The Multilingual Turn in Languages Education: Opportunities and Challenges

Starting from the key idea that learners and teachers bring diverse linguistic knowledge and resources to education, this book establishes and explores the concept of the 'multilingual turn' in languages education and the potential benefits for individuals and societies. It takes account of recent research, policy, and practice in the fields of bilingual and multilingual education as well as foreign and second language education. The chapters integrate theory and practice, bringing together researchers and practitioners from five continents to illustrate the effects of the multilingual turn in society and evaluate the opportunities and challenges of implementing multilingual curricula and activities in a variety of classrooms. Based on the examples featured, the editors invite students, teachers, teacher educators, and researchers to reflect on their own work and to evaluate the relevance and applicability of the multilingual turn in their own contexts. This book is comprised of three parts. Part 1, Societal Perspectives on the Multilingual Turn in Language(s) Education, contains the following chapters: (1) Socialized into Multilingualism: A Case Study of a Mauritian Pre-School (A. M. Auleear Owodally); (2) Exploring the -lingual Between Bi and Mono: Young People and Their Languages in an Australian Context (Ken Cruickshank); (3) Multilingualism as Portrayed in a Chinese English Textbook (Guangwei Hu and Sandra Lee McKay); and (4) Looking Through the Language Lens: Monolingual Taint or Plurilingual Tint? (Andrea Young). Part 2, Perspectives on the Multilingual Turn in Education, includes the following chapters: (5) From Normalization to Didactization of Multilingualism: European and Francophone Research at the Crossroads Between Linguistics and Didactics (Laurent Gajo); (6) Our Mother Tongue is Plurilingualism: A Framework of Orientations for Integrated Multilingual Curricula (Gabriela Meier); (7) Multilingual Teachers' Resources in Three Different Contexts: Empowering Learning (Jean Conteh, Fiona Copland, and Angela Creese); and (8) Multilingualism and Social Cohesion: Two-Way Immersion Education Meets Diverse Needs (Gabriela Meier). Part 3, Visions of the Multilingual Turn in Pedagogy and Practice, includes the following chapters: (9) Multilingual Pedagogy in Primary Settings: From the Margins to the Mainstream (Jean Conteh, Shila Begum, and Saiqa Riasat); (10) Plurilingualism and Empathy: Beyond Instrumental Language Learning (Enrica Piccardo and Joëlle Aden); (11) Translanguaging as Process and Pedagogy: Developing the English Writing of Japanese Students in the US (Ofelia García and Naomi Kano); (12) Transforming Learning, Building Identities: Arts-Based Creativity in the Community Languages Classroom (Jim Anderson and Yu-Chiao Chung); and Conclusion: The Multilingual Turn in Languages Education (Gabriela Meier and Jean Conteh).