Search results for "Multilingualism"
showing 10 items of 184 documents
Exploring the cross-linguistic transfer of reading skills in Spanish to English in the context of a computer adaptive reading intervention
2017
ABSTRACTWe explore the potential of a computer-adaptive decoding game in Spanish to increase the decoding skills and oral reading fluency in Spanish and English of bilingual students. Participants were 78 first-grade Spanish-speaking students attending bilingual programs in five classrooms in Texas. Classrooms were randomly assigned to the treatment (i.e., where students played Graphogame Spanish) for 16 weeks for ten minutes per day (n = 3) versus business as usual instruction (n = 2). Results indicate that students at some risk on Spanish pseudoword reading appeared to benefit the most from playing the game. Analysis of gains suggests a potentially small, but meaningful educational effect…
Speaking English in Finnish content-based classrooms
2007
: CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) is a term widely used in Europe to refer to different forms of content based education, often conducted in English. Earlier research on CLIL has tended to focus on matters of language learning or content mastery rather than on details of classroom interaction. This paper investigates how English is used in Finnish biology and physics CLIL classrooms. Classrooms are approached from a discourse-pragmatic perspective which involves close attention to social and interpersonal aspects of language use as it unfolds in authentic settings. The findings suggest that CLIL students claim ownership of English by the way they confidently use it as a res…
Creating a bilingual pre-school classroom: the multilayered discourses of a bilingual teacher
2015
Teachers have an agentive role as they interpret, evaluate and develop language policies and practices. In the current study we interviewed a bilingual pre-school teacher in Finland during the first year of implementing a new way of working bilingually with a class of monolingual children. Applying nexus analysis, we explored the teacher discourses on the trajectory of the development of the new approach; the concepts, places and people that were circulating in her reflections; and how these connected with larger societal discourses. The analysis showed that the teacher's new bilingual language practices demanded the renegotiation of previously held personal and professional beliefs. The te…
Languaging in Ultima Thule: Multilingualism in the Life of a Sami Boy
2008
Abstract In this paper we investigate multilingualism as a phenomenon which pervades different social and cultural levels but is manifested in the everyday life of multilingual individuals. As an illustration, we examine multilingualism from the perspective of a young Sami boy, Ante, and explore how different languages function as a complex – but at times problematic – set of resources for him. To capture the complexity and fluidity in the relationships between various languages in his life, we base our theorising on such concepts as ‘linguistic resources’, ‘heteroglossia’ and ‘languaging’. With the help of multimodal data we examine how the linguistic resources present in Ante's daily life…
Conditions of commodification : Russian as a transient commodity in an Arctic tourism resort
2022
Abstract Based on an ethnography incorporating interview, linguistic landscape and observational data, this research illustrates how temporary linguistic value is negotiated and how an Arctic tourism destination is made fit for consumption for a specific audience. Set within a tourism resort in the Finnish Arctic during two weeks in Winter when the region habitually receives a large influx of Russian-speaking visitors, we illustrate how Russian is conceptualized as a means of economic practice by stakeholders in the local tourism industry. While some offer services specifically for a Russian-speaking audience as part of a short-term high-risk/high-reward investment, others regard Russian as…
Putting resources into practice: a nexus analysis of knowledge mobilisation activities in language research and multilingual communities
2014
Recent demand within the academy for language research that bridges different stakeholders renders the social relevance of research a factor in the academic competition for research funds [Curry, M. J., & Lillis, T. (2013). Introduction to the thematic issue: Participating in academic publishing – consequences of linguistic policies and practices. Language Policy, 12, 209–213]. This calls for new means and innovations for designing and carrying out knowledge mobilisation activities, with consequences concerning where, how and with whom this type of undertaking can or should be done. In this paper we, a team of (multilingual) researchers working within the fields of multilingualism, minority…
SOCIAL INTERACTION IN CONTEXT OF MULTILINGUALISM: FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE
2015
During the last decade, research interest in multilingualism has increased immensely. As a result, the present paper explores certain aspects of growing understanding and commitment to the linguistic diversity, which are considered to be some of the factors that underlie a successful interaction in a multilingual society nowadays. The theoretical framework of the study is designed considering the latest contributions of sociolinguistic ethnography in the area of multilingualism, relating the notion of multilingualism to the notion of multicompetence. The current situation demonstrates that multilingualism having developed from sociolinguistically-bound research distinguishes its own social,…
A language socialisation perspective on Swedish immersion in Finland : Students, teachers, and parents as key actors
2022
Abstract This retrospective review applies a language socialisation perspective in examining the findings of a four-year research project on Swedish immersion in Finland. Findings from nine sub-studies within the project are reported with a point-of-view from three key actors’ (teachers, students, and parents) language socialisation processes. Results show that a special feature of immersion teacher socialisation is its continuous attention toward the additive multilingual nature of immersion education, which requires sustained attention to multilingual language use and development. Students in Swedish immersion are socialised into the use of multiple languages in school and act as socialis…
¿Qué perspectivas para las lenguas regionales de Francia?
2014
Nous étudions, dans ce travail, la situation de langues en contact en France et les politiques linguistiques qui ont été menées depuis que le français a été institué langue officielle du pays, afin de déterminer les perspectives de reconnaissance nationale qui existent pour les autres langues, encore sans statut officiel. Le traitement exclusivement national qu’elles ont reçu jusqu’à la fin du XXe siècle se heurte aujourd’hui à la position de défense et de protection des langues régionales de l’Union Européenne. Nous analyserons les deux approches, nationale et européenne, avant de conclure en termes d’attentes pour ces langues minoritaires. We study in this work the situation of the langua…
Multimodal literacy practices in the indigenous Sámi classroom: Children navigating in a complex multilingual setting.
2013
This article explores multimodal literacy practices in a transforming multilingual context of an indigenous and endangered Sami language classroom. Looking at literacy practices as embedded in a complex and shifting terrain of language ideologies, language norms, and individual experiences and attitudes, we examined how multilingual Sami children navigate and appropriate meaning-making resources available for them while designing their own picture books. We adopted a discourse ethnographic approach to analyse these multimodal picture books and found three different but interrelated orientations to the making of the books, each organising and valuing multimodal resources in his or her own wa…