Page 82 - Linguistically Diverse Educational Contexts

LINGUISTICALLY DIVERSE EDUCATIONAL CONTEXTS
for further activities. Integrating the work of learners on written150 and read texts allows us to understand that it is not only texts that are never free from socially constructed perspectives but reading too. Every time we read, write, or create, we draw on our prior experiences, our understanding of the world. Therefore, we should also analyse our own creations and texts, and look at our perception of the world. The students' activities during the course are intended to help generate new insights and perspectives, which in turn are intended to foster critical reflection and readiness for change. This practice serves the development and reconstruction of educational identity as it provides opportunities to use knowledge, theory and skills to gain a new level of awareness, point of view, or perspective (Kurantowicz & Nizińska, 2011, p. 127), and to express different learners' perspectives and engage with society through activism. For example, if students have to create a petition or organise an event for the local community, they refer to an existing problem or situation. If they write surveys, they conduct them and analyse the data. They can use their whole language repertoire to do this, not just English. If they wish, they can work in several languages. This is also the learning goal of intercultural education which fosters decision-making and social action skills.
Grammar only appears in class in this course when it is needed to construct meaning through the text, because I view foreign language learning through the lens of the concept of interlingual grammar and the idea of multicompetences (Cook, 1999). In choosing the texts and topics to be included in the course, I was not guided by a predetermined order of grammatical structures. In my view, formal grammatical knowledge must be subordinated to discursive knowledge151 and foster the development of critical linguistic awareness. I believe that our role as teachers is not to teach foreign languages to a certain level, but to develop plurilingualism and translingualism through the use of the pluriliteracies approach. Developing pluriliteracy skills increases the potential for communication, knowledge, and understanding between learners.
During the course learners are motivated to act and reflect on their learning processes and self-direct their learning through learning (not learner)152 mentoring. This reflection consists of seeking new sources of learning, such as drawing on one's own experiences or enriching and developing one's own learning strategies (Kurantowicz & Nizińska, 2011). The teacher is able to assess the actual learning strategies of the learners through retrospective interviews and conversations about their performance during the course. Learning logs are used by students to assess and plan their own learning paths. They can also be used by the teacher to identify student learning strategies. Students' understanding of content and specific literary skills is assessed through adequate communication and language use in their chosen contexts.
As I mentioned above, the aim of this course is to promote diversity and inclusive education, to promote plurilingualism, critical language awareness, deep learning, transferable skills, and knowledge through connection to the real world. This can also be achieved by building teacher-student partnerships and by creating mutually negotiated learning pathways, moving away from formal, institutional foreign language learning requiring constant teacher intervention. The course is designed
150 Different types of genres are often overlooked in language education (i.e., empathy writing, for example), and attention is often directed towards writing a typical email, article, or report, where one practises writing for the sake of practising language skills.
151 Discourse is made up of language. It refers to the use of language to enable communication on given topics in a specific area of life.
152 Through goal setting and discussions about the learning process in the first or second language. 67