She Shuts Her English Channel in Her Brain: Racial and Linguistic Ordering during Kindergarten Practicums.

This article examines how teacher candidates in a Canadian Masters of Teaching program understand and navigate socially constructed boundaries of language and race during their kindergarten practicum placements, focusing on multilingual students. Using the theoretical frameworks of translanguaging—a pedagogical approach that values students' entire linguistic repertoires—and LangCrit, which explores intersections of language, race, and identity, the study analyzes interviews with three teacher candidates who worked with multilingual children, primarily Mandarin speakers. Findings reveal that kindergarten classrooms often reproduce English language dominance and racialized hierarchies, leading some children to resist English use, while candidates attempted to support multilingual identities through translanguaging practices. However, communication with families was frequently limited by language barriers and monolingual school practices, and racialized candidates experienced essentializing assumptions about their linguistic and cultural identities, highlighting the need for more inclusive, critically informed teacher education and practicum environments.