Page 299 - Karmen Pižorn, Alja Lipavic Oštir in Janja Žmavc, ur. • Obrazi več-/raznojezičnosti. Ljubljana: Pedagoški inštitut, 2022. Digitalna knjižnica, Dissertationes 44
P. 299
rethinking language teaching: the theory and practice of plurilingual education
Bhríde launch the learning of new languages, so that EAL pupils become
proficient in English, they and their Irish peers become proficient in Irish,
and in Fifth and Sixth Class all pupils add French to their repertoires? The
answer to this question comes in two parts. The first has to do with the na-
ture of education as a socializing process and the second with the strong
emphasis that Scoil Bhríde places on pupils’ literacy development and the
consequent intertwining of written and spoken language.
Current theories of second language acquisition differ significantly in
their view of the cognitive mechanisms that produce proficiency, but they
agree that those mechanisms are driven by spontaneous and authentic lan-
guage use (see, for example, Ellis and Wulff, 2019; Truscott and Sharwood
Smith, 2019). In other words, current theories agree that it is impossible to
teach languages in the traditional sense; the best we can do is create the
conditions that enable pupils to learn their target language by attempting
to use it. In Scoil Bhríde’s case, those conditions are provided by the social
processes of schooling: the daily life and routine activities of the classroom
and the diverse extracurricular activities that surround them. Pupils are
socialized through language as they are socialized into language (Ochs and
Schieffelin, 2008, p. 5); that is, language is the instrument used to draw pu-
pils into the social processes of schooling, and their participation in those
processes secures their language development. Scoil Bhríde’s EAL pupils
become proficient in English by becoming socialized into the communica-
tive practices of the classrooms through which they pass from Junior In-
fants to Sixth Class; while all pupils become proficient in Irish by becom-
ing socialized into the communicative practices that their teacher conducts
in Irish. In this sense Scoil Bhríde is a “community of practice” (Lave and
Wenger, 1991) whose goals and activities are shaped by the Primary School
Curriculum; as pupils progress through the school, their developing mas-
tery of curriculum content is impossible to separate from their developing
plurilingual repertoires.
This process of language acquisition through socialization is launched
on the basis of the knowledge and communicative abilities pupils already
possess. We explained in section 2.3 that learning to count in Junior Infants
is a multilingual activity. Pupils are taught to count from one to five first
in English and then in Irish, after which EAL pupils teach the rest of the
class how to count from one to five in their home languages. The inclusion
of home languages serves two purposes: it gives Irish pupils an early expe-
rience of multilingual communication and at the same time provides EAL
299
Bhríde launch the learning of new languages, so that EAL pupils become
proficient in English, they and their Irish peers become proficient in Irish,
and in Fifth and Sixth Class all pupils add French to their repertoires? The
answer to this question comes in two parts. The first has to do with the na-
ture of education as a socializing process and the second with the strong
emphasis that Scoil Bhríde places on pupils’ literacy development and the
consequent intertwining of written and spoken language.
Current theories of second language acquisition differ significantly in
their view of the cognitive mechanisms that produce proficiency, but they
agree that those mechanisms are driven by spontaneous and authentic lan-
guage use (see, for example, Ellis and Wulff, 2019; Truscott and Sharwood
Smith, 2019). In other words, current theories agree that it is impossible to
teach languages in the traditional sense; the best we can do is create the
conditions that enable pupils to learn their target language by attempting
to use it. In Scoil Bhríde’s case, those conditions are provided by the social
processes of schooling: the daily life and routine activities of the classroom
and the diverse extracurricular activities that surround them. Pupils are
socialized through language as they are socialized into language (Ochs and
Schieffelin, 2008, p. 5); that is, language is the instrument used to draw pu-
pils into the social processes of schooling, and their participation in those
processes secures their language development. Scoil Bhríde’s EAL pupils
become proficient in English by becoming socialized into the communica-
tive practices of the classrooms through which they pass from Junior In-
fants to Sixth Class; while all pupils become proficient in Irish by becom-
ing socialized into the communicative practices that their teacher conducts
in Irish. In this sense Scoil Bhríde is a “community of practice” (Lave and
Wenger, 1991) whose goals and activities are shaped by the Primary School
Curriculum; as pupils progress through the school, their developing mas-
tery of curriculum content is impossible to separate from their developing
plurilingual repertoires.
This process of language acquisition through socialization is launched
on the basis of the knowledge and communicative abilities pupils already
possess. We explained in section 2.3 that learning to count in Junior Infants
is a multilingual activity. Pupils are taught to count from one to five first
in English and then in Irish, after which EAL pupils teach the rest of the
class how to count from one to five in their home languages. The inclusion
of home languages serves two purposes: it gives Irish pupils an early expe-
rience of multilingual communication and at the same time provides EAL
299
