Emergent plurilingualism and metalinguistic awareness in primary school

This paper aims to present some of the results from a project conducted in primary schools within a bilingual area in northern Italy, focusing on enhancing language skills and metalinguistic awareness. The project is inspired by the “Éveil aux langues” approach as represented in the FREPA/CARAP project (Candelier et al., 2012) and the studies conducted by Andorno and Sordella (Andorno & Sordella 2017, 2018). It took place during the 2021-22 school year in three classes at a primary school in the province of Bolzano, Italy. In this multilingual region there are at least two languages of instruction (German L1/L2 and Italian L1/L2 respectively). Children from international/migrant backgrounds are learning these languages as their L2/L3/LX, presenting a challenge for teachers who need to adapt their classroom practices for newly arrived pupils.