Literacy and language in different contexts

The Heritage Language Resource Hub serves a variety of users in different teaching and learning situations.

Below you will find a variety of ideas for how to use the Heritage Language Resource Hub across various contexts, including activities for use in the language or literacy classroom. Click the headings to learn more about using hub resources in a range of settings.

Alone, wherever you want

The benefits of reading for pleasure in literacy acquisition are apparent in the light of experience and research. However, many adults with limited literacy do not frequently practise this way of reading. Reading for pleasure is an individual activity. Teaching it sounds paradoxical, but second language teachers and tutors can help to discover and support the pleasure of reading in various ways. For example, they can:

  • give value to reading in their learners' heritage language

  • present different genres, fictional and non-fictional - novels, cookbooks, biographies, do-it-yourself manuals, travel books – in different languages to let everyone discover their interests

  • help their learners to overcome the difficulties that they have in understanding texts in order to make reading less fatiguing and more enjoyable

  • present engaging books in the lesson, discuss them together, and highlight the emotions they arouse and the knowledge they provide

  • help learners in their search for the appropriate reading material

In the family

The family is crucial for transmitting language and literacy from one generation to the next, but migrant parents with limited schooling and literacy may sometimes lack the self-confidence to perform this task. Family literacy programmes address this critical issue with educational pathways that involve either children, parents, or both and (as best practices) support family languages. Programmes to promote reading with and for children beyond the school identify parents as essential figures. Even where structured programmes do not exist, the parental role is an important lever to motivate and support adult literacy and language learning. LESLLA teachers and tutors can play a part in promoting adult literacy through reading in the family. They can provide information on educational opportunities or motivate family reading through engaging activities based on the resources offered by the Heritage Language Resource Hub, as in the following examples.

EXAMPLE 1: MAKE YOUR OWN BOOK FAIR

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The teachers of Italian language courses for migrant women, many of whom had limited schooling, jointly organized a multilingual children’s book exhibition in a school facility as an awareness-raising initiative. Teachers' objectives were to (a) inform migrant women about the availability of children’s books in their languages to support the maintenance of their heritage languages; (b) promote family literacy and children’s early access to reading; and (c) enhance Italian language learning by creating an informal learning context. The teachers made contact with the project Mamma Lingua, a multilingual website, which is part of the Nati per Leggere (Born to read) national programme aimed at providing reading opportunities for children up to the age of six. Books in different languages were brought to the school for learners to explore. Learners commented on the stories, told each other stories, and informally translated the books from the original language into Italian under the guidance of teachers and other learners. Learners evaluated this as an exciting and positive experience at both the linguistic and the personal levels. At the linguistic level, learners found the task of mediating between their languages and Italian to be challenging but useful, to better focus on the languages themselves. Teachers appreciate that they now have access to more materials in more languages through the Heritage Language Resource Hub.

In the community

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Community associations, cultural and intercultural centres and libraries can offer opportunities to promote reading in heritage languages among migrant adults with limited literacy. For example, they can organise reading events, storytelling sessions (as in the example below) and reading circles. Many libraries already have resource collections in the migrants' languages that teachers can explore to use either alone or with their learners. Printed books and digital books on the Heritage Language Resource Hub complement each other.

Example 2: Storytelling

The Boishakhi Mela festival in London offers a festival of Bengali culture, including a storytelling activity and the opportunity for people to exchange books. Storytelling is meant for children, but open to everyone.

In literacy and heritage language instruction

Teaching literacy in a heritage language to migrant adults in the countries where they have resettled is different from both teaching a second language and literacy teaching in the countries where that language is spoken (and written) in a variety of everyday situations. Instruction needs to connect with the language, cultural, and life experience of the learners. It needs to leverage their oracy to strengthen their communicative competence in the heritage language, which could be vernacular or limited to use in the family and with friends. Reading opens access to different and more elaborate language registers. With the necessary adaptations, some suggestions for use of the resources in the Heritage Language Resource Hub in second language teaching can also be adopted in the context of literacy and heritage language courses. 

Heritage languages in second language teaching

Photo: Relief International

Photo: Relief International

The adult learners' heritage languages can enter the second language classroom, from which they have been banned by a well-established teaching tradition. According to this tradition, rooted in an influential research approach, the exclusive use of the second language in the classroom offers a richer linguistic environment where numerous oral interactions and contacts with the written texts maximize learning. Recently, research and teaching experience have questioned this tenet, pointing out the benefits of also using the heritage language as a learning resource and promoting strategic use of heritage languages in the classroom. Using all the languages in learners' repertoires in language instruction appears to be consistent with natural language uses outside the classroom and creates a welcoming and easy learning environment. Learners are empowered, and their linguistic and general knowledge can emerge more easily. The heritage language (and possible other languages in the learner's repertoire) facilitates comprehension and metalinguistic awareness (the ability to reflect on and manipulate language structures).We are in the midst of a shift from monolingual to bi-/plurilingual language teaching. These Guidelines respond to teachers' requests for guidance. To ensure that the Guidelines meet users’ needs, a preliminary needs analysis was carried out in Italy. It aimed to explore teachers' attitudes toward using heritage languages, current and possible uses of reading materials in learners’ heritage languages, and contexts in which these materials might be used. (To read the Focus Group Report click HERE). Teachers suggested some examples of uses, shown below. We thank them.

Tips for literacy and second language courses

We offer here some classroom activities based on resources taken from some platforms on the Heritage Language Resource Hub. As mentioned, most have been carried out in Italy in literacy and Italian language courses, which shows how resources are flexible and easy to transfer.Examples are based on three large international websites, but you are invited to explore more sites and experiment with different resources.

We speak of "class," "classroom," and "learners," but activities can also be carried out in informal educational settings, for example by volunteers.

Bloom Book Library

Bloom Book Library collects books that are suitable for use with children, adults and young adults. In the catalogue by subject you will find topics that may be of interest for your learners, such as "agriculture," "animals," "health," "community living," etc.

For some themes, images and situations are closely linked to the rural contexts in which the books were produced. This choice responds to the fundamental principle in adult education of rooting literacy in the biographical experience of learners. However, this bond with specific contexts could limit the possibility of using the same materials in other contexts; for example, with learners from other geographical and cultural backgrounds or migrants who have lost contact with their countries of origin.

In addition, resources are not available on every topic for all languages.However, the Bloom Book Library offers an easy author programme for translation and creation of new books. You can adapt the resources to your teaching situation.

Below are two suggestions, based on Dry season, rainy season, a trilingual text in English, French and Kom, a language spoken in Cameroon. The original book has an appendix with questions to assess learners' comprehension and suggestions for activities for language and literacy development that can also be used in an adult class.

+ Activity 1: A (very) free translation

Possible target group: adult learners who speak the same heritage language, with varied degree of literacy and second language competence.

Preparation. The author programme allows translations into up to three languages. The teacher prepares versions in two languages: the target second language (e.g., Italian in Italy) and a bridge language used in class, if there is one (e.g., French). If the class uses several bridge languages, more versions can be prepared (e.g., Italian - French; Italian - English; Italian - Arabic). The space for the heritage language (in first place) is left blank.

Step 1. Learners observe the images in the book without reading it and briefly discuss in their L2 the notions of dry season and rainy season. Learners, guided by the teacher, note the keywords and translate them into the languages of the learners. The aim is to create a common background of information and language contents.

Step 2. The teacher reads the text aloud in the learners’ L2 to facilitate text comprehension; afterwards, learners read the text individually, relying, if they want, on the bridge language.

Step 3. The learners prepare a "translation" of the text into the heritage language. The result cannot be a translation in the proper sense of the term, since translation is a specialised competence. Learners are asked to rewrite in their heritage language a text faithful to the original, even if it may be shorter or more elaborate. The use of dictionaries is allowed. If possible, the learners' texts are revised by the teacher, a tutor, or a mediator.

Step 4. The texts in the heritage language are copied on the template offered by Bloom. If the keyboard is not suitable for the heritage language script, the texts are copied in hard copy. The texts are added to a self-produced class library that is available to the learners.

Expected results

  • Development of the second language

  • Development of literacy in the heritage language

  • Increased awareness of the grammatical structures and vocabulary of the learners’ L1 and L2 through the comparison generated by the activity.

+ Activity 2: Seasons

This is a variant or a continuation of the previous activity. It involves the collective writing of a text to enhance the learners’ self-confidence in writing.

Possible target group: adult learners who have different heritage languages, countries of origin, degree of literacy and second language competence.

Preparation. As in Activity 1.

Step 1. As in Activity 1. The group also discusses the characteristics of the four seasons.

Step 2.. As in Activity 1.

Step 3. In groups, the learners observe the text vocabulary and assign words to the two lexical fields of nature and agricultural activities.

Step 4. Divided into linguistically homogeneous groups, learners discuss their representations of the seasons (it could be two seasons or four seasons). Each group writes a short text in the second language. Following the original model, they treat one or more natural aspects (e.g., "Trees are green.") and agricultural or non-agricultural activities (e.g., "In autumn, children start school."). Additional illustrations can be found in the "Art of Reading" collection can be downloaded from https://bloomlibrary.org/installers or in other image collections. The use of dictionaries is allowed.

Step 5. Each group presents its text to the class, which compares, discusses, and comments on the different texts.

Expected results:

  • Development of second language literacy
  • Development of heritage language literacy
  • Increased awareness of the grammatical structures and vocabulary of the L1 and L2 through the comparison generated by the activity
  • Intercultural reflection

Global Storybooks

The Global Storybooks website brings together around 40 national, regional, or language-related sites that collect books (all of them stories) for children and young people. The resources are largely from the African Storybooks website thus contents, situations, and illustrations are linked to African contexts and translated into several languages. A dropdown list on the page of each book shows the available languages. For example, the book we use here, The day I left home for the city is available in 11 African languages and English if accessed from the Kenya portal, in 7 languages (including English) spoken in Pakistan if accessed from the Pakistani portal, and in 21 languages including some European languages if accessed from the Québec portal (Canada). This allows you to use the resources both in linguistically homogeneous classes and in heterogeneous classes and in non-English speaking countries.

For each book, the website provides information about the required literacy level. The books can be downloaded and printed in both colour and outline versions. For some books, there are also an audio book, read aloud by a native speaker of the language, and a picture book without text.

+ Activity 3: Tell me a story

Possible target group: adult learners who speak the same heritage language; their level of literacy in the heritage language is at least 3, according to the website classification.

Step 1. The teacher introduces the theme of the story: a boy remembers the first time he travelled alone, left his village and went to the city. The learners comment on and describe the illustrations in the second language without reading the text (you can use the illustrated book without text or, if this is not possible, a version in unknown languages), to build up a common vocabulary.

Step 2. Some (1-3) learners tell the story in the heritage language, some (1-3) tell the story in the second language.

Step 3. The learners read the book individually in the heritage language. Then they read the same book in the second language.

Step 4. The group and the teacher discuss the differences between the stories the students developed in Step 1 and the original stories in the books. This discussion may also include linguistic considerations about the difference between oral narration and written narration (e.g., in terms of conciseness of the story).

Step 5. The class, guided by the teacher, observes specific lexical, grammatical, or textual aspects, such as, in this book, the form and use of past tenses in the two languages.

Expected results:

  • Development of oracy in the heritage and second language

  • Development of literacy in heritage and second language

  • Increased awareness of the differences between spoken and written language

  • Increased explicit awareness of the grammatical structures and vocabulary of heritage and second language through comparison of the languages.

+ Activity 4: Tell me a story in ...

This activity is a variation of Activity 3 for a different target group.

Possible target group: adult learners who have different heritage languages, countries of origin, and second language competence. The level of literacy in the heritage language is at least 3.

Step 1. As in Activity 3.

Step 2. Learners read the book individually in their heritage language.

Step 3. Divided into linguistically homogeneous groups, learners prepare (using the language they prefer) a faithful narration in the second language of the story that they will tell the class. The class comments on and takes note of the differences among the different narrations (e.g., which parts each group emphasised).

Step 4. Learners read the version in the second language individually.

Step 5. The class, facilitated by the teacher, comments on and discusses the differences between the reported stories and the possible reasons for these differences. From the discussions, several topics can emerge: how different readers read/interpret the texts; difficulty/pleasure of reading in the heritage or second language; difficulty of mediating between the two languages.The story offers opportunities for different oral conversations in the second language; e.g., on transport, transition to adulthood, personal stories.

Expected results:

  • Development of oracy in the heritage and second language

  • Development of literacy in the heritage and second language

  • Increased awareness of the reader’s part in reading a text

  • Intercultural awareness

StoryWeaver  

The Storyweaver website collects books for children, mostly narratives (original, traditional, and mythological stories), but also engaging educational materials on math, science, and ecology. Each book is translated into several languages, including European languages. For example, “A Cloud of Trash”, one of the books selected in Activity 5, is available in 42 languages. Furthermore, an easy author programme is available for translating a book into additional languages (translating tips are offered) or for creating new illustrated books, graded according to literacy levels. Illustrations are, in general, internationally oriented and represent both rural and urban environments. Books are downloadable and printable. For each book, the website provides information about the required literacy level. For some books there is also a book read orally and an illustrated book without text.

+ Activity 5: Tell me a story remotely

Target group: adult learners who have different heritage languages, countries of origin, literacy and second language competence and attend adult education courses in a formal setting (e.g. a class of adult migrants attending courses for the completion of compulsory schooling - corresponding to grade 6 to 8 - in a state-run adult education centre in Italy). They participate in a remote learning course.

Step 1. Learners explore the Heritage Language Resource Hub and the available resources through teacher-led navigation on the school platform to get familiar with the Hub’s structure and to decide which platform to use (StoryWeaver, in this case).

Step 2. Learners choose texts in their own languages and read the text individually outside of the class time.

Step 3. In the virtual classroom, they show the book, present it, and discuss it in the L2. The discussion is open. For example, during a session in Italy, learners illustrate writing systems other than the Latin alphabet at the initiative of a Malayalam-speaking learner.

Step 4. Outside of the class time, learners record a narration of the chosen book in the L2 and send it to the class group on a social network. The teacher gives individual feedback.

Step 5. Outside of the class time, learners write an original text in Italian modelled on the one read and send it individually to the teacher for feedback. Learners may volunteer to read it to the class in the next online session.

Expected results:

  • Development of digital literacy along with print literacy

  • An interactive, welcoming digital environment

Submit your Heritage Language Resource Hub Activities

If you have activities based on the Heritage Language Resource Hub that you want to share with the LESLLA community, please email them to Fernana Minuz: fernandaminuz@gmail.com. Please use the template provided below for your activity submissions.

There are a few rules for your cooperation:

  • You hold the authorship and the copyright of the published activities.

  • There are no fees. The Heritage Language Resource Hub is based on voluntary work and does not receive funding.

  • You can write in one of these languages (for now): English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Turkish. We apologize; we will try to expand the number of languages.

  • The activity you want to publish should not exceed five pages and follow a standard format (click here to download the template).

  • Please make sure that images, texts, videos and other resources are not subject to copyright.

  • An editorial board will evaluate whether the activity is appropriate and may request changes before posting it.

+ Template for Activity Submission

Title of the activity

Author(s)

Affiliation and country

Email address

Date

Target group: Describe briefly the target group (linguistically/culturally homogeneous/diverse; country(-ies) of origin; levels of competence in L2; degree of literacy in the heritage language; schooling; age and any relevant characteristics).

Educational setting (if relevant): Adult education organisation, NGOs, vocational training, community educational programmes, others.

Resource(s) used from the Heritage Language Resource Hub: Specify the title(s) and the website(s) from which the resource(s) is taken, the type of resource (book, recording, video, other), how you chose it (you as teacher/tutor, one of the learners, the learners' group, other).

Other materials: images, photos, video-clips, any other material.

Steps: Describe briefly how you used the resources in your course(s), keeping in mind that others could be interested in applying your suggestions in their classroom. Write your suggestions in the form of instructions.

Objectives: Objectives could be linguistic, cognitive, intercultural, relational. Link clearly the objectives to the activity and the steps.

Other comments: Write what you think could interest the LESLLA community; e.g. the learners' feedback, suggested adaptations, etc.