Against the backdrop of cultural confidence construction and international communication of Chinese culture in higher foreign language education, cultural identity building contains two interconnected dimensions: inward cultivation of cultural awareness through classroom ideological‑political instruction and outward cross‑cultural recognition realized via literary translation. This study takes the Curriculum‑based Ideological‑Political Multimodal Teaching Model (hereinafter referred to as CIM) for art‑sports college English and the English translation of Chinese core concepts in children’s literature as dual research objects, aiming to explore the interactive mechanism of the two‑way construction of cultural identity. Building upon the author’s prior empirical practice of the CIM model, this paper adopts an explanatory sequential mixed‑method design, integrating questionnaire surveys, classroom observation, and qualitative case analysis of translated children’s literary texts. Questionnaires were distributed to 126 art‑sports undergraduates receiving CIM instruction to measure changes in their cultural cognition and identity, while 18 typical translation samples of Chinese national community core concepts in children’s literature were selected to compare the effects of different translation strategies on cross‑cultural reception. The results indicate that the CIM multimodal teaching model effectively helps art‑sports students overcome their weak foundation in cultural expression, internalize recognition of Chinese cultural values, and develop subject consciousness for cultural communication in English classes. Meanwhile, appropriate translation strategies balancing domestication and foreignization can make core concepts of the Chinese national community accessible to young overseas readers, thereby facilitating external cultural identification. This study argues that inward identity cultivation in foreign language classrooms and outward cultural dissemination through children’s literature translation form a mutually reinforcing two‑way loop: classroom teaching shapes translators’ and learners’ endogenous cultural stance, and translation practice further tests and reflects the teaching outcomes of cultural confidence education. This research provides empirical support for the reform of college English ideological‑political teaching for special student groups and offers operational references for the international dissemination of Chinese children’s literature.