Teachers’ Beliefs About Multilingualism in Early Childhood Education Settings: A Scoping Review

Abstract

There is an increasing number of multilingual children attending early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings around the world. Early childhood teachers play a crucial role in supporting these multilingual young children. As teachers’ teaching practices are directed by their beliefs, it is significant to understand early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in the existing literature in order to better support multilingual children. From 14 studies, this review categorised three main themes of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism: multilingualism as a problem, multilingualism as a right, and concerns about multilingualism as a resource. Two studies examined factors associated with the variation in teachers’ beliefs. The findings of this review summarised various perspectives of teachers’ misconceptions and negative beliefs about multilingualism, although a small number of studies reported teachers’ positive beliefs about multilingualism in ECEC. This review addresses early childhood teachers’ knowledge gaps in child language development and multilingual pedagogies. In addition, this review identifies several research gaps for future studies. For example, more studies conducted in non-Western contexts and studies on teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingual infants and toddlers are much needed. This review also contributes to informing future directions for professional development to empower early childhood teachers to support multilingualism.

1. Introduction

Many young children grow up speaking more than one language due to the increasing trends of globalisation and migration. For example, in the United States, 27% of children under the age of 6 are dual language learners (Guiberson & Ferris, 2019). In Australia, nearly one in four children under 6 speak a language other than English at home (Department of Education, Skills and Employment [DESE], 2022). In this article we use the general term “multilingual children” as it includes “bilingual children” or “dual language learners”, and this is viewed as the mainstream position in recent studies (Cenoz, 2013; Zheng, 2021; Zheng et al., 2021). With a growing number of multilingual children attending early childhood education and care (ECEC) services, early childhood education environments play a crucial role in supporting multilingual development outside home contexts. There are a range of cognitive, health, economic, and other personal benefits of early multilingualism identified in the existing literature (Bialystok, 2009; Langeloo et al., 2019). Multilingual development also has social and cultural benefits for these young children, such as strengthening their social identity and belonging, maintaining children and their families’ wellbeing, and fostering personal connections with their diverse cultural communities (Verdon et al., 2014; De Houwer, 2021). In the meantime, multilingual children face challenges in learning the majority language and maintaining their home language (Verdon et al., 2014).

Different countries and regions also have different guidelines and national policies in order to support the implementation of multilingualism in ECEC settings. For instance, the Early Years Learning Framework for Australia (Australian Government Department of Education [AGDE], 2022) addresses the importance of using children’s home language to construct meaning and develop strong connections with the culture and language/s of their family. Also, the Framework encourages early childhood teachers to expose children to different languages and dialects, and encourages appreciation of linguistic diversity (AGDE, 2022). (In this review, we use the broad term “early childhood teachers” to refer to all early childhood professionals, including diploma-level and below-diploma-level educators, as well as early childhood education degree-qualified teachers.) However, research has found that many early childhood teachers fail to provide adequate support to facilitate early multilingualism in ECEC settings (Verdon et al., 2014; Zheng et al., 2021, 2023). In addition, Langeloo et al. (2019)’s systematic review found that early childhood teachers used more non-verbal and less complex language when they interacted with multilingual children. Langeloo et al. (2019) further raised concerns about limiting multilingual children’s learning opportunities compared with their monolingual peers, while another recent study conducted by Chan et al. (2023) argued that preschool teachers employed simplified language to communicate with multilingual children as an attempt to support multilingual children with ability-appropriate input. These mixed results revealed that teachers hold different beliefs about supporting multilingualism and transfer these beliefs into their daily practices. Also, studies have suggested that early childhood teachers have limited knowledge of language development (Degotardi & Gill, 2019). In particular, early childhood teachers need more knowledge about how young children’s home language experiences impact their interactions with teachers in ECEC environments (Degotardi & Gill, 2019). Also, case studies drawn on interview data from early childhood teachers found that teachers lacked sufficient knowledge on supporting multilingual children in Australian ECEC settings, while both monolingual and bilingual teachers acknowledged that bilingual children need additional support in ECEC settings (Hayes et al., 2020).

1.1. The Importance of Teachers’ Beliefs for Their Practices

Bronfenbrenner’s (2001) ecological theory suggests that examination of caregivers’ beliefs provides valuable insight at the microsystem level for children’s development. Specially, according to the ecobehavioural model of early language development (Ford et al., 2020), as parents’ and teachers’ knowledge and beliefs can influence their behaviour, changes in these beliefs and knowledge would lead to changes in the ways they interact with children (Cote & Bornstein, 2000). Therefore, early childhood teachers’ knowledge and beliefs “can affect the frequency, structure, and quality of their interactions with young children, including how to interpret and respond to children’s behaviour” (Ford et al., 2020, p. 250). For example, teachers’ cultural beliefs about child development can shape the styles of teacher–infant interactions (Tay-Lim & Lim, 2013). Beliefs can be influenced by a variety of factors such as contexts, locations, educational polices, and dominant societal and personal language ideologies (Busch, 2010). Beliefs are also shaped by personal language learning experiences and variables such as age and personality (see a review by Kirsch, 2018). Unlike parents’ beliefs, which were mostly reflected or shaped by contextual and personal factors (e.g., the social and physical environments and parents’ backgrounds), early childhood teachers’ beliefs were reflections of guide practice in the broader context of ECEC environments (Degotardi & Gill, 2019). As some teachers tend to hold experience-based beliefs in ECEC settings, there is a need to support teachers in developing evidence-based beliefs to facilitate their daily practices (Degotardi & Han, 2020).

Also, other theories such as Bandura and National Institute of Mental Health’s (1986) social learning theory and studies on professional development (PD) suggest that teachers’ attitudes, knowledge, and skills affect practices which, in turn, influence child development (Kirsch et al., 2020). Based on these theoretical perspectives, most studies on teachers’ beliefs adopt the theory model interpreted and conceptualised by Fang (1996). In Fang’s model of teachers’ beliefs, “Teachers’ theories and beliefs represent the rich store of general knowledge of objects, people, events and their characteristic relationships that teachers have that affects their planning and their interactive thoughts and decision, as well as their classroom behaviour” (Fang, 1996, p. 49). Furthermore, teachers can change their beliefs and develop new schema of understanding drawn from the integration of new knowledge and experience, and these beliefs can further guide their teaching practices (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019).

In relation to the importance of understanding teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism, studies in school settings found that understanding teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism provided insightful information regarding how teachers implemented linguistic diversity into curriculum contents through classroom practices (Vikøy & Haukås, 2021). In return, it would benefit children’s learning experience, progress, and engagement. For example, teachers who value the importance of home languages and literacy practices are more likely to implement respect in their own pedagogical practices and support children (and parents) build connections between home and school literacies (Kenner and Ruby, 2012). Such practices further support multilingual children’s emotional, social, cognitive, and linguistic development (Kirsch, 2018). Therefore, it is a significant step to review and map the current evidence of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism and conceptualise the key concepts in early childhood teachers’ beliefs.

Regarding teachers’ beliefs about working with multilingual young children, the small existing body of research has provided initial insights on theories reflecting early childhood teachers’ knowledge and attitudes about early multilingualism (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019; Zepeda et al., 2011). For example, Zepeda et al. (2011)’s work suggested that teachers’ preparation for working with multilingual children in preschool classrooms should include knowledge on children’s language development, first and second language acquisition, and pedagogies employed in classroom practices to support these children and their families. Jacoby and Lesaux (2019) reviewed two theoretical perspectives on facilitating teachers’ understanding of multilingual development. First, Krashen’s hypothesis about second language learning, which argues that language acquisition is a staged developmental process, representing only one conceptualization of second language acquisition. Second, other theoretical perspectives, which include the behaviourist perspective and the interactionist perspective, which have different assumptions about how children learn language and emphasise different approaches to support. For example, the behaviourist perspective “emphasises structured repetitions of grammar patterns”, while the interactionist perspective “emphasises the role of unstructured interpersonal communications in developing language” (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019, p. 122). It is crucial to know how early childhood teachers understand these theories and implement them into their everyday practices.

1.2. The Research Gaps and Current Study

Evidence shows that early childhood teachers hold different beliefs about multilingual education, and that these beliefs are translated into teaching practices in classrooms (S. Garrity & Guerra, 2015). Therefore, it is important to understand teachers’ different perspectives to better support multilingual children’s language learning and wellbeing in ECEC environments (Reyes et al., 2016). Also, Byers-Heinlein and Lew-Williams (2013) found that parents had various questions and concerns about raising multilingual children; for example, would multilingual children feel confused about using two different languages? Should they only use one language with the child? Would multilingual children be more likely to have learning difficulties (Byers-Heinlein & Lew-Williams, 2013)? Early childhood teachers play a significant role in sharing their professional evidence-based knowledge with parents and empowering the parents of multilingual children.

Currently a large body of studies has focused on teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in school settings. For example, Vikøy and Haukås (2021) reported that Norwegian secondary school teachers viewed multilingualism as a problem and challenge in classroom practices, while other studies found that teachers hold positive attitudes towards multilingualism (Bredthauer & Engfer, 2016; Haukås, 2016). Furthermore, although teachers acknowledged the importance of using the home language, they also prioritised the majority language in classroom practices. In addition, some studies revealed that, from teachers’ perspectives, home languages were viewed as a barrier to multilingual children’s academic success (Quiocho & Daoud, 2006). A recent scoping review of 31 articles on primary school teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism identified three categories: rejecting, moderating, and supporting multilingualism in primary classroom teaching (Désirée Lange & Polat, 2024). As the existing literature has largely focused on school-aged teachers’ perspectives, less is known about early childhood teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingual development in ECEC rooms. Giving the growing number of multilingual children attending ECEC settings and the challenges of supporting multilingual development in early years, there is an urgent need to review the current evidence on early childhood teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingualism.

Encouraging teachers to reflect on their own beliefs and classroom practices can lead to more inclusive and effective multilingual pedagogies (Protassova & Silkin, 2025). Positive experiences and targeted training can foster more supportive attitudes toward multilingualism. In addition, to enhance teachers’ content knowledge of multilingual development, understanding teachers’ beliefs and mapping the evidence in this area also contribute to provide targeted training to support teachers in developing “critical multilingual awareness” (García, 2015; Alstad, 2024a). However, multilingual pedagogies in ECEC settings have received less attention compared to those in school settings. Kultti and Pramling (2020) were concerned that early childhood teachers’ understanding of multilingualism was based more on personal experiences than on research-based practices. Kultti and Pramling’s (2020) study acknowledged the complexities of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism, while their study also underscored the need to support early childhood teachers in developing their beliefs through evidence-based research and theories, rather than experience-based knowledge. Also, research suggests that early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism not only shape their practices and pedagogies but also influence the national guidelines and how teachers foster partnerships with parents to support multilingualism from an ecological perspective (Alstad, 2024a; Protassova & Silkin, 2025). For example, in Nordic ECTE contexts, multilingualism is viewed through a monolingual ideological lens, which emphasises second language learning in many policy documents and curricula (Alstad, 2024a). Therefore, identifying and summarising the key concepts of early childhood teachers’ beliefs on multilingualism from the current literature is a crucial step in supporting teachers to develop evidence-based knowledge on multilingualism so that this will further inform national guidelines and empower multilingual families. The synthesis of evidence on early childhood teachers’ beliefs would contribute to identifying teachers’ knowledge gaps concerning multilingualism. It can also inform future directions for planning targeted professional development to support teachers in developing multilingual pedagogies that provide high-quality interactions with multilingual children, as well as benefit multilingual children’s learning, wellbeing, and development.

This review aims to (1) summarise early childhood teachers’ knowledge and beliefs about multilingualism based on the existing literature; (2) identify any individual, cultural, and contextual factors that are associated with variances in teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingualism in ECEC settings.

2. Method

This review adapted the scoping review approach to map the evidence and develop the key concepts of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingualism in ECEC settings. The methods of this review followed the five stages of conducting a scoping review as recommended by Arksey and O’Malley (2005): (1) addressing the research questions; (2) identifying relevant studies; (3) selecting the studies; (4) charting the data; (5) collating, summarising, and reporting the results.

In the first stage (addressing the research question), this systematic search aimed to answer the following question: what is known about early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in ECEC settings?

In the second stage (identifying relevant studies), initial searches of databases (ERIC, Academic Search Premier, and Education Research Complete) were conducted using the following key terms: (early childhood teachers) AND (perceptions OR attitudes OR opinion OR experience OR view OR reflection OR beliefs) AND (multilingualism OR bilingualism OR multilingual OR bilingual) AND (language OR bilingualism) AND (preschool education OR early childhood education). The searches produced a total number of 149 articles (98 results from ERIC, 21 results from Academic Search Premier, and 30 results from Education Research Complete). The last search was performed in December 2024. The search results were exported to EndNote X9, a citation management database software.

In the third stage, inclusion and exclusion were developed to select eligible studies. The selection criteria included (1) articles that appeared in peer-reviewed journals and were written in English; (2) articles with a publication date between 2000 and 2024, in order to reflect contemporary practices in ECEC settings and the increasing demands of supporting multilingual children in the past two decades; (3) studies concerning teachers who worked in early childhood education settings catering for children under the age of 6. After the title and abstract screening and full-text screening, 14 studies were included in this review (see Figure 1).

In the fourth and fifth stages (charting the data and summarising the results), this review focused on identifying and summarising the similar patterns or characteristics of the findings of the included studies. The common themes in early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism were developed and conceptualised by employing NVivo software (version 15).

3. Results

The qualitative synthesis of this review adapts Ruíz’s (1984) conceptual model of the three orientations towards multilingualism to summarise early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in the included studies. According to Ruíz (1984), there are three basic orientations towards language and linguistic diversity for language planning purposes: language-as-problem, language-as-right, and language-as-resource. This model has served as a heuristic and effective tool to analyse teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in prior studies on school settings (Vikøy & Haukås, 2021). A language-as-problem orientation views multilingualism as a disadvantage or threat from a monolingual-biased mindset. The view of language-as-right values the importance of multilingualism, while a language-as-resource orientation emphasises the benefits and value of linguistic diversity for individuals and society (Vikøy & Haukås, 2021), and encourages teachers to use different strategies to support multilingualism in classroom practices (Zheng et al., 2021). Ruíz’s (1984) conceptual model of the three orientations towards multilingualism help us identify early childhood teachers’ different beliefs about multilingualism. The summary and key concepts of mapping early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism are presented in

Table 1. The categories of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism.

Categories	Key Results	Studies
Language-as-problem	Learning a second language confuses children; teachers should only speak English; learning two languages would hinder children’s social development; multilinguals have the same level of proficiency in all languages; delayed majority language acquisition as an illness; multilingualism is a disability.	S. M. Garrity et al. (2019); Jacoby and Lesaux (2019); Lew and Choi (2023); Michael-Luna (2013); Portolés and Martí (2020); Sawyer et al. (2017); Thomauske (2011)
Language-as-right	Valuing and respecting children’s home language; using their home language benefits children’s learning; using their home language fosters relationships with multilingual children; understanding parents’ perspectives	Jacoby and Lesaux (2019); Kirsch et al. (2020); Kirsch (2018); Lengyel and Salem (2022); Sawyer et al. (2016)
Language-as-resource	Concerns about language barriers; concern about children’s home language maintenance; the challenges of a lack of bilingual resources (e.g., books) and professional development.	Bernstein et al. (2021); Palviainen et al. (2016); Sawyer et al. (2017); Thomauske (2011)

.

3.1. Language-As-Problem: Misconceptions of Multilingual Development

This review found that some teachers viewed multilingualism as a problem, and this belief translated into their classroom practices (Sawyer et al., 2017; Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019; S. M. Garrity et al., 2019; Portolés & Martí, 2020). These beliefs included various aspects of misconceptions regarding multilingual language learning.

For example, in a focus group study from three early childhood education centres in the United States, Sawyer et al. (2017) found that nearly half of the 17 preschool teachers held overly simplistic beliefs or misconceptions about child second language acquisition, such as the belief that multilingual young children learn like “magic” or that learning two languages would confuse children (Sawyer et al., 2017). Also, many teachers considered that it was easy for young children to learn a second language compared with adolescents (Sawyer et al., 2017). Furthermore, many teachers had misconceptions and failed to understand the differences in typical learning trajectory between multilingual children and children with language impairment (Sawyer et al., 2017). The other study of Sawyer and her colleagues (2016), which examined preschool teachers’ classroom practices for multilingual children, revealed that bilingual teachers held a monolingual belief that English should be the only language spoken in classrooms. This was also evident in two other studies, those by Thomauske (2011) and Lew and Choi (2023). In Germany, early childhood teachers prioritised German and believed it should be the only language spoken, rather than children’s home languages (Thomauske, 2011). In South Korea, Lew and Choi (2023) found that teachers only valued Korean and considered multilingualism as a disability. Furthermore, delayed Korean acquisition or incorrect pronunciation was treated as an illness. In addition, Korean teachers considered some home languages (e.g., Mandarin and English) to be more important than other home languages (e.g., Vietnamese).

Jacoby and Lesaux (2019) also investigated Head Start preschool teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingual children’s language learning and development, particularly English language acquisition. They found that more than half of the interviewed teachers (n = 20) prioritised social–emotional skills instead of language skills. In addition, teachers believed that multilingual children’s ability to use English was a result of being surrounded by Head Start classroom environments. Therefore, teachers did not provide any extra instructional support to these multilingual preschoolers.

S. M. Garrity et al. (2019) found that more than half of their participants held the misconception that learning two languages would hinder children’s social development in the United States. Their study also suggested that teachers failed to understand different language acquisition patterns between multilingual and monolingual children, which might lead to the misconception that multilingual children cannot achieve the same level of proficiency or vocabulary size as monolingual children (S. M. Garrity et al., 2019). Outside United States contexts, similarly, in Spain, pre-service preschool teachers viewed multilingualism as a child’s high proficiency in all languages (Portolés & Martí, 2020). Also, teachers valued and prioritised English in kindergartens in children’s early years (Portolés & Martí, 2020).

A few studies investigated factors associated with these misconceptions. For instance, Portolés and Martí (2020) suggested that individual factors, such as teachers’ linguistic backgrounds (e.g., being a monolingual speaker, etc.), contributed to misconceptions of viewing children who achieve high proficiency levels in all their languages as multilingual. This finding was further supported by Bernstein et al. (2021)’s quantitative study, which examined the relationship between demographic variables (e.g., ethnicity, education level, age, year of teaching, etc.) and preschool teachers’ language ideologies on multilingualism. Their results showed that teachers with a bachelor’s degree or higher held significantly more positive views of multilingualism than teachers with less education. Also, teachers’ knowledge of multilingual development also predicted favourable attitudes (Bernstein et al., 2021). In addition, teachers’ age and years of experience teaching were related to the negative view that multilingualism is a problem in classroom practices (Bernstein et al., 2021). S. M. Garrity et al. (2019) found that preschool teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism were associated with whether the teachers spoke other languages at home or were born overseas. And teachers of non-white ethnicities held more favourable attitudes towards multilingual education (S. M. Garrity et al., 2019). Unlike the association between teachers’ positive beliefs about multilingualism and their education levels reported by Bernstein et al. (2021), S. M. Garrity et al. (2019) found no statistically significant effects of education level on teachers’ positive beliefs about multilingualism.

3.2. Language-As-Right: The Importance of Supporting Children’s Home Language

From a language-as-right perspective, teachers respect the right of multilingual children and their families to maintain their home language. Studies included in the review suggested that teachers acknowledged the importance of home languages for multilingual children in classroom practices (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019; Kirsch et al., 2020; Sawyer et al., 2016). These positive attitudes suggest that multilingualism is valued and reflected in ECEC daily practices across many multilingual countries and regions. For instance, Sawyer et al.’s (2016) study found that teachers respected children and families’ rights to speak home languages, and some teachers agreed that English should not be the only language spoken in classrooms in the United States. Teachers also acknowledged the benefits of learning other languages and cultures for children (Sawyer et al., 2016). Early childhood teachers in Luxembourg valued the benefits of using multiple languages in daily conversation and literacy activities for developing children’s full linguistic repertoire (Kirsch et al., 2020). Luxembourgian teachers also criticised the national policy of exclusion of children’s home languages and overemphasis on the use of Luxembourgish in ECEC (Kirsch, 2018). In addition, Luxembourgian teachers valued the importance of advocating for children’s home language and inviting them to use it in everyday activities (Kirsch, 2018). Also, Jacoby and Lesaux (2019) found that 75% of teachers (including English monolingual and English–Spanish bilingual teachers) understood the importance of using children’s home language (Spanish) to support multilingual children in preschool classrooms, such as by helping children to feel comfortable and building relationships with others. Similarly, some teachers considered that the ability of speaking a child’s home language could help them understand multilingual families’ perspectives and connect with the multilingual community (Sawyer et al., 2017).

However, one study reported that teachers allowed home languages to be used to help children settle in the ECEC environments. After they started to learn the majority language (German), teachers believed that it was not necessary to speak or allow children speak their home language anymore (Lengyel & Salem, 2022).

3.3. Language-As-Resource: Challenges and Concerns About Supporting Multilingualism in Classroom Practices

The orientation of language-as-resource supports teachers in using different strategies to implement multilingualism in classroom practices. A few studies described how a teacher transferred her belief about promoting children’s use of their home languages into her classroom practices, such as by employing multilingual resources (in children’s home languages) to make everyone feel valued in the classroom environment (Kirsch, 2018). Also, early childhood teachers in Germany held the view that using a child’s home language would promote more responses from the multilingual child (Thomauske, 2011). In Finland, early childhood teachers considered that switching between two languages was crucial to support different children’s diverse needs and their competence in both languages (Palviainen et al., 2016).

However, more studies included in this review reported teachers’ concerns about the language-as-resource orientation during daily practices in ECEC environments, such as language barriers, concerns about children’s language skills, challenging the validity of certain pedagogies, the lack of resources/material support, and conflicts between personal teaching philosophy and the national language policy/curriculum.

For example, teachers were concerned about language barriers when they interacted with multilingual young children. Two-thirds of teachers wished to know more Spanish, as they believed that a lack of linguistic knowledge of Spanish would prevent them from developing important interpersonal relationships with children (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019). This finding was in line with Sawyer et al.’s (2017) study, which suggested that monolingual English teachers felt excluded and failed to foster teacher–child relationships as they could not speak children’s home languages. Bernstein et al. (2021) found that pre-kindergarten teachers had concerns regarding their own Spanish language skills and the ability to teach in Spanish in classrooms. Both English monolingual and English–Spanish bilingual teachers viewed a lack of linguistic knowledge in Spanish as a barrier (Bernstein et al., 2021). Other concerns also included the challenges of navigating their roles as language teachers, the stress of implementing multilingualism along with other teaching tasks, logistical issues (e.g., lack of time), and uncertainty about their roles and responsibilities in building parent–teacher collaboration (Bernstein et al., 2021; Sawyer et al., 2017).

Also, teachers reported their concerns about children’s home language maintenance. For example, bilingual teachers worried that children would decrease the use of their home language as they might receive the perception that English was the more valued societal language in ECEC environments (Sawyer et al., 2017).

Teachers also questioned the validity of certain pedagogies such as “parallel monolingualism” (language separation model) for supporting multilingualism in daily class practices (Palviainen et al., 2016). In addition, Sawyer et al. (2017) also found that teachers held negative views about using an interpreter/translator. Similarly, in Palviainen et al.’s (2016) study, teachers were concerned about the use of translators or translation, arguing that children would be less engaged if they relied solely on translation during communication.

Teachers also expressed their concerns in relation to the lack of bilingual books and professional development for facilitating multilingual education (Bernstein et al., 2021).

In Kirsch’s (2018) case study, the focal teacher addressed the conflicts between her personal teaching philosophy of promoting multilingualism and the national language policy of focusing on teaching Luxembourgish in classrooms. The focal teacher valued the importance of children’s multilingual competences, and she was keen to use multilingual strategies to support children’s multilingual development. However, the Luxembourg national language policy implemented a strict monolingual focus on Luxembourgish (Kirsch, 2018).

4. Discussion

This review identified the following themes of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism by adapting Ruíz’s (1984) conceptual model: (1) Language-as-problem: Teachers held misconceptions; for example, some believed that learning a second language would confuse children, or that learning two languages would hinder children’s social development. The misconceptions also included that multilingual children have the same level of proficiency in all languages, and teachers viewed delayed majority language acquisition as an illness or multilingualism as a disability. (2) Language-as-right: Teachers valued the benefits of multilingualism and respected multilingual children and their families’ right to using home language. (3) Language-as-resource: While only a few studies reported teachers’ positive beliefs about the benefits of using children’s home languages in classroom practices, in more studies, teachers shared their practical concerns about implementing multilingualism in their classroom pedagogies, such as language barriers (teachers could not speak a child’s home language), the lack of adequate support in resources/materials (e.g., bilingual books), and questions about monolingual pedagogies/national monolingual language policies in classroom practices. This review found that early childhood teachers had mixed beliefs about multilingualism. For example, in some studies, teachers viewed multilingualism as a problem, while in others they acknowledged that multilingualism as a right (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019).

While most of the studies included in this review employed qualitative research designs, two studies examined the factors associated with early childhood teachers’ beliefs about supporting multilingualism. Bernstein et al. (2021) found that teachers with a bachelor’s degree or higher level of education favoured multilingual education compared with teachers with lower levels of education, while older teachers who had more years of experiences were more likely to view multilingualism as a problem. However, S. M. Garrity et al. (2019) found that teachers’ beliefs about multilingual development were more closely related to their personal experiences with cultural, linguistic, and ethnic identities, as well as immigration backgrounds, rather than their education levels. As these two studies reported mixed results, more research is needed to help us understand the complex dynamic factors that contribute to early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism. The conception of early childhood teachers’ beliefs and the factors associated with their beliefs in this review are consistent with Bronfenbrenner’s (2001) ecological theory and Bandura and National Institute of Mental Health’s (1986) social learning theory, as this review found great variation amongst teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism and such beliefs impacted their everyday practices in ECEC. These findings suggest that many ECEC teachers operated within a monolingual habitus, viewing the dominant language as the primary medium of instruction. This perspective often stems from traditional educational practices and a lack of exposure to multilingual pedagogies. While some educators recognised the importance of maintaining children’s home languages, others perceived them as obstacles to learning the dominant language. This dichotomy reflects varying degrees of awareness and training in multilingual education (Alstad, 2024b).

Also, our findings regarding the concepts of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism and multilingual development are aligned with a recent scoping review on primary school teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in classroom practices (Désirée Lange & Polat, 2024). In Désirée Lange and Polat’s (2024) scoping review, they summarised three themes of primary school teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism: supporting multilingualism (multilingualism is a right, encouraging multilingualism), moderated multilingualism (limiting and tolerating multilingualism), and rejecting multilingualism (banning and disadvantaging multilingualism). The majority of the studies in their review reported teachers’ beliefs about supporting and tolerating multilingualism, while fewer studies reported teachers’ beliefs about rejecting multilingualism. In contrast, in this review, most of the studies found that early childhood teachers viewed multilingualism as a problem and had concerns about multilingualism as a resource. In addition, teachers questioned the feasibility of using multilingualism as a pedagogical resource, which was similar to the rejecting beliefs in Désirée Lange and Polat’s (2024) scoping review. In this review, only a small number of studies reported positive beliefs about multilingualism in early childhood teachers. Given the importance of supporting multilingualism as well as the importance of teachers’ beliefs for guiding their teaching practices (Fang, 1996; Kirsch et al., 2020), this review identified an urgent need to promote the benefits of multilingualism and multilingual pedagogies through future professional development. Also, in primary school settings, Désirée Lange and Polat’s (2024) scoping review found that many of the studies addressed multilingualism in the context of the minority languages, while fewer studies positioned multilingualism in the context of the majority language. This is also evident in this review of ECEC settings. However, while a few studies reported that early childhood teachers respected multilingual children’s right to use their home languages, the purpose of such respect was to help children settle into the majority language environment and learn the majority language, instead of supporting multilingualism (Lengyel & Salem, 2022). Such findings also align with teaching practices in early language learning across European contexts, where multilingualism has been employed to promote second language learning and reflect a monolingual norm (Alstad, 2024a). Lastly, this review identified various perspectives and misconceptions due to early childhood teachers’ misunderstanding of language learning theories. Such findings also suggest that future professional development on supporting multilingualism should focus on facilitating early childhood teachers’ knowledge on language development theories in children, first and second language acquisition, and multilingual pedagogies such as translanguaging (Jacoby & Lesaux, 2019; Zepeda et al., 2011; Zheng et al., 2021, 2024). How teachers translate their beliefs into classroom practices can provide insights into effective strategies and reduce potential barriers. Understanding how cultural backgrounds and personal contexts influence teachers’ beliefs can inform us more about their real beliefs (Protassova & Silkin, 2025).

5. Conclusions and Future Directions

This review maps the current evidence on early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingual development. This review summarised the key conceptions of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism in ECEC. Three themes were identified from 14 studies: multilingualism as a problem, multilingualism as a right, and concerns about multilingualism as a resource. In addition, this review found contradictory results from studies on factors associated with teachers’ differing beliefs on multilingualism (e.g., teachers’ language background, ethnicity, education, age, and years of teaching experiences). This review has two limitations. First, only peer-reviewed academic journal articles found through database searching were included, meaning that this review could have missed valuable research published in research books or grey literature. Second, this review only included studies written in English, meaning that this review might have missed meaningful studies on early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism written in other languages.

The following research gaps and future directions are addressed in this review. Firstly, as many studies are based on United States or European contexts, there is a pressing need to investigate early childhood teachers’ beliefs in non-Western contexts. With regard to research design, most studies included in this review collected data through questionnaires, one-on-one interviews, or teachers’ self-reports, which may have resulted in overly positive replies to satisfy the researchers (Portolés & Martí, 2020). Other alternatives for data collection such as focus group discussions could be considered in the future, as these allow participants to play a more active role and emphasise group interaction in a free environment (Haukås, 2016). In this way, research participants could flexibly speak with each other, ask questions, exchange ideas, and comment on those of others (Haukås, 2016). In addition, as many studies on teachers’ beliefs relied on qualitative methodologies, more quantitative-based evidence on how these beliefs guide teachers’ teaching practices in ECEC settings should be examined. Furthermore, as the research in the limited literature focused on preschool- or pre-kindergarten-aged children, there is a dearth of studies on teachers’ beliefs about multilingual infants under the age of 2 in ECEC contexts. Further research on teachers’ understanding of multilingual infants’ language development and how teachers can implement strategies in infant/toddler rooms in ECEC settings is clearly needed (Zheng et al., 2024).

Considering the relationship between early childhood teachers’ beliefs and their everyday practices, as well as the relationship between these practices and children’s learning and developmental outcomes, identifying early childhood teachers’ beliefs and knowledge gaps regarding multilingualism would boost their confidence in supporting multilingual children’s learning, development, and wellbeing. This review identifies and summarises the key conceptions of early childhood teachers’ beliefs about multilingualism and identifies their common knowledge gaps. This scoping review examines the evidence of such beliefs and provides insightful knowledge to inform teachers’ professional development surrounding multilingualism. Additionally, the findings remind teachers to further reflect and adjust their pedagogies to better support multilingual children. Through reviewing the current evidence, these results can inform future directions of professional development to empower early childhood teachers of multilingual children.