Why use mother language in a foreign language classroom: From plurilinguism to translinguism

• Autor(a) principal: Grilli, Marina
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista Linguagem em Foco (Online)
• DOI: 10.46230/2674-8266-12-4245
• Texto Completo: https://revistas.uece.br/index.php/linguagememfoco/article/view/4245
• topic: Aprendizagem de língua estrangeira; Plurilinguismo; Translinguismo; Aprendizagem intercultural; Intercompreensão; Foreign language learning; Plurilingualism; Translingualism; Intercultural language learning; Intercomprehension

A recurring question that foreign language (FL) teachers face is what to do when studentsexpress themselves in their mother language (ML) during class. This article presents reasonsin favor of using one’s ML as a resource when learning a FL. Although the non-exclusion ofML in the FL classroom is not an innovative idea, communicating exclusively in FL from thefirst class is still considered a plus in many FL courses, as opposed to those where the FLinput is progressively increased according to the learners’ evolution. As a matter of fact, thelinguistic input and the opportunities for FL oral and written mobilization are more relevantfor learning than explanations about the structure of the language; however, it is possible anddesirable to use the ML as a resource to optimize the learning of any FL. In this article, wepresent some models of multilingual teaching developed for the European reality and rethinkthem according to the Brazilian reality. Thus, we defend the translingual perspective for FLteaching, overcoming the idea of ​​plurilingualism as separate knowledges of unrelatedlanguages.