ABSTRACT
The concept of translanguaging has become a new way of conceptualizing the language used by learners, especially for emergent bilinguals. The Reggio Emilia concept of the hundred languages of children lends well to including the concept of translanguaging in early childhood education. Researchers applied a translanguaging lens to a Reggio-inspired Spanish dual-language immersion program, but their research focused more narrowly on the use of Spanish and English, both oral languages. Interviews with Reggio Emilia educators in Italy, though, revealed a concept of language that was broader than traditional concepts of written and oral languages. This chapter pulls from three forms of translation (intralingual, interlingual, and intersemiotic) to help explain how many Reggio Emilia educators use an expanded concept of “language” to describe and document the ways that young learners translate their thoughts and experiences into expressive semiotic forms. The implications for educators are to be more inclusive of the full range of languages used by young learners, including visual, physical, and other non-verbal forms of expressive communication as they use their full multimodal repertoire to translanguage and make meaning.
