12 Creative Ways to Start Supporting and Educating Emergent Bilinguals at Schools

While policies and frameworks continue to evolve, it’s creativity at the classroom level that drives real change.

That’s why, despite being essential for systemic change, curriculum updates alone aren’t enough to meet the complex requirements for educating emergent bilinguals at schools.

Educators must go beyond compliance and adopt imaginative, student-centered practices that engage and affirm multilingual learners.

Being creative means adapting to students’ strengths, incorporating cultural relevance, and designing activities that recognize language as both a tool for communication and a marker of identity.

This blog offers a toolkit of creative strategies rooted in diverse pedagogy, educational access, and language acquisition support.

Creative Strategies for Educating Emergent Bilinguals at Schools

Below are 12 strategies that teachers and leaders can use to build diverse, engaging, and accessible environments for educating emergent bilinguals at schools.

Remember that each institution and community lives a different reality and responds to unique challenges.

1. Design Multilingual Classroom Spaces

Create visually rich environments that showcase the linguistic diversity of students.

Use multilingual labels, bilingual bulletin boards, translated instructions, and classroom libraries featuring books in multiple languages. Students see their identities reflected in the space and gain access to content in ways that build confidence and comprehension.

2. Use Translanguaging Journals

Encourage students to maintain journals where they can freely express themselves using all their languages. 

These journals support cognitive development, bridge home and school knowledge, strengthen communication with families and caregivers, and allow students to process complex concepts without linguistic limitations.

3. Launch Language Buddy Programs

Pairing students intentionally across language abilities builds community and facilitates peer-assisted learning.

Buddies can work together on assignments, practice academic vocabulary, or support transitions in classroom routines. This strategy reinforces collaborative skills and reduces isolation and social anxiety.

4. Incorporate Story Circles with Family Languages

Story circles invite students to share narratives from their families and cultures in any language.

This activity validates home languages and cultures, encourages listening and storytelling skills, and provides a meaningful opportunity for parents and caregivers to engage directly in classroom life.

5. Gamify Language Learning with Culturally Relevant Content

Digital and in-person games can incorporate student cultures to boost motivation. 

Creating vocabulary games based on culturally relevant topics helps students feel represented in the content and supports deeper vocabulary retention.

6. Offer Dual-Language Book Clubs

Organize small groups where students read books in English and their home language, then discuss themes and characters in both. 

This supports literacy development, critical thinking, and translanguaging practices that strengthen overall comprehension.

7. Build Classroom Glossaries Together

Co-creating glossaries helps students take ownership of academic language. 

Encourage learners to contribute illustrations, synonyms, and definitions in multiple languages. Use audio recordings or videos to extend accessibility and multimodal learning.

8. Use Art and Music as Language Bridges

Encourage creative expression through visual and performing arts. 

Assignments can include drawing scenes from a reading passage, composing bilingual songs, or exploring global art forms. These experiences connect emotion, identity, and content mastery.

9. Host Family Culture Days and Language Showcases

These community-building events foster pride and understanding among students, educators, and families. 

Allow students to present projects, lead songs, or facilitate games in their home languages to promote multilingual appreciation.

10. Integrate Real-Life Language Projects

Apply academic skills to authentic tasks such as creating welcome posters in multiple languages or conducting interviews for a classroom podcast. 

These projects demonstrate the value of multilingualism in real-world settings.

11. Scaffold Assessments with Choice Boards

Design flexible assessments that allow students to show understanding through visuals, audio, performance, or writing in a combination of languages. 

Offering choice increases engagement and ensures better access to rigorous content.

12. Train Teachers with Empathy-Driven Language Simulations

Professional development can include simulations where teachers experience unfamiliar language instruction. 

This deepens empathy and helps educators reflect on the need for clearer visuals, predictable routines, and intentional language support.

Afterward, they reflect on the challenges of processing content without full language access and discuss instructional adjustments to support multilingual learners.

Effective Teaching Methods for Educating Emergent Bilingual Students

While creative strategies offer innovation and engagement, they are most effective when grounded in evidence-based methods.

These foundational approaches provide the structure necessary for educating emergent bilinguals at schools and helping them thrive academically while maintaining their linguistic and cultural identities.

Translanguaging

Translanguaging supports learning by allowing students to use all their language resources to convey and communicate meaning.

This strategy encourages students to speak, write, and think across languages as they develop conceptual understanding. Teachers can implement translanguaging by allowing bilingual discussions, assigning multilingual projects, and accepting work in multiple languages.

Scaffolding

Scaffolding refers to breaking down learning into manageable steps while maintaining high expectations.

Techniques include using sentence starters, anchor charts, graphic organizers, and teacher modeling. When applied to language acquisition, these supports provide access to rigorous content while building language proficiency gradually.

Culturally Responsive Teaching

This method centers student identity in curriculum and pedagogy.

Culturally responsive teaching includes selecting diverse texts, validating students’ lived experiences, and incorporating their cultural knowledge into lessons. It also means examining one’s own biases and adapting instruction to reflect community strengths.

These approaches—when used consistently and in combination—promote academic growth, affirm identity, and support holistic development for educating emergent bilingual students at schools: Inclusive instruction considers students’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds as assets, not obstacles.

Implementing Culturally Aware Education Practices for Emergent Bilinguals

To move from strategy to system and truly start educating emergent bilinguals at schools, leaders must embed diverse practices into every level of planning and implementation.

Key steps include:

• Building Teacher Capacity: Offer sustained professional learning in multilingual pedagogy, cultural responsiveness, and family engagement.
• Allocating Resources: Invest in multilingual materials, translation tools, and collaborative planning time.
• Involving Families: Invite families to help shape programs, policies, and cultural events, ensuring authenticity and relevance.

Every Language Is a Strength. Start Unlocking It Today

Emergent bilingual students bring deep knowledge, creativity, and resilience to our schools.

By embracing creative, diverse approaches to for educating emergent bilinguals at schools, institutions can ensure that every student feels empowered, capable, and seen.

To support emergent bilinguals, educators don’t need to overhaul their entire approach—they can start with one new practice, one tool, or one deeper conversation about language and diversity.

Want to start taking action to support your multilingual learners? 

Contact Ensemble Learning for personalized support. 

Let’s help every student thrive in their language learning journey!