The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test

The paper presents an explorative study regarding the relation between multilingual pedagogies and language aptitude, a complex construct associated with metalinguistic awareness and cognitive processes, which predict the capacity of learning a foreign language. We administered the LLAMA test to 67...

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Main Author: Valentina Carbonara
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: E-JournALL 2022-12-01
Series:EuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages
Subjects:
Online Access:https://e-journall.org/index.php/ejall/article/view/2632/2422
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author Valentina Carbonara
author_facet Valentina Carbonara
author_sort Valentina Carbonara
collection DOAJ
description The paper presents an explorative study regarding the relation between multilingual pedagogies and language aptitude, a complex construct associated with metalinguistic awareness and cognitive processes, which predict the capacity of learning a foreign language. We administered the LLAMA test to 67 lower secondary school students in Italy, divided into two groups: the target group had been regularly exposed to éveil aux langues (awakening to languages) and translanguaging practices, with explicit focuses on crosslinguistic reflection, for the prior four years; the control group has been exposed to regular monolingual instruction. Results show that the target group achieved a better score in two LLAMA sub-tests (sound-symbol correspondence task and grammatical inferencing task). A composite pattern of correlations and predictors regarding the influence of Italian competence and English competence are also analysed and disentangled. Finally, the paper discusses the implications of these results in terms of research and educational perspectives.
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spelling doaj.art-5da4ea4205464ec98adfb7506de1172a2023-09-22T22:38:33ZengE-JournALLEuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages2376-905X2022-12-0192116https://doi.org/10.21283/2376905X.1.9.2.272The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA testValentina Carbonara0https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2275-5407Università per Stranieri di Siena, Italia The paper presents an explorative study regarding the relation between multilingual pedagogies and language aptitude, a complex construct associated with metalinguistic awareness and cognitive processes, which predict the capacity of learning a foreign language. We administered the LLAMA test to 67 lower secondary school students in Italy, divided into two groups: the target group had been regularly exposed to éveil aux langues (awakening to languages) and translanguaging practices, with explicit focuses on crosslinguistic reflection, for the prior four years; the control group has been exposed to regular monolingual instruction. Results show that the target group achieved a better score in two LLAMA sub-tests (sound-symbol correspondence task and grammatical inferencing task). A composite pattern of correlations and predictors regarding the influence of Italian competence and English competence are also analysed and disentangled. Finally, the paper discusses the implications of these results in terms of research and educational perspectives.https://e-journall.org/index.php/ejall/article/view/2632/2422multilingual pedagogiestranslanguaginglanguage aptitudemetalinguistic awareness
spellingShingle Valentina Carbonara
The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
EuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages
multilingual pedagogies
translanguaging
language aptitude
metalinguistic awareness
title The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
title_full The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
title_fullStr The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
title_full_unstemmed The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
title_short The effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude: A study on lower secondary school students based on the LLAMA test
title_sort effect of multilingual pedagogies on language aptitude a study on lower secondary school students based on the llama test
topic multilingual pedagogies
translanguaging
language aptitude
metalinguistic awareness
url https://e-journall.org/index.php/ejall/article/view/2632/2422
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