Translanguaging as a Bilingual Education Pedagogy in Early Childhood Education: A Systematic Review

Bilingual education has become a reality of early childhood education in several multilingual and monolingual countries. In this sense, translanguaging is suggested as an effective and alternative strategy for bilingual education. By following PRISMA guidelines for systematic reviews, this study conducts an in-depth analysis of the existing research articles on translanguaging practices in diverse multilingual and bilingual early childhood education settings across the world and to highlight possible avenues for further studies. Based on the predetermined eligibility criteria, 43 peer-reviewed full-length articles published between 2014 and 2023 were included from a search of three electronic databases: Web of Science, ERIC, and SCOPUS. The reviewed studies were analyzed under five major dimensions: publication trends, methodology, research focus, translanguaging implementations, and their overall impacts on early childhood educators and emergent bilingual preschoolers. While translanguaging facilitated transformative changes in preschool teachers’ perceptions and pedagogical practices, it also fostered preschoolers’ cognitive, cultural, and emotional development by providing an inclusive and interactive learning environment.