Legitimacy, effectiveness, and feasibility of language pull-out classes – assessing in-service teachers’ attitudes towards segregated language support

Supporting the language of instruction for second language learners has gained increasing attention in practice and research over the past decades. School systems establish different support programmes, and many of them have installed segregated pull-out classes. The present paper examines the psychometric properties of the German version of the Attitudes Towards Pull-out Language Support Classes Questionnaire. A total of 474 in-service teachers (313 primary school teachers, 161 secondary school teachers) participated in an online survey. The results of the confirmatory factor analysis indicated a bifactorial model. In addition to a strong unidimensional factor, three (strongly correlated) subfactors were identified: legitimacy, effectiveness, and feasibility. The overall scale and each of the three subscales showed high internal consistencies. Further, measurement invariance was confirmed for primary and secondary school teachers. Overall, teachers’ attitudes towards segregated language support were ambivalent.