Policy and Practice for Multilingual Educational Settings Comparisons across Contexts
Product details
Biographical note
Siv Björklund is Professor of Swedish Immersion and Multilingualism at Åbo Akademi University, Finland. Her research interests include language immersion and multilingual education and she serves as a board member of the Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education.
Mikaela Björklund is City Manager of Närpes and a researcher at Åbo Akademi University, Finland. Her research focuses on multilingualism and multiculturalism in education in the Nordic countries, as well as CLIL, linguistic schoolscapes and Dominant Language Constellations.
This timely and engaging collection of comparative explorations of multilingualism as manifested in educational policy, curricular reform and praxis represents a compelling and important contribution to the literature on multilingualism. It is indispensable reading for all those who seek to understand the complexity of multilingualism across a wide range of contexts.
Diane J. Tedick, Professor Emeritus, University of Minnesota, USA
A remarkable and innovative volume that addresses multilingualism from a cross-disciplinary and cross-context perspective. By comparing and contrasting geographically different educational settings, this timely book provides a much-needed resource for policy stakeholders and researchers to understand the various aspects of multilingualism and linguistic diversity in broader educational domains, from language policy to language programmes and from classroom practices to individual identity.
Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen, University of Bath, UK
This timely volume reveals important similarities and differences of multilingualism in a wide-ranging set of case studies. Its systematic comparative approach shows the benefits of exploring multilingualism across contexts. The book provides an invaluable resource for educators, policymakers, and researchers interested in the study of multilingualism and education.
Durk Gorter, University of the Basque Country; Ikerbasque, Basque Foundation for Science, Spain
<p>[This book] adds a crucial, multidisciplinary, and cross-contextual perspective to the study of multilingualism in educational settings. The empirically-based contributions present novel, comparative case studies of educational planning and practices in diverse multilingual settings. The international collaborations among chapter contributors that span a wide range of educational contexts are a unique feature of the volume. Taken together,<br />
the collection adds to our understanding of the facets of multilingualism through an examination of educational policies, pedagogical practices, and teacher and student identities and their conformity across contexts and divergence within contexts. This collaborative work, available as open access, is a very welcome contribution<br />
to the study of multilingualism and education.</p>
Anna Krulatz and Georgios Neokleous, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway, ITL - International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2025
<p>This publication is a treasure, for researchers, teacher educators and student teachers [...] With intriguing comparisons across contexts, the volume is educational. It could be one of those pieces of literature that lasts from the first course in ITE to the final degree project</p>
Ylva Sandberg, Language Policy 22 2023
Exploring multilingualism as a complex, context-related, societal and individual phenomenon, this book centres around perspectives on how multiple languages are made (in)visible within educational settings in the Global North. The authors of each chapter compare and contrast findings across geographical contexts with the goal of understanding the facets of multilingualism that, on the one hand, conform across contexts, and on the other, diverge context-specifically. The chapters range from contributions with a focus on national/state planning for the development of sustainable multilingual and intercultural educational policies, to chapters that deal with multilingual practices and identities of students and student teachers as well as the consequences for language practices, strategies and policies in diversifying societies. This cross-contextual, comparative and interdisciplinary exploration of multilingualism will be of great interest to researchers, administrators, practitioners and students within the fields of multilingual education, sociolinguistics, youth culture and identity studies. The book is open access under a CC BY NC ND licence.
Exploring multilingualism as a complex, context-related, societal and individual phenomenon, this book centres around perspectives on how multiple languages are made (in)visible within educational settings. The chapters compare findings across geographical contexts in the areas of language policy and planning, multilingual practices and identity.
Contributors
Siv Björklund and Mikaela Björklund: Introduction
Chapter 1. Jim Cummins and Jarmo Lainio: A Comparison of Swedish and Canadian Educational Policies and Instructional Practices: The Case of Multilingual Language Learners
Chapter 2. Kamil Özerk and Colin H. Williams: National Curriculum Reforms and Their Impact on Indigenous and Minority Languages: The Sami in Norway and Welsh in Wales in Comparative Perspective
Chapter 3. Anna Slotte, Janus Spindler Møller and Tuuli From: Languaging and Language Policies among Multilingual Children and Youth Groups in Finland and Denmark
Chapter 4. Júlia Llompart, Tjaša Dražnik and Mari Bergroth: ‘I am a Plurilingual Speaker, but can I Teach Plurilingual Speakers?’ Contradictions in Student Teacher Discourses on Plurilingualism in Spain, Slovenia and Finland
Chapter 5. Sviatlana Karpava, Mikaela Björklund and Siv Björklund: In Search of Dominant Language Constellations among Multilingual Young Adults in Cyprus and Finland: The Influence of Multiple Language Use and Practices on Linguistic Identity and Trajectories as Future Teachers
Chapter 6. Agnieszka Otwinowska, Mari Bergroth and Eve Zyzik: Supporting Multilingual Learning in Educational Contexts: Lessons from Poland, Finland and California
Chapter 7. Lorenzo Zanasi, Karita Mård-Miettinen and Verena Platzgummer: Researching Adolescents’ Linguistic Repertoires in Multilingual Areas: Case Studies from South Tyrol and Finland
Colin H. Williams: Creating Synergies in Comparative Multilingualism: An Epilogue
Index
Product details
Biographical note
Siv Björklund is Professor of Swedish Immersion and Multilingualism at Åbo Akademi University, Finland. Her research interests include language immersion and multilingual education and she serves as a board member of the Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education.
Mikaela Björklund is City Manager of Närpes and a researcher at Åbo Akademi University, Finland. Her research focuses on multilingualism and multiculturalism in education in the Nordic countries, as well as CLIL, linguistic schoolscapes and Dominant Language Constellations.