Beskrivning
The aim of this presentation is to discuss partly conflicting language education discourses regarding official languages in linguistically diverse child groups within early childhood education and care (ECEC). The question of how educational policies should best tackle multiple languages present in the society is tricky in all Nordic contexts (Hansell et al., 2024), but especially so in a country with two separated language tracks of ECEC, such as the officially bilingual, but in practice, multilingual Finland.The analysis is based on a national survey data on supporting early language learning in the ECEC (Sopanen et al., 2024). By analysing qualitatively 389 ECEC staff responses to an open-ended question Do you think second national language can be used in a group of children where some of the children are just getting to know Finnish or Swedish (for example, children who have just arrived in Finland)? we seek to untangle which language related discourses are manifested in the staff responses, and to discuss why they are mentioned by the respondents. We identify both similarities and differences in the two language tracks of ECEC (Finnish and Swedish). We focus on two discourses: one that relates to the language of the ECEC/schooling, which is a second language (SL) for children with migrant background. The other relates to teaching of the second national language (SNL), an obligatory language subject for all children later at school. Both SL and SNL societal discourses include voiced concerns on intergroup attitudes and learning outcomes. These concerns have led to the political promotion of supporting the early learning of SNL already in ECEC (MINEDU, 2022). However, we argue that promoting the learning of SNL cannot be discussed without addressing even the SL discourse.
Overall, the results reveal the complexity of the matter. The reasonings vary between the staff in the two language tracks of schooling, but the results indicate that the overall low number of positive ECEC responses for introducing SNL in multilingual groups challenges any large-scale attempts to quickly establish and support learning of SNL in ECEC.
| Period | 5 mars 2025 |
|---|---|
| Evenemangstitel | NERA 2025 Education for a better and just world |
| Typ av evenemang | Konferens |
| Plats | Helsinki, FinlandVisa på karta |
| Omfattning | Internationell |