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This reflective article examines the emerging tendencies in critical perspectives within English Language Teaching (ELT). The article begins by providing a brief historical overview of ELT's critical pedagogies and discussing its perspectives in the post-pandemic era. It highlights the need for critical approaches that address power dynamics, social inequalities, and ideological influences. In addition, new trends imply integrating cultural aspects that favor students' identity and culture, and more dynamic bilingual practices to promote inclusive, socially just, multilingual, and transformative language learning environments. The article concludes by emphasizing the importance of ongoing reflection, professional development, and collaboration among ELT practitioners to incorporate critical perspectives effectively in the classroom.

The following article recommends Texas high school English teachers to select "All the Pretty Horses" (McCarthy, 1992), the critically acclaimed, best-selling novel by Cormac McCarthy, as a reading option for students. Set in rural Texas and Mexico, "All the Pretty Horses" provides an engaging reading experience that would likely connect to the lives of many Texas high school students. In addition to the rural setting and bilingual dialogues, the novel offers relatable teenage characters with diverse cultural, socioeconomic, and linguistic backgrounds similar to the diverse student populations in Texas schools. The novel also addresses developmentally appropriate themes including independence, identity, and career. Likewise, students with various reading levels will be able to comprehend the text. The present article discusses how "All the Pretty Horses" is an example of a relevant, accessible, and high-interest text for adolescents. In addition, the article provides high school teachers with suggestions for meaningful literacy activities that correspond to Boardman and colleagues' (2008) five central components of adolescent literacy.

Translanguaging, defined as "the deployment of a speaker's full linguistic repertoire without regard for watchful adherence to the socially and politically defined boundaries of named (and usually national and state) languages" (Otheguy et al., 2015, p. 281), has great potential to play a key role in English as a Second Language (ESL) classrooms and institutions. This article first explores the origins and historical development of the concept of translanguaging before examining more general recent developments and applications of this concept internationally and in Australia. The final section provides suggestions for how to apply some of the principles of translanguaging in the adult ESL classroom, with a particular focus on specific translanguaging practices that have been used with Direct Entry English for Academic Purposes students.

This longitudinal, mixed-methods study reports on the development and implementation of an early phonological awareness screening and intervention program for struggling emergent readers in a French immersion school in Manitoba. The program was created by a professional learning community made up of the school administrator, teachers, and clinical support staff. This paper describes the process of developing the phonological awareness program and the intervention itself. Forty-two children participated in the phonological awareness intervention that lasted 10 weeks. The intervention was given in English in kindergarten. Significant gains were found in the phonological awareness skills of the children who participated in the intervention. Results also indicated that children's phonological awareness skills in English predicted their French reading levels in Grade 1. In addition, we provide insight into the roles played by key members of the school's PLC through qualitative analysis of a series of semi-structured interviews. The work of the school's professional learning community offers a model that may be implemented by other school teams to promote equity and accessibility for all learners in FI programs.

The English reading ability of university students is crucial for their academic achievement, regardless of whether they are studying English or any other subject in English. Examining the affective factors that influence this ability is critical for understanding its development. Research has been conducted on the correlation between first language (L1) and English as a second language (ESL/EFL) reading attitudes, but there is limited research on the correlation between L2 and L1. This research seeks to investigate the similarities in reading perspectives between Arabic-speaking international students and English-speaking university students. The study employed surveys and semi-structured interviews to evaluate individuals' viewpoints on bilingual reading. The objective was to assess individuals' attitudes towards reading in two languages. Both quantitative and qualitative analyses were conducted. The study revealed that students' reading preferences remained consistent across different languages. However, the relationship between second-language reading attitudes and first-language reading attitudes was found to be minimal. The implications of the current study suggest that enhancing reading attitudes in both languages may enhance reading ability. The study utilised subjective data and targeted a specific demographic, limiting its generalizability to more diverse student populations.

The present study aimed to validate a 70-item Korean bilingual version of the Vocabulary Size Test (VST) using Rasch modeling. The goal was to assess the applicability of this Korean version of the VST for Korean learners of English in an English as a foreign language (EFL) context by examining validity evidence based on Messick's framework. Specifically, the study focused on the content, substantive, and external aspects of construct validity. However, the findings provided weak evidence supporting the utility of the VST as a measure of receptive vocabulary for Korean EFL learners. The test was deemed too easy and lacked the ability to effectively differentiate among varying levels of second language proficiency, with many test items exhibiting unexpected behavior. Additionally, the VST showed a weak correlation with another measure of second language proficiency. In light of these findings, the study offers specific recommendations for improving the test's validity and usefulness.

This cross-sectional study examined materials adaptation within an English-Chinese bilingual storytelling curriculum for first graders to identify the potential factors influencing adaptation choice. It delved into the relationship between curriculum objectives, perceptions of picture books, and the use of tense and narrative. A survey (N=352) gathered demographic data of English teachers from China, and the data was analyzed using Partial Least Square (PLS) structural equation modeling. Findings illuminate how teachers' perception of picture books fully mediate the interplay between bilingual storytelling curriculum objectives and teachers' narrative in a picture book adaptation. Analyzing the results by narrative theory, it found that the essence of storytelling and narrative is making meanings; stories play a leading role in the curriculum for first graders to develop their bilingual narrative through sharing, reading, and telling stories. Consequently, teachers' understanding of picture books' possibilities as teaching materials, benefits for fostering students' bilingual development, and perception of the intertextuality of illustration and words can significantly facilitate teachers' narrative in a picture book adaptation. This study contributes by elucidating the mediating role of picture books, emphasizing the importance of linking curriculum objectives with teaching materials adaptation in practice. Furthermore, longitudinal research is to overcome the limitations of this cross-sectional correlation analysis.

In the geographies where various languages are spoken, individuals may have to experience learning one or more languages to fulfil their needs. When societies who live together and use various language groups make contact with people who use other language groups and cultures, they have to interact with each other. This mutual effect is then reflected on the languages and brings the term of bilingualism or multilingualism into the agenda. Multilingualism is regarded as the simple form of bilingualism. The acquisition of a second language indicates the ability to use another language. The process of dual-language/bilingualism emerges in cases where people learn/acquire another language in addition to his/her mother language. Dual language or bilingualism can be stated as an individual expressing themselves in two or more languages as effectively as in the mother tongue. The reason for choosing this topic is the increasing popularity of it; because human beings who use various languages all over the world have had to live together for numerous reasons such as wars, migrations, education, trade and etc. In 2022-2023 AY, in order to understand and shed light on students' ideas towards bilingualism, a survey was carried out at a state university in England. We would like to state that the findings obtained from evaluating the attitudes of the bilingual students related to the acquisition of English will contribute to the literature and provide a different perspective in this research.

This research study provided a basic understanding of pedagogical translanguaging and its importance in a multilingual classroom environment from the perspective of foreign language class students. The qualitative study, employing interpretive phenomenological analysis, investigated students' viewpoints on pedagogical translanguaging in a multilingual classroom setting, specifically within Pondicherry Central University's French certificate program in India. Through semi-structured interviews, 8 main themes and 35 subthemes were identified. Comparing these findings with the functions of translanguaging, similarities and differences in translanguaging application in language learning contexts emerged. Additionally, the study aimed to enhance instructional strategies tailored to meet the linguistic needs of diverse learners in multilingual classrooms.

The study described in this article evaluates the effectiveness of methods of improving phonetic, grammatical, and syntactic skills in children with general speech underdevelopment in a bilingual environment. The method is based on a theoretical study of severe speech disorders, a structural analysis of linguistic samples, and a comparative study of the results of research by various scientists in an interdisciplinary discourse. An experimental study was carried out concerning the assessment of the effectiveness of speech therapy exercises for forming linguistic skills (phonetic-phonemic, morphological, word-formation, lexical, and syntactic) at different language levels in preschoolers with a general speech disorder in the context of bilingualism (Kazakh was considered the main language, and Russian was considered an additional language). The materials presented in this paper can be used to develop linguistic skills for various speech defects.

This study investigates the influences of early and intense L2 exposure on children's L1 causative verb production, assessed by an experimental causative verb production task. Turkish expresses causality by morphological and lexical means, whereas English does so by periphrastic and lexical means. Learning L2 English might enhance L1 Turkish causative verb production by highlighting the parallels and contrasts in causal expressions between the languages, which may result in an enriched L1 causative use. Five-, 7 -, and 9-year-old L1-Turkish L2-English bilingual (n = 80) and L1-Turkish monolingual (n = 80) children participated in the study in L1-Turkish. Results indicated that language group differences only emerged for the use of morphological causative verbs in favor of 5-year-old bilinguals compared with monolingual peers. Age group differences occurred only for the monolingual group and only for morphological verbs. Specifically, monolingual 7- and 9-year-olds performed better than monolingual 5-year-olds. Causative verb-type differences were only seen for 5-year-old monolinguals, who performed better for lexical than morphological verbs; in contrast, 5-year-old bilinguals performed equally well on the two types of causatives, and better than 5-year-old monolinguals on morphological causatives. Overall, these findings indicate that learning an L2 with structural similarities and differences compared with L1 might enhance children's awareness and correct use of causal linguistic structures.

While extensive quantitative research has shed light on the cognitive mechanisms of dyslexia, few mixed-methods studies have been conducted to examine the perceptions of and attitudes towards learning in children with dyslexia, especially in Hong Kong, a bilingual context. In addition, the validity of the metaphor elicitation technique, which was adopted in previous interview studies, has not yet been examined in children. Therefore, 30 children with dyslexia (age range: 8-13; 10 females) in Hong Kong were interviewed for metaphors regarding six domains: Chinese reading, Chinese writing, having Chinese lessons, English reading, solving maths problems, and dyslexia. Word reading fluency and parent-rated learning interest and confidence were measured to validate the use of the metaphor elicitation method in assessing children's reading attitudes in both Chinese and English using correlation analyses. Perceptions were examined by way of qualitative analyses based on the metaphor entailments. Results showed that children who expressed more positive attitudes towards English reading performed better in English reading. Moreover, the attitudes also positively correlated with the corresponding parents' ratings. These findings suggested that the metaphor elicitation technique is a valid method for assessing attitudes towards English reading in children with dyslexia. Furthermore, their perceptions of dyslexia and learning generally corresponded to those from previous interview studies despite differences in languages and contexts. Importantly, descriptions related to multiple themes, including metalinguistic awareness, cognitive skills, coping strategies, and dyslexia, were well-aligned with scientific findings, demonstrating that children already have a good understanding of dyslexia and various learning domains.

This study explores the decolonial potential of Chinese bilingual postgraduate students' translanguaging practices in English academic writing. It investigates the ways that students enact translanguaging to delink from monolingual standard English norms and integrate their authentic bilingual voices in the writing process. A case study was conducted to collect the students' written products and record and analyze their approaches and views to language use in academic writing in an English for academic purpose course. The findings reveal that students could employ the integrated multilingual repertoires to enhance learning outcomes, negotiate deficit linguistic views, and voice cultural identities in the writing process. Their translanguaging enactment transcends linguistic boundaries and English-dominated norms, providing empirical support for the decolonization of academic writing in Chinese higher education. The study underscores the importance of student-led negotiation of linguistic and cultural differences, advocating for critical engagement with translanguaging to deconstruct social inequalities perpetuated by hegemonic ideologies and promote bilingual subjectivities in non-Anglophone academic contexts.

Purpose: This study examined the language and nonverbal inhibitory control skills of Italian monolingual and bilingual typically developing (TD) preschoolers with Italian as their second language and of age-matched monolingual and bilingual peers with developmental language disorder (DLD). Method: Four groups of preschoolers were enrolled: 30 TD Italian monolinguals, 24 TD bilinguals, 19 Italian monolinguals with DLD, and 19 bilinguals with DLD. All children were assessed in Italian on vocabulary, receptive morphosyntax, and morphological markers for DLD in the Italian language (i.e., third-person verb inflections, definite articles, third-person direct-object clitic pronouns, simple prepositions) and nonverbal inhibitory control skills. Group performance was compared using a series of one-way analyses of variance. Results: Monolingual and bilingual children with DLD achieved significantly lower performance in all language measures compared to both TD monolingual and bilingual children. However, TD bilinguals, although comprehensively showing better language skills than monolinguals with DLD, achieved a performance closer to that of monolinguals with DLD but significantly higher than that of bilinguals with DLD. Both TD monolinguals and bilinguals showed better results than both DLD groups in inhibitory control tasks, particularly in the interference suppression task. Conclusions: This study provides a picture of language and inhibitory control characteristics of children with various language profiles and adds to the literature on potential markers of DLD among bilingual children. These results suggest that the assessment of nonlinguistic markers, which are associated with language impairment, could be a useful approach to better specify the diagnosis of DLD and reduce cases of misdiagnosis in the context of bilingualism.

Sometime before their second birthday, many children have a period of rapid expressive vocabulary growth called the vocabulary spurt. Theories of the underlying mechanisms differ: Accumulator models emphasize the accumulation of experience with words over time to yield a spurtlike pattern, while cognitive models attribute the spurt to cognitive changes. To test these theories, English-French monolingual and bilingual children with different exposure to each language were studied. Dense, longitudinal data were analyzed from 45 infants aged 16-30 months, whose expressive vocabulary was measured on a total of 617 occasions in English and/or French. Single-language (English and/or French), concept (number of concepts lexicalized across both languages), and word (sum of both languages) vocabulary scores were computed. Infants' exposure to each language and their exposure balance were measured using a language exposure questionnaire. Logistic curves were fitted to each infant's data to estimate the timing (midpoint) and steepness (slope) of the vocabulary spurt in single-language, concept, and word vocabularies. Seventy-six percent of infants showed a spurt in at least one vocabulary type, and bilinguals were less likely to show one in their nondominant than their dominant language. For single-language vocabulary, infants with more exposure to a language had earlier spurts. For combined vocabularies (concept and word), monolinguals and unbalanced bilinguals had earlier and steeper spurts than balanced bilinguals. Results better support the predictions of accumulator models than cognitive theories and show that infants follow different vocabulary acquisition trajectories based on their language background.

Bilingualism has become the norm--not the exception--in today's globalized world. The development of bilingual proficiency in English and other languages is increasing worldwide. Saudi Arabia is one of many countries within the expanding circle of nations in which English (although with no official status) enjoys a special position as the sole foreign language taught in public schools. This study examined Saudi university students' beliefs about issues surrounding bilingualism, particularly about their first language (L1), second language (L2), and potential benefits of being bilingual. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and a focus group discussion with 15 university students. The findings showed that all students explicitly self-identified as bilingual based on their perceived linguistic repertoire and daily bilingual practices. Self-identification seems to have an empowering effect, which positively influences beliefs about bilingualism and language learning. As members of the dominant Arabic-speaking group, the students were able to achieve sequential additive bilingualism. Overall, the students saw bilingualism as an advantage and highlighted its perceived benefits, the instrumental importance of English, and the vital role of Arabic as a marker of their ethnoreligious identity.

This study explores four 1.5-generation Korean-New Zealanders' perceptions of bilingualism, heritage language (HL) competence, and identity. Drawing on interview data, the study shows that the participants were strongly connected to their ethnic group and strove to accept and strengthen their hyphenated Korean-New Zealander identities through foregrounding their bilingual and bicultural competence. In addition to their Korean use at home, socializing with other Korean speakers at church and in peer groups aided their learning of a wide range of registers in context, while providing culturally sensitive places for the participants to explore their identities. Nevertheless, the study also found that the participants encountered racial and linguistic hierarchical structures from which they were marginalized, which delayed their construction of positive bilingual identities. The findings enable a deeper understanding of how family-internal and family-external factors shape immigrant children's identities, and suggest that substantial institutional and societal support are needed to foster immigrant children's bilingualism and biculturalism.

Many bilinguals switch languages in daily-life conversations. Although this usually happens within sentence context and with another speaker, most research on the cognitive mechanisms underlying the production of language switches has studied individual words. Here, we examined how context influences both switching frequency and the temporal cost associated with it. Sixty Bulgarian-English bilinguals named pictures in their language of choice without any context, in a sentence context, and in interaction with another (recorded) bilingual. Switching frequency was lower, and costs higher, when bilinguals switched languages with context than without context. This suggests switching costs were not an artifact of tasks without context. Furthermore, both switching frequency and costs correlated across the tasks. In addition, we examined the potential influence of sentence context and the conversation partner. Predictability in sentence context has previously been argued to reduce language competition, which in turn could influence switching. We therefore compared sentences with a predictable or unpredictable target word. As hypothesized, bilinguals were less likely to switch languages when a word was predictable in its sentence context, potentially because words in the other language were less active. The conversation partner's overall switching behaviour had little impact on a bilingual's general switching rate, showing relatively low global alignment. However, local alignment was observed as switching was influenced by the partner's switching in the immediately preceding utterance. Together, these findings show that while production tasks without context can reliably measure switching costs, studying effects of context is necessary to better capture a bilingual's language-switching behavior.

Motivation to learn languages strongly correlates with language achievement, and the school context has a great influence on the motivation of young learners (YLs). A key rationale for the implementation of content and language integrated learning (CLIL) programs, therefore, was pupil motivation. Very few studies have measured motivation in this context, especially in primary schools. Even fewer have done so in bilingual areas, where the continuation of widespread use of the regional language often depends on its presence in the school system and where CLIL reduces this presence. To address these gaps, motivation towards the foreign language (FL), English, and the regional language, Basque, was measured in 399 YLs of English (aged 10-12 years) in Basque immersion schools. The learners were divided into a CLIL group (n = 230), with English as a foreign language (EFL) and CLIL lessons, and a non-CLIL group (n = 169), which received only EFL lessons. Results showed that the CLIL learners had a more positive attitude towards English and a slightly lower motivation towards Basque. This suggests that increasing the amount of exposure to the foreign language (FL) via CLIL lessons improves the motivation towards English but could decrease the instrumental motivation towards the regional language.

With the overwhelming "Anglocentric" or "alphabetocentric" science of reading, the current review aimed to add to the science of reading acquisition from the perspective of abugidic writing system, distinct from the well-research alphabetic writing system in multiple dimensions of orthographic complexity, as proposed by Daniels and Share (2018), such as linguistic distance, spatial arrangement and non-linearity, and omission of phonological elements. Abugidic writing system is featured with scripts where each base consonant symbol denotes a consonant with an inherent vowel (/a/) and has billions of users in south Asia (e.g., India, Nepal, Sri Lanka), southeast Asia (e.g., Thailand, Laos, Cambodia), east Asia (parts of China) and Africa (Ethiopia and Eritrea). The current review describes the orthographic feature of Indic (Brahmi-derived) and Ethiopic (Ge'ez) scripts within the abugidic writing system and synthesizes existing findings on the literacy acquisition patterns specific to each script. Further, we elaborate on the multilingual and biscriptal language and literacy environment featured with the abugida-writing societies and discuss the theoretical implication for considering multilingualism and biscriptality as an inseparable sociolinguistic factor when understanding the literacy acquisition of the abugidic writing system in particular and literacy in general.

This study investigated bilingualism effects on the production of focus in 5- to 9-year-old Cantonese-English bilingual autistic children's L1 Cantonese, compared to their monolingual autistic peers as well as monolingual and bilingual typically developing children matched in nonverbal IQ, working memory, receptive vocabulary and maternal education. The results from an elicitation task showed that monolingual autistic children had significantly lower accuracy than typically developing children in producing focus in subject and object positions. Bilingual autistic children in general performed similarly to monolingual autistic children but outperformed their monolingual autistic peers in the production of object focus with a significantly higher accuracy. The total amount of English exposure did not relate to the accuracy of focus production in autistic and typically developing children. Our results also revealed autistic children's tendency to make use of less prosodic means to produce focus. The overall findings indicate that bilingual exposure has no detrimental effect on the language skills of autistic children but might enhance the production of focus in bilingual autistic children's L1 Cantonese.

Research has shown that speakers of different languages may differ in their cognitive and perceptual processing of reality. A common denominator of this line of investigation has been its reliance on the sensory domain of vision. The aim of our study was to extend the scope to a new sense-taste. Using as a starting point crosslinguistic differences in the category boundaries of edible bulbs, we examined whether monolingual speakers of English and bilingual speakers of Norwegian and English were influenced by language-specific categories during tasting. The results showed no evidence of such effects, not even for the Norwegian participants in an entirely Norwegian context. This suggests that crosslinguistic differences in visual perception do not readily generalize to the domain of taste. We discuss the findings in terms of predictive processing, with particular reference to trigeminal stimulation (a central tasting component) and the interplay between chemosensory signals and top-down linguistic modulation.

Color terms divide the color spectrum differently across languages. Previous studies have reported that speakers of languages that have different words for light and dark blue (e.g., Russian "siniy" and "goluboy") discriminate color chips sampled from these two linguistic categories faster than speakers of languages that use one basic color term for blue (e.g., English "blue"). This effect has been reported to be disrupted when participants engaged in a verbal interference task, suggesting that active language use can modulate the linguistic category effect. The current study provided a stringent test of this hypothesis by examining color discrimination under verbal interference in bilinguals speaking Lithuanian (two blue categories) and Norwegian (one blue category). The results revealed that the language activated during verbal interference had a significant impact on bilinguals' color discrimination. Specifically, Lithuanian-Norwegian bilinguals exhibited a color category effect only when performing the task under verbal interference in Lithuanian but not in Norwegian. This demonstrated, within the same individuals, the momentary effect of active language processing on color perception.

Embodied cognition posits that processing concepts requires sensorimotor activation. Previous research has shown that perceived power is spatially embodied along the vertical axis. However, it is unclear whether such mapping applies equally in the two languages of bilinguals. Using event-related potentials, we compared spatial embodiment correlates in participants reporting the source of auditory words as being presented from above or below their sitting position. English bilinguals responded faster for congruent presentations of high-power words (presented above) but not for congruent presentations of low-power words (presented below) in both languages. Low-power words together also failed to modulate N400 amplitude or interact with language. However, follow-up analyses on high-power words showed congruency effects on N400 amplitude in Chinese but not in English. Finally, English controls showed no effect. This suggests that spatial embodiment differs across languages in bilinguals, but the roles of culture and proficiency require further research.

This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the motivations that key policy documents have put forward as justifications for Sweden's mother-tongue instruction in immigrant and historical minority languages as a multicultural policy that has endured for nearly half a century. The diachronic development of these motivations is analysed in four periods and interpreted with the help of Ruiz's (1984) orientations in language planning. The corpus consists of 26 key policy documents making up the coordinative discourse among policy actors. Based on an innovative mix of qualitative and quantitative methods, the motivations are presented in a three-tiered taxonomy consisting of motivational units, themes and language-planning orientations. The results point to both continuity and change in how mother-tongue instruction has been justified over time. Confirming previous research, the results show that the language-as-resource orientation has played a central role in justifying both the establishment and the maintenance of mother-tongue instruction in Sweden and that language as right complemented this orientation. Furthermore, the study illustrates that the language-as-problem orientation need not always be detrimental to bilingualism and minority-language maintenance. Contrary to some claims in the literature, it is argued that language as extrinsic resource is not necessarily underpinned by neoliberalism, as there are also social liberal and conservative inroads to this orientation. The paper concludes that although the language-as-resource orientation plays an indispensable role in supporting bilingualism in education, not only the language-as-right orientation but also the language-as-problem orientation should not be neglected.

The emotional stance of the instructor in an educational video can influence the learning process. For this reason, we checked the first link of the cognitive-affective model of e-learning, namely, whether learners can recognize emotions that an instructor expresses only with their voice. Since English is not the native language for many learners and most instructional videos are produced in English, we tested for possible differences in emotion recognition between native and non-native speakers. We focused on positive emotions typically conveyed in such videos - enthusiasm and calmness. Native and non-native English speakers watched 12 short video clips about wood as a building material spoken by an instructor in different emotional tones - five videos expressed enthusiasm, five calmness, one boredom and one frustration. Participants rated the extent to which they thought the narrator expressed a specific emotion, the valence and activation level of the narration and solved an English vocabulary test. Both native and non-native speakers recognized the correct emotions (except for frustration), demonstrating the power of voice prosody to convey emotion in a multimedia learning scenario. Native speakers rated the enthusiastic videos more positively than non-native speakers, indicating a subtle difference in the way the two groups perceive emotions expressed through voice.

The present study investigated whether parent--child interactions during shared reading in a diverse sample of 91 three- to five-year-old dual language learners (DLLs) in Norway supported the development of the children's first (L1) and second language (L2) vocabulary skills. The dyads spoke 11 different L1s (i.e., Arabic, Polish, Somali, and Urdu). The analysis of shared reading was based on predefined story elements in the book, and differentiated between whether central story elements were introduced as parent inferential questions and child responses, or as parent and child narrative statements. The children's L1 and L2 receptive vocabulary skills were assessed prior to the reading as well as 8 months later. Regression analyses revealed that parent inferential questions predicted children's L1 vocabulary development across the time-period. Child responses to adult inferential questions predicted their L1 and L2 vocabulary development. These findings support the growing research base that emphasizes the importance of eliciting child reasoning during shared reading.

While it is established that parental "wh"-questions, as a high-quality language input, are associated with child language outcome, less is known about the role of children's "wh"-questions in their language development. This study examines whether children's "wh"-questions during a dinnertime conversation are associated with their receptive and expressive language skills. The sample consists of a unique group of bilingual children: 32 Chinese preschoolers (aged 3-5 years) in Norway. At the onset of the study, parents self-recorded a dinnertime conversation with the target child and other family members present. Over the following year, we assessed children's receptive vocabulary, expressive vocabulary, and narrative skills in Chinese three times. Individual growth modeling revealed that concurrently, the density of children's "wh"-questions was associated with children's expressive vocabulary and narrative skills, but the association faded when controlling for family demographics. Significantly, even when accounting for all control variables, children's "wh"-questions predicted their receptive vocabulary growth across one year. These findings underline children's active role in shaping their language learning and development. This study also contributes to our understanding of bilingual children's home language development. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

Preschool education describes the education process of the child until primary school, and it is also within the scope of child bilingualism. This study examined the studies on bilingualism covering the preschool period in Turkey. The main statement of this study is that related postgraduate theses in different disciplines investigating the issue of bilingualism covering the preschool period are insufficient in the national literature in Turkey. This study aimed to analyze postgraduate theses between 2003 and 2022 registered in the Turkish Higher Education Institution (YÖK) database and to break down different variables. The main findings are that bilingualism studies are mostly concentrated on master's theses, they are not the subject of doctoral theses. Furthermore, education- and teaching-oriented theses are at the forefront and should be handled together with other disciplines. The model of the study is a qualitative case study, and the data of the study were obtained from theses on the website of YÖK. In the analysis of the data, the bibliometric technique is used, and statistics about the subject are created.

Research has suggested that Swedish higher education institutions' (HEIs') language policies may exclude some academic staff from work-related activities due to (dual) monolingual ideologies requiring one language at a time. This study, based on the analysis of twenty-one language policy texts, investigates HEIs' policies using a lens of inclusion at workplaces with linguistic diversity, drawing on concepts from diversity management and language policy for democracy of inclusion. All documents examined began with statements of HEIs' values relevant to the policies. Inclusion was seldom explicitly emphasized, although policies suggested ways to facilitate it. We argue that some of the approaches--namely, taking a top-down monolinguistic approach to language choice, requiring staff to be highly proficient in both Swedish and English, and offering unspecified language support--reinforce language-based in-groups and out-groups, likely compromising rather than facilitating inclusion. Another approach, emphasizing individuals' rights to choose what language they use, facilitates inclusion only if support is provided for everyone's understanding. Providing immediate language support and encouraging bottom-up, flexible language choice were less common approaches but seem particularly likely to facilitate inclusion. Our analysis suggests that policies prioritizing successful communication, not specific languages, facilitate inclusion and help employees develop job-related language and intercultural communicative competence.

This study investigates for the first time the comprehension of rhetorical questions (RhQs) in bilingual children. RhQs are non-canonical questions, as they are not used to request information, but to express the speaker's belief that the answer is already obvious. This special pragmatic meaning often arises by means of specific prosodic and lexical-syntactic cues. Being childhood learners, children have to acquire the concept of rhetoricity, but being bilinguals, they further need to acquire the different cues marking RhQs in their two languages. We tested 85 bilingual children (aged 6-9 years) with Italian as heritage language (HL) and German as majority language (ML) in both of their languages, using a forced-choice comprehension task. Our results show that RhQ comprehension improves with age in both languages. Bilingual children are able to exploit prosodic and syntactic cues to comprehend RhQs in their ML and HL with a slight advantage in the ML. This advantage could be either an effect of the cues used in the experiments in the two languages or of a higher proficiency in the ML. In addition, our results point to a later acquisition of prosodic rhetorical cues, which has implications for bilingual acquisition of non-canonicity in general.

In its language policy and planning (LPP), Colombia offers ethnoeducation for ethnic groups, with Spanish as a second language, and for the protection/revitalization of native languages. However, these LPP measures are insufficiently implemented. Meanwhile, with regard to foreign languages, LPP have specifically advocated a Spanish-English bilingualism emphasized since the early 2000s. What then favours English to the detriment of native languages? The objective of this research is to reveal what is hidden behind this LPP through a Critical Discourse Analysis of official documents. The elements brought to light show "unilingualism" and "unibilingualism" ideologies that discriminate against native languages, and value the linguistic imperialism of English.

Developing intercultural communicative competence has become an inevitable need within 21st-century demands, mobilizing global efforts to promote unity through diversity. However, within the Colombian context and supported by an economic interest in bilingualism, most English language teaching programs still advocate educational practices that reaffirm cultural homogenization and legitimation. This presupposes a challenge for pre-service language teachers, who may not be interculturally prepared to overcome their ethnocentrism, and yet have to face a language classroom. The study explored the intercultural sensitivity level of a group of 50 pre-service English language teachers from a Colombian private university, its influencing factors, and explained its relationship with the representation of the Other. A twostage explanatory sequential mixed-method design was employed, involving, in the first stage, quantitative data from a self-awareness intercultural sensitivity questionnaire and in the second stage, qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and two in-class observations. Findings indicated that the participants demonstrated ethnocentric intercultural sensitivity arising from a traditionalist culture teaching approach, misleading artificial means to culture learning, and limited overseas cultural experience, which led them to perpetuate Cultural Othering, a social representation materialized through mechanisms of overgeneralization, cultural pride, and cultural underestimation. The conclusions and implications are further discussed.

Recently, translanguaging has begun challenging and replacing English-only policies in English-medium instruction (EMI) contexts, advocating that bi/multilingual learners may better internalise information in two or more languages. Within this perspective and using linguistic ethnography as the framework, this case study examines the translanguaging practices used by the instructor and the students in English literature classrooms and how/whether these practices mediate learning when multilingual resources are used for pedagogical purposes. The data for this study comes from the researcher, as the instructor, observing and recording their two content classrooms in an English Literature department, namely Contemporary British Novel and Discourse Analysis courses. These observations and recordings were analysed from a pedagogical translanguaging lens to identify the instructor's input and the students' output in terms of their display of linguistic repertoires in English (the language of instruction) and Turkish (the shared language in the classroom). The results provide implications for research and practice, offerings suggestions for how/whether a pedagogical translanguaging lens might be adopted in content classrooms.

This meta-synthesis study aims to reveal the types of bilingualism in Turkey by interpreting the quantitative data and findings obtained from studies on bilingualism types. In the light of the findings, 28 types of bilingualism and 5 classification criteria have been identified in the theses written on bilingualism in the "Turkish Higher Education Institution Thesis Center database". The synthesis data show that the most addressed type of bilingualism in 22 theses was "balanced" and "dominant bilingualism". The most frequently used criterion in classifying bilingualism is "skill level criterion", followed by "age of acquisition", "cognitive organization," and "status of the two languages".

In this article, we report the results of a study through which we collected English language teachers' needs and wants to design an online language assessment course. Through a mixed-methods approach, we asked 20 teachers from four Latin American countries what they wanted to learn in the course. The teachers wanted a course in which they could address the challenges they faced in assessment; discuss and develop new ways to assess; and learn about authentic, valid, and ethical assessment. Therefore, the findings suggest that the teachers wanted a course that mixed theory, practice, and principles of assessment. Additionally, the course should address emerging topics in English language assessment, namely bilingual assessment and the assessment of learners with special educational needs.

One of the bilingual communities surviving today in Mongolia, which is the cultural heritage site of the ancient communities that left their mark on the history of Central Asia, are the Tuvan and the Dukha, which is considered a branch of them. In this study, it is aimed to reflect the language teaching practices carried out for the young generation of Tuvan and Dukha origin living in the Northwest Mongolia region and to reveal the views of the Dukha, the reindeer herder living in the triangular tent, on the Dukha language, which is the heritage language shown in the endangered languages category, and the supportive education practices carried out. The study was designed as two-stage qualitative research methods, such as field research and case study. First of all, the living areas of Tuvans and Dukhas in the Western and Northern regions of Mongolia were visited, and data were collected from available sources. In the second stage, interviews were conducted with the Dukha children studying in the town school through a semi-structured interview form. Obtained interview data were analyzed by content analysis. In the study, it was observed that Dukha children acquired L1 language in the family environment and also learned L2 language, but mostly they communicated in the dominant L2 language and therefore language change and endangered language situation progressed day by day. The country's local languages support policy and the positive impact of the heritage language supportive trainings made from time to time by various international institutions for families and children were mentioned.

This paper studies the two English synonymous words "little" and "small," and their Thai equivalents n??j4 and lek4. In addition to monolingual and bilingual dictionaries, British National Corpus, Thai National Corpus and an English-Thai parallel corpus were used in this study. It is found that "little" and "small" and their Thai equivalents are not precisely identical in meaning. In addition, there are some meanings that can apply to all these four English-Thai synonymous words. Therefore, a Thai learner of English may not be able to simply equate the use of "little" and "small" with n??j4 and lek4, and vice versa. Moreover, it is also found that "little" and "small" can be translated into Thai with some other words rather than n??j4 and lek4. This indicates the complexity of meaning in which "little" and "small" can connect to other related meanings and be translated into Thai with other words. This study suggests that information provided in dictionaries alone is not sufficient. Learners should learn how to use corpora as a resource to enhance their lexical knowledge in both languages.

English teachers' professional development responds to individual needs and societal discourses about teaching, learning, and language use. This paper reports the findings of a case study that explored the factors that increased or limited the active and committed participation of nine Colombian teachers of English in professional development programs. Findings suggest that English teachers are invested in their professional development if they may develop three imagined identities--as proficient English speakers, ELT experts, and ICT competent users--and their affiliation to an imagined community of "bilinguals." The teachers' journey to the imagined identities and the imagined community is full of conflicting emotions amidst the socio-political context of their work and the country's language education policies.

A large body of research has been conducted on the requests employed by monolingual children, whilst knowledge about the requests uttered by bilingual children has remained scarce. To address this issue, this paper, for the first time in the literature, focuses on the request strategies and purposes employed by preschool children bilingual in Turkish and Zazaki in Turkey. By examining the requests of these children, this paper demonstrates how these learners differ from monolingual preschool children concerning their requestive language and the affordances of the local context. The investigation was based on the video-recorded spontaneous speech of 10 five-year-old preschool children (range = 5.0-5.6 years). The results were analyzed according to the request strategies and then according to the purposes of requests. The interactions were handled under two headings: child-child and child-teacher interactions. The outcomes indicated that imperative forms constituted the most frequent strategy both in child-child and teacher-child interactions and that the use of hints was revealed at a rudimentary level, and request for action was the most common purpose elicited in both interactions.

Although numerous studies show that intelligence, measured by various tests, is a significant predictor of school achievement, this cognitive variable can only explain about 50% of the variance. It is also known that communicative language ability represents an important basis for learning subject content in the early period of formal education. One of the most comprehensive models of language ability (Bahman, Palmer, 1996), in addition to strategic knowledge, includes language knowledge that includes organizational language knowledge (grammatical and textual) and pragmatic language knowledge. Although the non-cognitive factors de facto participate in the explanation of school success, the aim of the research presented in this paper was to determine the predictive influence of intelligence and communicative language ability, i.e. organizational and pragmatic language knowledge on differences in school achievement in Serbian, English and Mathematics at the end of the first half of the fifth grade. The research was conducted on the sample of 197 fifth-grade students (51% girls, average age 11.5 months) in elementary schools in Loznica. The authors of the paper applied an adapted form of the test of communicative language abilities that was applied in research in a bilingual context (Šimonji-Cernak, 2005). Revisk was used to test verbal and manipulative intelligence (Biro, 1997). We started from the assumption that organizational language knowledge, has a more significant predictive influence on differences in school performance in the above-mentioned subjects than intelligence. Hierarchical regression analysis model determined that the predictor variables of organizational language knowledge explain 36.8%-49.4% of the variance in school achievement, while the intelligence variables are related to the achievements in Serbian and Mathematics and explain 0.6%-3% of the variance. A significant partial contribution of pragmatic knowledge and knowledge of verbs as an element of grammatical language knowledge were determined in all three subjects, as well as the contribution of knowledge of grammatical rules only in the Serbian language.The results confirm the hypothesis and indicate that for success in the mother tongue, foreign language and mathematics it is important to develop grammatical knowledge, and pay special attention to the importance and strategies of developing pragmatic language function in the period of early formal education.

The goal of this study is to examine which word order is dominant in colloquial Buginese-Indonesian, 1) to find out which word-order pattern is more acceptable between SVO and VSO, 2) to find out which word-order pattern is more acceptable between VO and OV, and 3) to find out what internal linguistic characteristics and social factors motivate such acceptability. The data were collected through an online survey via Monkey Survey that employed Acceptability Judgment Task (AJT) to determine which word order is more acceptable in Buginese Indonesian (SVO or VSO and VO or OV). A total of 50 Buginese-Indonesian bilinguals rated the acceptability of 48 target items (and 48 fillers) for patterns such as SVO/VSO and VO/OV in a 1-5 Likert Scale (1=completely unnatural; 5=compeletely natural). Target items were controlled for linguistic factors and social factors. ANOVA analysis was used to analyze the data. The results indicate that both SVO and VSO are equally acceptable though VSO was slightly more favorable than SVO. When the subject is omitted, VO was farther favorable than OV. L1, age, and residence had a significant effect on the acceptability of VSO while grammatical person, education level, and residence contributed greatly to the acceptability of VO. The results also reveal that the acceptability of different word orders in Buginese-Indonesian is both linguistically and socially constrained. Thus, the results are situated within a discussion of Backus' (2014) notion of entrenchment and conventionalization.

Bilingualism has been the subject of a lot of research in the last century. Bilingualism is having the competence to speak two languages. The reasons for bilingualism of individuals may differ. Some of them may have parents from different languages, some may be children of ethnic minority or immigrants. In daily life it is possible to encounter more bilinguals than monolinguals. Bilingualism is not a new phenomenon, and it takes place in the media and news in different ways under different titles related to it. In this study, the news about bilingualism in the newspapers of the USA, the UK, France, Germany, and the Netherlands is analyzed in terms of content which is named as discourse analysis. The contents are categorized under five different titles which are neurological, social-cultural, psychological, educational, national categories. It has been found that majority of news related to bilingualism belong to educational category which shows that bilingualism draws attention and is given importance in educational contexts. Another categorization in this study is implemented for speech act categories. Each headline is categorized according to the speech acts which are representatives, directives, commissives, expressives and declaratives. In this study it was found that majority of headlines belong to representative category of speech acts.

In the present case study, we aimed to explore whether there were any differences between monolingual Turkish and Turkish-Italian bilingual children in terms of their use of language structures in Turkish while narrating a story from a picture book titled "Frog, where are you?" by Mayer (1969). Four monolingual Turkish and three Turkish-Italian bilingual children narrated the story. The data from the recordings indicated some differences in terms of preference for certain language features like tense differences in their story narration. While younger monolinguals reported the events in the story with past tense markers like "-mIs" and "-Iyor," bilingual children displayed a marked tendency for the past tense "-mIs" marker. The older children in both groups chose to use the "-Iyor" marker used by monolingual teenagers and adults. We argued that such differences in preferences might indicate an effect of Italian, or the interlanguage varieties might be responsible for the discrepancies. Explanations as to why these differences might have occurred and some practical suggestions for educators are provided in the study.

This study investigated the connection between translanguaging and reading comprehension of Filipino ESL intermediate learners. The respondents were intermediate pupils enrolled in the selected central schools in Bicol, Philippines. The respondents' ages range from 8 to 12 years old, and 124 students (27.55%) were males while 326 students (72.44%) were females. The descriptive-correlational method was used in the study. The descriptive method was used to describe the reading performance of the ESL intermediate learners and their translanguaging factors, while Pearson Product Moment Correlation was used to determine the relationship between the two variables. The primary instruments used were validated teacher-made reading comprehension test and translanguage factors survey questionnaire. Data disclosed that the general reading comprehension of the ESL intermediate learners along with vocabulary, drawing inferences, and getting the main idea, are very satisfactory. Meanwhile, the different translanguaging factors, along with personal, teacher, and social, were surveyed and identified in the study. The statistical test revealed that the reading comprehension of the respondents was significantly correlated with the identified translanguaging factors. Thus, it is recommended that teachers should promote group discussions and allow open interactions in the classroom. Teachers should allow the use of both the home language and English; employ translanguaging pedagogy in teaching reading; foster an understanding and acceptance of linguistic differences; promote multilingualism, and allow indigenous languages to be used in education to facilitate meaningful learning.

The collaboration between designers and digital humanists has indeed gained increasing significance in crafting effective projects, with design serving as a centralizing force in the realm of digital humanities by establishing interfaces for individuals to engage with technological resources. Therefore, design's methodological practices, encompassing various research and experiential facets, play a pivotal role in enhancing the usability and accessibility of digital resources within the social sphere. This study aims to expand the discourse on the characteristics and potential of the interplay between inclusive design and digital humanities practices, with a specific focus on the development of bilingual digital narratives (utilizing Brazilian Sign Language and Portuguese). The research adopts a collaborative, qualitative approach, encompassing processes of evaluation, validation, and enhancement. Digital visual narratives are presented as a facilitating tool for integrating LIBRAS and Portuguese, thereby aiding in language acquisition for deaf children. The article contributes to the discussion of the humanistic approach to design, emphasizing the values of empathy, ethics, and social responsibility in the creation of inclusive and accessible projects.

A critical review of the nature of education as a universal right in peripheral societies, based on the analysis of the social and cultural circumstances that permeate the learning experience of the written Portuguese language in Brazilian schools. The concept of cultural bilingualism is defended as necessary in facing the demand for subjectivation of the universal right to education, supported by facts of written production among school subjects. It also justifies the overcoming of the classic concepts of bilingualism, listed exclusively from grammatical-functional aspects or issues of use that are restricted to linguistic facts. Situations of tension stand out in the contact between oral and written Portuguese of Brazil - symbolically considered the Brazilian national language - whose origin goes back to historical-cultural aspects that acted in the process of the implantation of the Portuguese language in Brazilian territory. Derived from such aspects, there are situations of languages in contact that can only be properly explained by the concept of cultural bilingualism.

Teacher´s beliefs and conceptions of teaching English are an important area for the professional development path of primary teachers. Giving primary teachers opportunities to grow professionally and support their learning belongs to the wide variety of practices that can be implemented to foster early education today. To do that, the Colombian government has implemented different initiatives; however, through the exploration of literature, primary public-school teachers need more professional development opportunities to fulfill the objectives stated by the Ministry of National Education. This is why, the present study aims to investigate the perceptions and attitudes of elementary rural teachers involved in the incorporation of English in their teaching practices. A total of ten teachers were selected to be involved during a semester that lasts the implementation of the project. Through qualitative research under the exploratory paradigm, we identified frustration, motivation, and lack of expertise as the main perceptions that interfere the teaching practices of the selected population. Findings suggest that professional development strategies should be incorporated as an eventual strategy to foster the teaching practices in the classroom.