A travelling exhibition to promote multilingualism in South Tyrol (workshop)

Sabrina Colombo & Dana Engel, Institute of Applied Linguistics - Eurac Research, Bolzano/ Bozen, Italy, ID LLCE2017-142;     Abstract: Multilingualism has always been a key feature of South Tyrol. Since 2012 the project “one school, many languages” aims to establish multilingualism as a general educational objective in schools, overcoming borders between linguistics groups and the divide between the prestige of “old” and “new” multilingualism. Moreover, the project has a strong focus on practical instruments insofar as workshops, supporting materials, teacher trainings and class projects are constantly carried out and developed. Within the project a travelling exhibition called “Languages: on our doorstep and around the world” consisting of seven interactive posters has developed for an adequate promotion of language competencies. Since 2013, it has become a vital tool for both teachers and professionals whose aim is to let their pupils explore the different aspects of multilingualism. The travelling exhibition will be the subject of the workshop together with its background ideas and the didactic behind each poster: from etymology to social linguistics, from language change to European language diversity. In terms of theoretical basis, all the activities will be linked with the Framework of reference for pluralistic approach (FREPA) in order to set up connections for the promotion of plurilingual competencies.

KEYWORDS: didactic of multilingualism, language awareness, didactic materials, promotion of multilingualism, multilingualism in education