive acquisition of
legitimate resources, which is completed only when these students control the
required linguistic resources, and in turn are in a position to support or hinder
their acquisition by a further cohort of newcomers. hese conlicts relect the

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 198 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

intricate nature of participation and the level of control exerted by community

members.
As we will analyse in this chapter, our previous research on inequality has had
an impact on the changes made to the Spanish as a second language programme.
he illuminating nature of an ethnographic approach stems precisely from the
fact that the participation of the researcher(s) in the activities brings insight
through proximity, but at the cost of distortion. In Burawoy’s words (1998:
17), ‘A social order reveals itself in the way it responds to pressure’. Aware that
even the most passive observer produces ripples worthy of examination, this
chapter goes a step further; while sharing Burawoy’s views, it explores how
the knowledge produced by this kind of research, and the problematization
it entails, concerning linguistic programmes and the naturalized knowledge
about newcomer students, ethnicities and Spanish society in general, increases
teachers’ and students’ awareness of the relation between educational practices
and social processes.3 his knowledge also helps create the conditions for
new ways to approach the implementation of such programmes, and informs
teachers’ and students’ demands and expectations.
In order to understand how these social processes take place. Firstly, I
present the school and educational linguistics programmes. Secondly, I present
the analytical framework and the research questions addressed. hirdly, I
explain the context of the changes introduced and the way the programmes
are implemented, focusing at the point where they were accepted, and moving
towards what makes them acceptable. Finally, I focuses on the outcomes of
these changes and on how they give rise to processes of capitalization among the
students studied. In section 6, some conclusions are drawn on the genealogy of
these changes.

Linguistic educational programmes at Villababel school

Villababel is a secondary school located in the southeast quarter of Madrid in

a traditionally working-class area. he area has a history of migration from the
Spanish regions, especially Andalusia, Castilla-La Mancha and Extremadura,
by workers who settled in the 1960s, followed by new migrants from other
countries, who have since the 1990s been settling in the Madrid region, which
is now home to a million immigrants from some 168 countries.
he school has a pyramidal structure, with seven groups in the irst grade of
compulsory secondary education (ESO) and only one group in the top grade

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 199

(Bachillerato), relecting the high dropout rate between ESO and the advanced
levels. Students in the English bilingual programme constitute only 180 of
the 780 students in the school, and only seven of these are from a migrant
background. Some twenty students, in two classes, were enrolled in the Spanish
as a second language programme when this study was carried out. In addition,
a considerable number of students (around 30 per cent) were taking special
programmes, with curricular adaptations to the regular syllabus.
At that time, Villababel school was institutionally managing multilingualism
through two language programmes:

he Spanish–English bilingual programme, a pilot programme run

by the Spanish Ministry of Education and the British Council4
his programme, as implemented in primary schools, is based on a whole-
school approach, under which all children enrolled have the same educational
opportunities, regardless of their socio-economic or other circumstances. In
secondary education, however, bilingual education is not ofered to the whole
school; it is only available to those students considered to be competent in the
two languages of instruction, Spanish and English. hus, at Villababel, only
one group was taking the bilingual programme in each grade. he students in
this group either had successfully completed a bilingual programme in primary
education or had demonstrated suicient competence in both languages to
enter the secondary education programme. his condition represented a de
facto selection of students. At the time of this study, Villababel had 143 students
(18 per cent) enrolled in the bilingual programme, which was in its fourth year
in the 2008–9 academic year. he following subjects were taught in English:
English Literacy (ive hours per week); Geography and History (three hours per
week); Science (three hours per week); Arts and Crats (three hours per week);
Technology (three hours per week).

he Spanish as a second language programme for newcomers: the

Bridging Class
In 2002, the irst speciic programme for the children of immigrant workers
came into operation in Madrid,5 with the aim of facilitating their transition
to mainstream schooling. However, in many cases this was not achieved, and
students were transferred from this programme to others, leading to their early
entry into the labour market. As I have observed previously, the approach to

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language teaching in these classes, in which little or no emphasis is placed on

acquiring the content and language skills required in the subjects studied in the
mainstream groups, is one of the main reasons why full integration does not
take place (Martín Rojo, 2010a). In this programme, students have to remain
in the language classes for ive to six hours per day, until they achieve an
adequate level of Spanish proiciency to be transferred to mainstream classes.
In Villababel, the number of students in the programme decreased during the
2008–9 academic year, when our ieldwork was conducted. At the outset, there
were thirteen pupils in two bridging classes – Bridging Class 1 and Bridging Class
2 – but this number subsequently decreased to six, in a single class. his fall in
the student population took place because some students were incorporated
into the corresponding mainstream group, and the others were assigned to a
lower achievement group, as a second transition procedure.
he bridging class programme was taught by four teachers. Two of them,
Juan and Lucía, who taught Spanish language to secondary school students,
had had recent experience in teaching Spanish as a second language, and had
taken a training course in this area. In addition, Alicia had taught Spanish as a
foreign language in the Netherlands, and before that she had taught English in
a primary school. Finally, Nerea had a diferent background, in addition to her
experience as a Spanish language teacher, that facilitated her access to students
in other subject areas. She had been teaching biology at Villababel, but was
transferred to the bridging class at Villababel four years previously when her
post was illed by a teacher who could teach biology in English, as part of a
Spanish–English bilingual programme.

he analytical frame

he data analysis carried out in this chapter is interactional-based (focused

on examples from the sixty-ive classroom interactions recorded in the two
bridging class programmes). However, in order to understand the dimension
of the changes introduced by the teachers at the end of the academic year, the
analysis encompasses other kinds of data: irst, the institutional documentation
of the school and of the educational programmes (school projects, subject
syllabuses, information on the composition of the student body, etc.), these
documents show the aims determined by the administration and the school
for the educational linguistic programmes; second, teachers’ and students’
voices, attitudes and ideologies were analysed from focus groups and in-depth

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 201

interviews; inally, data on students’ marks and trajectories allow us to assess

the value of the results obtained from these educational programmes and the
impact of the changes introduced. Audio-recordings were made throughout the
school year, but particularly at the beginning of the year, at the beginning of the
second term and at the end of the third term, when the year-end exams were
being held.
As we will see, the implementation of these new linguistic programmes in
education has inluenced the deinition of the ‘language of instruction’; but as
I show in this chapter, it has also had a broader impact on how language and
cultural capital is valued, on students’ trajectories and on how schools organize
their activities. In order to understand how these social processes take place,
my analysis of interactional dynamics within the classroom, and of the in-depth
interviews with teachers and students, focuses on how symbolic capital is
managed, and on whether this management could give rise to the processes of
capitalization and decapitalization I discussed in an earlier study (Martín Rojo,
2010a).
My analysis of how the distribution of symbolic capital through linguistic
practices takes place was based on the following three questions:

1 How are classroom activities organized and coordinated? Speciically: (i)

what is the pedagogical focus of the teacher? (ii) how does this focus shape
activities in the class? (iii) what is the participation framework through
which these activities are developed?
2 What languages, knowledge and participants can enter the scenario? hat
is, which elements are allowed front stage and which are forced backstage?
his placement encompasses: (i) the languages and topics taught in the
classrooms; (ii) the knowledge presupposed and the inferences required.
3 How are social representations built into the discourse? Speciically: (i)
how are the processes (education, educational programmes) and agents
(students, teachers) represented within class interactions and interviews?
(ii) are these representations negotiated? (iii) are they challenged?

In order to answer these questions, a praxis-oriented approach is needed,

focusing on the relation between the way in which classroom interaction is
organized (activities, objectives, topics, participation framework, sequences,
legitimate languages and participants brought to the front) and the teacher’s
pedagogical focus, i.e. their decisions about what is to be learned, how and when
(see Seedhouse [2004] for a similar approach; and for a detailed analysis Martin
Rojo, 2010a: 137–84). his pedagogical focus is shaped by teachers’ own views

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 202 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

on education, and in this particular case on the Spanish as a second language

programme, i.e. their approach to it (mainly a focus on language, on content,
or a balanced focus on content and language), and to the students themselves,
including the languages they present, their background knowledge and experi-
ences, personal situations and home environment. hese views on education
establish the goals of the teaching–learning process, which, in the case in
question, hinge on providing students with the competences and skills they
need to compete in this and other social domains. However, the analysis of the
interactions recorded in these and other classes also reveals to what extent this
pedagogical focus is inluenced by teachers’ expectations. hese expectations
are related to the prestige the educational programmes are considered to have
and to teachers’ understanding of linguistic, educational and ethnic diferences.
In order to develop this analytical approach, diferent analytical tools have
to be mobilised (for a rationale, see Martín Rojo, 2010a: 51–89). Educational
ideologies and methods can be observed in the analysis of participation (the
participation frame, the Initiation-Response-Evaluation (IRE) sequences and
their variation, turn management, etc.). In fact, a contrastive analysis of the
Spanish as a second language programme before and ater the changes intro-
duced by teachers shows, as we will see, a change in the types of participation.
Whereas in language-centred tasks previous to the transformation of the
programme we are studying, students’ participation was restricted by forms of
elicitation that demanded short answers, mere repetitions or the selection of a
particular item, in Excerpt 5 below we will see how the student contributes to
the construction of the educational activity and knowledge. (For a comparative
analysis of interactional dynamics and the processes of (de)capitalization in
diferent programmes, see Martín Rojo, 2013a, 2013b.)
Educational ideologies can explain which elements are placed front stage
and which are relegated to the backstage area in lessons, and in particular, to
what extent students’ voices, languages and experiences are included by the
teacher (Gofman’s dramaturgical metaphor [1967] and Gumperz’s conver-
sation inference [1996] are key analytical tools in this analysis; see Martín Rojo,
2010a, 2013a). It is precisely through this distribution of resources (languages,
knowledge, competences, participants) within the class that the distribution of
symbolic resources takes place.
Finally, the construction of a norm or the evaluation of students’ perfor-
mance and behaviour not only produces school, interactional or academic
knowledge in the classroom, but also provides information about the identity
conferred upon the students and about the expectations held regarding their

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 203

future school trajectories. In relation to this, changes in the representation

of students seem to be associated with the changes in the organization of
the programme, the content and the methods implemented (in this case, the
analysis of categorization and the representation of processes and discursive
(de)legitimation moves are signiicant analytical tools).
Answering these three questions can help us reach a better understanding
of the management of symbolic capital in schools. his management encom-
passes various aspects: irst, the process by which value is assigned to linguistic
varieties and communicative practices; second, what is actually at stake, namely
the resources (languages, knowledge, norms) that are required in order to
succeed at school; inally, the extent to which educational practice provides
students with the capital required and, moreover, allows new capital formation.

he genealogy of change

In the second semester of 2008–9, however, the implementation of this

programme changed radically, and the outcome was revealing. It is this change
that we shall now analyse. In this section I trace the shit in ‘conditions of possi-
bility’ in which we can think of historical development and politics. he point
of a genealogical analysis (in Foucault’s terms) is to show that a given system of
thought (in this case, the understanding of education, and the understanding of
social integration through linguistic education) is the result of contingent turns
of history, not the outcome of rationally inevitable trends. Particularly in the
case I am analysing, the researchers had a signiicant role in the production of
the conditions necessary for the possibility of such knowledge.
he teachers’ task in the SSL programme was not an easy one. In this
programme, students attended both mainstream classes and special classes
aimed at developing skills in the language of instruction. However, the primary
focus of these lessons was on Spanish grammar, vocabulary, and reading and
listening comprehension, rather than on academic content, which was delivered
in the mainstream instruction. Furthermore, there was hardly any consideration
of other educational policies aimed at transforming and adapting the organi-
zation of the school, teaching materials, the curriculum or teaching/learning
strategies in order to integrate those students who were learning the language of
instruction into mainstream classes. Furthermore, at Villababel, as the students
in this language programme were grouped by age and not by skill level–groups
were very heterogeneous. During the irst few months, the impact of this

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heterogeneity was less evident, as the students were being introduced to the
language; but as they started with other subjects, too, the diferences between
the students became increasingly evident, and some had considerable diiculty
in following mainstream classes.
he content and activities in these lessons responded to the teachers’
pedagogical focus, i.e. their decisions about what would be learned, how and
when, in this case Spanish language. Furthermore, the topics studied at the
beginning of the year addressed familiar content and basic vocabulary more
than acquiring an academic register (see ig. 9.1). In fact, the vocabulary, struc-
tures and communicative skills related to these topics could have been learned
by these students in everyday exchanges with their Spanish classmates, and
difered considerably from the resources they needed to speak, read and write
about the content addressed in standard classes (such as the water cycle and new
energy sources).
In Excerpt 1, we see an example of the kind of activities developed in this
class and focusing on language. In the excerpt, the students are beginning
the SSL class with one of their teachers, Juan. He is proposing a listening and
comprehension activity, based on family and relationship Spanish vocabulary,
a introductory considering that this class takes place in February, i.e. several
months ater the course began. In spite of this, the students’ levels seem to be
very diferent. he teacher resorts to the usual pattern of eliciting exchanges
(ll. 6–17), Initiation-Response-Evaluation (IRE), and provides diferent types
of interactional feedback. In the sequence, two students intervene, Laura, a
Brazilian student, and Lin, who is from China.

Excerpt 1

1 Juan venga // atentos // atentos // yo Alright // attention //

2 voy a ir parándolo / poco a poco / attention // I´m going to
3 continue, stopping bit by
4 bit
5 Audio Inaudible inaudible
6 Juan ¿qué hace los sábados? / What do you do on
7 Saturdays?
8 Laura juega She plays.
9 Jose ¿qué hace los sábados? / What do you do on
10 Saturdays?
11 Jeny (4 s.) juego I play
12 Jose ¿juega a qué? Play what?
13 Lin [juega] [she plays]

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 205

14 Laura [bolos] [bowling]

15 Jose a los bolos // ¿vale? // ¿y quién es Bowling. Okay? And who
16 Francisco? is Francisco?
17 Laura abuelo Grandpa6

he previous IRE pattern shows that the teacher’s focus is on the production of
a standard or ‘correct’ linguistic form. Seedhouse (2004) has studied this type of
exclusively form-focused or accuracy-focused classroom activity, in which the
organization of interaction is strongly constrained, and students’ contributions,
although perfectly acceptable in ‘natural’ conversation, are not accepted by the
teacher.
In general, in the Villababel SSL programme, these kinds of activities, mainly
focused on grammar and on explaining the content of speciic lexical units,
followed by other activities to embed this language acquisition, are conducted
at the beginning of the school day. Another activity performed was that of doing
exercises from a textbook, and copying lists of taught verbal or pronominal
forms, either in the student’s notebook or on the board. On some occasions,
as the morning went on, activities designed for individual work were carried
out; the students could then do diferent tasks, such as exercises or reading. At
the end of the morning, generally organized by the second teacher, there were
games in which the vocabulary learned was applied, either in a single large
group or in small groups working simultaneously; or students used computers
for learning songs, for revising the language learned or for looking up infor-
mation needed for other activities, such as essay writing.
Ater some months in the ‘bridging’ class, the students had acquired an inter-
mediate level of Spanish. In fact, some of them had begun in this class during
the previous year. At this stage, they began to express reactions of frustration
and discouragement. While they found the Spanish classes were easy, Physics
or Science classes were diicult to follow, as they lacked mastery of the appro-
priate academic register. Sometimes they told the researchers that the Spanish
class content was easy or even infantile and expressed their wish to join the
mainstream classes as soon as possible. he teachers, at diferent times, took
note of this feeling.

Excerpt 2

We’re doing this activity because you asked to transfer to the normal class as
soon as possible.7

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Figure 9.1 Cut and paste activity

In March, the school changed the implementation of this programme completely.

he more advanced students were fully integrated into the regular classes and
the two bridging classes were reduced to one. he students with a lower level
of Spanish, who had been in the class for a shorter time, began attending more
regular classes, but accompanied by a teacher who helped them both in the
classroom and outside it, so they could follow the teaching and keep up with
class activities. his is the change we are focusing on in this chapter – the change
from a standard bridging class to one speciically intended to constitute an
efective transition to the mainstream.
he process later became even more complex, as observed by one of the
teachers in the following interview, when he explained the distribution of
teachers and students:

Excerpt 3

Juan: that’s why they were all brought together / one of the things we decided
/ about bringing-/ eh / combining the two bridging classes // because there
were just a few students / as a lot of them were leaving the group [and
there’s just one teacher]
Luisa: [yes / (( ))]

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 207

Juan: = myself, for example, I’m providing support in the technology class //
and above all in the computing workshop // for classes 1D and 1H // Omar
is in 1H and Lara is in 1 / eh / SiQuin and Warda / who was a student
of ours last year / in the bridging class // so we are helping her in these
subjects because her academic results / especially in the irst phase / and
then Lucía is helping in arts and crats / eh / Nerea is helping [in natural
science / in the laboratory]
Luisa: [in the laboratory// (( )) I was] I’d very much like to go / [to see]
Juan: [yes]
Luisa: = if I’m allowed to go //
Juan: Nerea is helping in natural science and in / technology/ in 3rd grade
too// on computing // in the last class on [Fridays]8

We see how, in this interview, the teacher conceptualizes his task as being to
‘provide support’ or to ‘help students in a mainstream subject’. In discussions
with the researchers, the teachers repeatedly stated that the new bridging class
would provide newcomer students with the resources needed for academic
Spanish proiciency in mainstream classes, i.e. to be able to follow the content
and participate in class activities. he following interview highlights the need to
ensure that the claimed purpose of the bridging classes – to ensure a transition –
is fulilled. In Excerpt 3, we see how the researcher herself states the justiication
for the change before the teacher formulates it, and it is clear that there exists
an understanding between interviewer and interviewee as to what this change
should represent.

Excerpt 4

Nerea: and then I was talking with Pilar (the school principal) and what we
said was that we should, it must function as a transition class. I mean,
when this term inishes we would consider
Luisa: because the transition class represents a real bridge, for the students to
go into normal subject classes, doesn’t it
Nerea: yes9

In this positioning, the role of researchers was acknowledged by teachers and

students. As part of our ethnography, we designed activities for the classes
and participated in teachers’ meetings and in teacher–parent meetings. In all
these situations, the researchers stressed the weakness of the regulation and
implementation of the Spanish as a second language programme. First, there
is the degree of segregation this programme involves, because it mainly targets

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students from an immigrant background and not the student community

as a whole. Indeed, despite these students spending a portion of their day in
the regular classroom (particularly in practical or interactive areas such as
Physical Education, Music, etc.), these programmes cause separation and make
integration with their age peers more diicult. Second, the primary focus of the
instruction, aimed at developing language skills in the language of instruction,
is on grammar, vocabulary and communication rather than on academic
content, which is delivered in the mainstream instruction. Students also attend
some classes that do not make great demands on their language abilities, such
as Music and Physical Education. hese activities are aimed more at enabling
them to establish relations with other students and to become familiarized with
the school routine, rather than at the double challenge of learning the language
of instruction while they are learning the curriculum required. In this respect,
the researchers emphasized this programme is not designed to ensure that all
curriculum areas are being addressed while students are receiving support for
language acquisition. hese views progressively permeated teachers’ discourses
and practices.
Another factor mentioned by the teachers to justify the change was the
composition of the two existing ‘bridging’ classes. he criterion for grouping
the students was by educational level, i.e. by age (i.e. whether they were in the
irst or second phase of secondary education), rather than by level of language
proiciency. As a result, Bridging Class 1 was multi-ethnic, multinational
and multilingual, with students, boys and girls, from China, Cape Verde,
Morocco and Brazil. his diversity of origins, languages and genders led to
some discord among the students (a very complex process to be addressed in
the chapter). In Bridging Class 2, the older students were all Moroccan girls
and they usually talked to each other in Dariya (Moroccan Arabic). On the
one hand, this monolingual and monocultural background prevented gender
and ethnic conlicts in the class, but on the other it hampered the integration
of boys and non-Moroccan students, particularly when a student from a
Chinese background was well suited for this class. he dynamics of this group
consisted of a certain way of relating to the teachers; the Moroccan students
would constantly joke with them, taking things for granted and managing ways
of escaping school routines. his circumstance might have arisen from the
teachers’ own conception of this class and of their students, i.e. as being diferent
from those in a ‘normal’ secondary school class.
In the change we are studying, the teacher Nerea played a key role. Although
at Villababel there was no speciic responsibility for coordinating the activities of

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 209

the bridging classes, Nerea currently performed this role, and the other teachers
recognized her experience and knowledge. Her main capital was her ability to
teach scientiic subjects, and thus achieve the necessary liaison between these
classes and the rest of the school. With this background, she had always been
very interested in achieving this link between the Spanish as a second language
programme and the mainstream programme. She also had a good relationship
with her students. She was on good terms with her colleagues, who valued
her work very highly. Indeed, it was this positive relationship with the other
teachers that made it possible for the transformation to be efected smoothly.10
In fact, the changes introduced in the implementation of this programme
enabled teachers to resolve immediate tensions in local practices and increase
students’ opportunities to achieve academic success. In this way, these changes
can be seen as an example, in socialization, of ‘practices of collusion’ between
students and teachers (see Pérez Milans [2012, 2013] for a detailed analysis of
this concept). In Pérez Milans’ work, this concept is not seen as teachers’ and
students’ interactional face-saving work, in which the primary goal is to make
students’ low ability not be noticeable, but as a practice oriented to overcome
the contradictions between policies and their implementation. In this case,
contradictions emerge between not only the design and implementation of
this educational programme and the students’ efective demands, but also the
researchers’ approaches to language teaching and learning. As in Pérez Milans’
analysis (2013: chapter 4), in the class I analyse in this chapter, the teacher
performs double-voiced practice that makes room for both her oicial status
as a participant who is institutionally expected to implement the programme
following the Instructions from the Madrid Region Deputy Secretary of the
Department of Education, and also her individual persona, as someone who
questions this regulation and tries to ind other ways.

he capitalizing process

I shall now discuss an example of this diferent way of teaching, which may
give an idea of its scope and possible outcomes. As a point of reference, in this
analysis I consider what happens in the language section; in view of its prestige,
the languages included, the teachers and students involved, the bilingualism
approach on which it is based and the innovative language teaching methods
and content provided, it represents a valuable source of information about
similar models related to other social, cultural and ideological situations.

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 210 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

he communicative event analysed took place in early June. Our research

team had begun its observations in September, and the researchers were
very familiar with the students and teachers. It was early in the class, and the
activity had already begun. he teacher, Nerea, came into the classroom. At this
moment, only one student and two researchers (Esther and Luisa) were there.
hey had been working, irst, on a grammar exercise, and then on activities
corresponding to the technology class.
In Fig. 9.2. we see the physical arrangement of the class, the involvement of
both the teacher and a student. he researchers, as bystanders, were situated
backstage of the class.
he task is planned by the teacher, according to the demands of the
Technology teacher. In Excerpt 5, we see how the teacher explains the task and
how to proceed:

Excerpt 5

Nerea: now go and look at the poster that Fatima made/ ok? / because there
you can see / all the sources/ of energy/ that are used/ by/ er/ industry/
then/ let’s see what they are11

Fatima’s work is considered useful and is legitimized in the central space of the
class (see Fig. 9.3).

Figure 9.2 Scafolding activity

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 211

Figure 9.3 A building knowledge activity

Excerpt 612
1 Nerea ¿lo has visto ya? have you looked at it?
2 {la estudiante tiene que buscar la infor- {the student has to ind the infor-
3 mación en el poster} mation in the poster}
4 Nadia sí / [sí] yes / [yes]
 5 Nerea [¿cuá]les eran las fuentes de energía? / [what were the energy sources? / then/
6 entonces / para producir electricidad / to produce electricity / we’ve got/ well
7 tenemos / pues
8 Nadia una de [estas por aquí] one of [these here]
9 Nerea [petróleo por] un lado / ¿sí o no? [oil on] the one hand / yes or no?
10 Nadia & sí & yes
11 Nerea & podemos tener también / energía & we can also have / thermal energy /
12 térmica / que lo que hace es / calentar what this does is / heat the coal or the
13 el carbón o el gas natural / entonces / si natural gas / then/ and if we don’t have
14 no tenemos esto / ¿eh? // solo podemos this / eh? // we can only use
15 utilizar

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 212 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

16 Nadia los sol- / solar the sol- / solar

17 Nerea & la solar & solar
18
19 Nadia & y oliica & and wind
20
21 Nerea & la e- / la eólica / que era la del viento & *3R3* the w- e- / the wind / that’s the
22 / y esta que era / la hidroeléctrica / ¿de wind / and this was / hydroelectricity/
23 acuerdo? // entonces / de momento right? // then/ for the moment/ these
24 / estas energías / fue / el trabajo que energy sources / that was/ the work
25 hizoo / Fátima/ están todavía muy done by / Fátima/ they’re still pretty
26 poco desarrolladas underdeveloped
27 Nadia & sí sí sí & yes yes yes
28 Nerea & y entonces / no dan / para / que & and then / they’re not enough / for/
29 todos tengamos / la vida que hacemos for all of us to live / the life we have
30 ahora / que es / tener luz // tener todos now / that is/ to have electricity// to
31 electrodomésticos / todo eso que has have all the appliances / all this you’ve
32 ido poniendo ahí / viajar / y todo eso been putting there / travelling/ and all
33 / ¿eh? that/ right?
34 Nadia & sí & yes
35 Nerea yo creo que al principio del todo I think that irst of all you’d have to put
36 tendrías que poner eso // [antes] that // [before]
37 Nadia & sí / ya / es que no lo sé escribir yy & yes / all right / I don’t know how to
38 / [(())] write it and / [(())]
39 Nerea [a ver] escríbelo aquí / y ahora (()) [let’s see] write it here / and now(())
40
41 Nadia [¿qué tengo que escribir] / profe? [what do I have to write ] / teacher?
42 Nerea ¿cuáles son las fuentes de energía que what are the energy sources we use
43 ahora utilizamos / en todos los países? nowadays / all over the world? / mainly
44 / mayoritariamente
45 Nadia pues solar yy& & well solar and and &
46 Nerea & no / esas no / esas todavía muy poco & no / not that / that’s still not used
47 // esas que tienes ahí& very much // this here &
48 Nadia & nuclear & nuclear
49 Nerea & nuclear / sobre todo esas tres & nuclear / above all these three
50 Nadia aahh / gas y carbón / y eel& aahh / gas and coal / and&
51 Nerea & claro // el gas / y el carbón y el & of course // gas / and coal and oil
52 petróleo / son las fuentes más- / de / are the most – / important / energy
53 energía / más importantes sources

In this interaction, the teaching corresponds to the ‘bridging programme’,

because the activity taking place is in preparation for a technology class. he
student is preparing to meet the demands of this class, the worksheet to be
illed in and the text to be written out. he bridging class teacher helps the
student to perform this task (ll. 11–15, 36). She also focuses on language

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 213

(l.  20). In this respect, this excerpt can be seen as an example of a construc-
tivist method, using instructional scafolding, in which the teacher acts as an
expert and guides the students, who build upon their previous knowledge. he
students have to be actively engaged in the construction of knowledge, and the
teacher gives instructions, eliciting the tasks which have to be done (to select
the most common energies, in Excerpt 5; to write them down, Excerpt 6).
Previous knowledge is presented as shared knowledge about energy, and expert
knowledge to guide the student comes from the poster made by her sister,
Fatima, for the same technology class.
Regarding the sociolinguistic order, in this teacher’s classes, which addressed
both subject content and Spanish language, frequent use was made of the
students’ language of origin, which had been used in their irst experience of
schooling. he correct terms were asked for, but the teacher went further and
sometimes called on senior students who spoke the same language to approach
and help frame the subject within the curriculum of the country of origin and
in an appropriate language register. heir task was to help situate the students in
relation to the issues in question: energy, cell structure, the nature of matter, etc.
his reliance on the assistance and support of other students to locate the
class content within the curriculum raises an important question: when acqui-
sition of the language of instruction is seen not as the sole objective of education
but also as a means of incorporating content, are attitudes towards the language
of origin more open? At a later point in the same class, the teacher wrote a word
in Spanish, because the student had written something in Arabic in the exercise
to be handed in. In this case, we see that the same teacher, who had encouraged
her students to use and retain the new terms with the help of the language of
origin (‘so you don’t forget’), erased the presence of this language in the task to
be handed in, without criticism or comment. hus the monolingual rule was
upheld. Only temporary transgression was allowed, in what was perhaps viewed
as merely a stage in the process. Furthermore, in this class, students were famil-
iarized with the academic register needed to follow classes and pass exams. he
aim was not to teach the Spanish required for everyday life, but rather what was
necessary for students to advance in academic terms and not be let behind at
school.
With respect to what I have previously called ‘compensatory logic’ (Martín
Rojo, 2010a: 137–84), in this case it had disappeared. I found this logic in
remedial programmes where the activities prepared by teachers limit the
students’ participation, lower the levels of information provided and demanded,
and neither the voices nor experience nor knowledge of the students is

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 214 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

incorporated, while the low expectations of the teacher are made apparent. In
this case, in opposition to that logic, the student has to be actively engaged in the
construction of knowledge rather than passively receiving it. Not only cognitive
skills, such as the ability to display knowledge and understanding, but above all
practical skills (ll. 1, 5, 36) of inding and reading out the required answer, and
transferable skills, those applicable to other situations (e.g. problem-solving) or
independent action, are required to carry out the task. here are two main ways
in which the students’ responses are evaluated in this dialogue extract, either
by repeating the correct reply already provided by the students (ll. 48–9) or by
reinforcing it with a positive evaluation such as ‘sure’ (l. 51) (Unamuno, 1997).
he bridging class teacher also supports the student when she shows lack of
conidence: [let’s see] write it here (1.39).
hus, by changing the way the Spanish as a second language programme is
implemented, the demands made on the students were those of the regular class;
these had not decreased, nor was the subject content simpliied. And neither
was there any simpliication of the language used in class; what was employed
was the academic register, both oral and written.
According to the ‘deicit discourse’ (Martín Rojo, 2010a: 261–303), students
of foreign origin are viewed not as diferent, but rather as students who have
a deicit to be addressed, one that has arisen from inadequate prior schooling,
from ignorance of the Spanish language and of the content taught in Spanish
schools. In contrast to this widely prevailing discourse, at the Villababel school,
positive expectations were apparent. In my research into Spanish school-
teachers, I found they oten distinguished between ‘them’ (migrants) and ‘us’
(Spaniards), or ‘you’ and ‘us’ when speaking to migrant students, overlooking
the fact that they are still classmates who belong to ‘us’. hus, this was one of
the few cases encountered in which there was not this polarization between ‘us’,
and ‘them’. Instead there was an all-inclusive ‘we’ (l. 29), encompassing all those
present in the community. he interaction thus transmitted knowledge not only
about energy (for example), but also about the identities of teacher and students.
In cases I have studied on other occasions, students’ sociocultural difer-
ences, which might present students as less developed, were at the forefront of
attention, contributing to their minorization and exoticization (Martín Rojo,
2010a: 265–304). In the present case, however, the teacher did not present one
world that was developed, civilized and prosperous, versus another one that was
underdeveloped, lacking in technology, whose time had not yet come and that
was living in another era. Quite frequently, I have found that the reality of the
‘other’ is presented as referring to another stage of development, particularly in

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 215

the case of Morocco. However, in this example, the teacher constructed a world
in which we all coexist and jointly face the same challenges, which in the context
of this class means the issue of retaining the comforts of technological advances
within the framework of a clean energy system.
Pronoun choice can also be seen as the result of a practice of collusion, given
the fact that both teacher and student are collaborating to change the educa-
tional programme. his change leads to students being capitalized, given that
their activities and symbolic capital are considered adequate and can be used in
the construction of knowledge.

Concluding remarks

Following a praxis-oriented approach, in this chapter I have taken into account

the teachers’ own views on education, and on the Spanish as a second
language programme. he analysis has shown how teachers’ views on education
explain signiicant changes in the way this programme is implemented. In
this way, changes have been observed in the pedagogical focus, i.e. on the
goals of the teaching/learning process which, in the case in question, included
providing students with the competences and skills needed to be integrated
into mainstream classes. However, an analysis of the interactions recorded also
revealed the extent to which this pedagogical focus was inluenced by teachers’
expectations. We saw that these expectations were related to teachers’ under-
standing of the educational aims of the programmes, and of students’ linguistic
and ethnic diferences.
he organization of a class seems to have consequences for the partici-
pants themselves, as regards both the students’ academic progress and the
construction of their identity. With lower levels of subject matter being taught
and demanded, the students in these programmes, who moreover are well
aware of the lack of prestige of such classes, may come to perceive that they are
not being educated to compete. In fact, students demand to be transferred to
mainstream classes, and by the time the change I studied was introduced some
were already demotivated, and found it diicult to spend time and put in efort,
believing themselves to be already ruled out of the running.
With respect to the sociolinguistic order, it seems that balancing language
and content-centred instruction in this educational context can result in greater
incorporation of the language of origin (both in the bridging class and in the
bilingual programme). In view of the fact that the programme has a twofold

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 216 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

objective, and recognizing moreover that language is both the object of study
and the means of learning, it remains to be determined whether this teaching
method is necessary with respect to the subject content that is assumed to be
known or previously studied. Other important factors may include the value
attributed by the participants to the diferent languages in the interaction and
the question of how their use should be interpreted in the performance of the
tasks presented.
What is quite apparent is that if changes are made to the class contents and the
(challenging) demands made, and therefore to the tasks performed and the ways
in which the aims of the class are presented, this implies that remedial or compen-
satory logic must disappear. And this is not all – classes such as the one studied
provide the capital needed for students to link up efectively with education
outside the special programmes; in particular, they are enabled to acquire an
efective academic register by means of activities that are meaningful to them.
he question is, what has produced the change in the style of teaching here?
To all appearances, the answer lies in the problematization of the programme by
all the actors in the educational process, including the researchers. A non-deicit
representation of the students is also required. Clearly, Nerea’s educational aim
is for the students to be able to keep up in the technology class, and this means
she has good expectations of their chances of integration within the academic
system, regardless of their origin.
his chapter contributes to a better understanding of the process involved
in capitalization, i.e. ‘how symbolic capital is distributed through the trans-
formation of the SSL programme’. For this transformation, collusion between
teachers and students is needed. Implications of such distribution of students’
potential educational trajectories can be expected, given the fact that providing
them with the capital provided and the capital demanded to them promote
access to mainstream classes.
Finally, it is interesting to consider to what extent examples such as this
help us better understand the workings of the cycle of exclusion, by which
the presence of foreign students in higher education is decreased. he deicit
discourse plays a crucial role in this cycle, because if students of foreign
origin were not subjected to an unequal assessment of their knowledge, skills,
languages and values, the educational goal would be for these students to master
the elements of the language of instruction as soon as possible in order to be
successfully integrated into the education system. And at Villababel school, the
provision of support for their integration into mainstream classes has enabled
these students to obtain better results than would have otherwise been the case.

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 he Genealogy of Educational Change 217

herefore, eliminating the cycle of exclusion would put an end to the repre-
sentation of these students as persons who ‘do not it’ or who are ‘singular’.
Such a representation could be viewed as a form of ‘cultural racism’, to use
Grosfoguel’s term, whereby superiority and inferiority are constructed in terms
that suit the school and the dominant culture (Grosfoguel, 1999, 2003). he
absence of cultural adaptability resides in the inferior characteristics that are
attributed to the culture of the other; and, moreover, these characteristics are
assumed to be fundamental and unalterable. As a result of the deicit discourse,
stereotypes are perpetuated and decapitalization in the school is legitimized.
he involvement of these processes has signiicant implications for immigrant
students in terms of their academic integration, social mobility and national
identiication. Studies such as this help us to interpret phenomena, not just
describe them, and to discover the variety in the exciting realm of our collective
future, if we only dare to take a diferent path.

Transcription convention Meaning

Arnaldo student participant
right (italics) speech and data in the original language of our corpus
{} comments made by the transcriber
& turn latched to previous turn
= maintaining of a participant’s turn in an overlap
[] turn overlapping with similarly marked turn
- te-starts and self-interruptions without any pause
(5’) silence (lapse or interval) of 5 seconds (when it is
particularly meaningful, the number of seconds is
indicated in pauses longer than one second)
/ short pause (0.5 second)
// long pause (0.5–1.5 seconds)
↑ rising intonation
↓ falling intonation
→ intonation of suspension
RIGHT (all capital letters) loud talking
(( )) incomprehensible speech
pa´l syntactical phonetic phenomena between words
( )° low talking
aa (doubled vowels) vowel lengthening
ss (doubled consonants) consonant lengthening
? questions (also used for tag questions such as ‘right?’,
‘eh?’, ‘you know?’)
! exclamations
à preceding elements of the excerpt that will be referred
to in the running text

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 218 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

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Contemporary China: A Critical Sociolinguistic Ethnography, Routledge Critical

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Notes

1 his chapter was made possible thanks to a visiting programme at NYU, and at
King’s College, University of London in 2012 funded by a Salvador de Madariaga
research grant awarded by the Ministry of Science and Education (mobility grant
PR2011–0250). My research stay at the Social and Cultural Analysis Department
(NYU) and at the Centre for Language, Discourse and Communication (University
of London) and at the Language, Ideology and Power Group (Lancaster University),
and my participation in seminars and data sessions was both challenging and
inspiring.
2 his chapter has been written within the framework of the R&D Project:
Multilingualism in Schools: a Critical Sociolinguistic Analysis of Educational
Linguistics Programs in the Madrid Region (HUM2007–64694), inanced by
the National R&D&I Plan of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology.
Its aim is to study the educational linguistic programmes implemented in the
region of Madrid and their efects on the social integration of migrants and on
social stratiication (see Martín Rojo et al., 2003; Martín Rojo and Mijares, 2007;
Martín Rojo, 2010a, 2010b). he ieldwork was conducted by the research team
(Esther Alcalá, Diana Labajos, Laura Mijares, Ana María Relaño, and the principal
researcher Luisa Martín Rojo) during a complete academic year.
3 his impact of academic production on the ield of study, and on society in general,
is not exceptional but one of the distinctive features of modernity, known as social
relexivity. In the present study, however, it is more directly and clearly observable.
4 his programme has been operating in state schools since 1996. In 2004–5, the
regional government began to implement a diferent English–Spanish bilingual
programme in primary education, and in 2008–9 in secondary education. In
2008–9, there were about 180 such bilingual schools at primary level in the region.
5 Instructions from the Madrid Region Deputy Secretary of the Department of
Education, regulating Welcome Classes under the ‘Welcome Programme’ to help
foreign students join the educational system.
6 Corpus ELMA: SSL class, code 090210AE-J5.

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 220 Multilingual Encounters in Europe’s Institutional Spaces

7 Corpus ELMA: SSL class, code 090427AE_L. Original excerpt in Spanish: Profesora:
Estamos haciendo estas actividades porque vosotras habéis pedido pasar al aula
normal cuanto antes.
8 Corpus ELMA: Juan’s Interview, March 2009. Original excerpt in Spanish:
Juan: por eso ha sido lo de juntarlos a todos / una
de las iniciativas que hemos tomado / lo de una-/ eh / aunar y juntar las dos aulas
de enlace // que al tener pocos alumnos / al ir saliendo ya mucho [y hay un
profesor]
Luisa: [sí / (( ))]
Juan: = yo por ejemplo estoy apoyando en tecnología // estoy
apoyando sobre todo en el taller en informática // a primero de y a primero hache
// en primero hache está Omar y en primero está Lara / eh / SiQuin y Warda / que
era alumna nuestra el año pasado / del aula de enlace // entonces estamos
apoyándole en esas asignaturas porque los resultados académicos / sobretodo en el
primer ciclo / y luego Lola está apoyando en plástica / eh / Nerea está apoyando
[en ciencias naturales / en laboratorio]
Luisa: [en laboratorio // (( )) estuve yo] me gustaría mucho ir / [a ver]
Juan: [sí]
Luisa: = si me dejan ir a mí //
Juan: Nerea está apoyando en ciencias naturales y en / tecnología / en tercero
también // en informática // a última hora los [viernes]
9 Corpus ELMA, Nerea’s Interview, November 2008. Original excerpt in Spanish:
Nerea: y entonces yo hablé con Pilar (la directora) y lo que decíamos es que
debería funcionar como una clase de transición. Quiero decir, que cuando termine
este trmiestre tendremos que valorar
Luisa: porque una clase de transición supone un verdero enlace para que los
estudiantes se acerquen a los contenidos de las aulas de referencia, verdad?
Nerea: sí
10 It is important to note also that Nerea had the most positive attitude towards our
research and gave us her full cooperation.
11 Corpus ELMA, Bridging class, code: 090616AE_v1. Original excerpt in Spanish:
Nerea: Ahora ve y mira el poster que hizo Zakia/ ¿vale?/porque ahí puedes ver/
todas las fuentes de energía/ que se utilizan/ por /er/ en la industria/entonces/
vamos a ver cuáles son
12 Corpus ELMA, Bridging class, code: 090616AE_v1.

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