Young Learners' Oracy Acquisition and Development in International Foreign Language Learning Contexts: (10 Early Language Learning in School Contexts)

This volume presents research on oracy development in early language learning, with a particular focus on the pedagogical implications for growingly plurilingual classrooms. The chapters offer empirical results from diverse international contexts which reveal common and differing experiences of teaching methodologies and assessment practices, learners’ attitudes and motivation, and young learners’ skill development processes. Together they explore the effects of language policy, collaborative learning and teacher intervention on the development of children’s listening and speaking skills in a second or foreign language. The book will be of interest to researchers in early second language acquisition as well as students on EFL, TESOL and ESL courses. It will be particularly useful to pre-primary and primary teachers in multilingual classrooms and can be used in teacher education and professional development programmes to promote reflection on current teaching practices.

Table of Contents:
Contributors Dimitra Karoulla-Vrikki and Lucilla Lopriore: Introduction  Chapter 1. Lucilla Lopriore: Young Foreign Language Learners’ Oracy Development in Multilingual Contexts Part 1: Language Policy and Oracy    Chapter 2. Dimitra Karoulla-Vrikki and Sophie Ioannou-Georgiou: EFL Oracy Acquisition and Language-In-Education Policy at Pre-Primary and Early Primary Stages: The Case of Cyprus Chapter 3. Sandie Mourão, Carolyn E. Leslie, Maria Alfredo Moreira and Estela Monteiro: From (Mis)Perceptions to (Mis)Practices: The Assessment of Oral Skills in Primary English Education in Portugal   Part 2: Oracy Acquisition Through Learners’ Collaborative Learning and Learning Strategies Chapter 4. María Ángeles Hidalgo and Amparo Lázaro-Ibarrola: Talking to Write: Insights into the Oral Interactions of Young EFL Writers Repeating a Collaborative Task Chapter 5. Hatice Ergul and Hacer Hande Uysal: Negotiation of Errors in Form-Focused Oral Interaction Sequences in Young Learner Classrooms Chapter 6. Carolyn E. Leslie: Comparing Primary and Lower Secondary EFL Learners’ Oral Collaboration   Chapter 7. Areti-Maria Sougari and Sophia Batsari: Motivation and Learning Strategies in the Development of Primary School Learners’ Oral Skills across an EFL Context in Greece   Part 3: Oracy Promotion Through Teacher Intervention  Chapter 8. Jasenka Čengić: Young FL Learners’ Oral Production Skills: Does Vocabulary Learning Ability Count? Chapter 9. Anastasia Georgountzou and Natasha Tsantila: Prioritizing Young Learners’ Pronunciation Needs in the Greek Multicultural Classroom   Chapter 10. Eleni Griva and Eleni Korosidou: A Multimodal Approach in an Early FL Classroom for Oracy Skills Development: Insights from a Longitudinal Study   Chapter 11. Yuko Goto Butler, Yeting Liu, Heejin Kim and Katherine I. Kang: The Development of the Use of Articles in Oral Narratives among Young English Learners in China Chapter 12. Nayr Correia Ibrahim: Translanguaging as Inclusive Pedagogy and Multilingual Oracy Dimitra Karoulla-Vrikki and Lucilla Lopriore: Concluding Thoughts Index

About the Author :
Dimitra Karoulla-Vrikki is Associate Professor of Linguistics at European University Cyprus. Her research investigates language policy and planning, English as a medium of instruction in higher education, early foreign language learning, government translation and interpretation, and the linguistic landscape in Cyprus. Lucilla Lopriore is a teacher and teacher educator and was Professor of English Linguistics at Roma Tre University, Italy until 2022. She has led Italian research teams in international projects including ELLiE, ENRICH and the 1999 Italian National Survey of young learners’ FL achievement. Her research includes CLIL, early foreign language acquisition, ELF, language policy and plurilingualism.

Review :
This timely volume addresses the development of oracy in young learners, emphasizing the need to support speaking and listening skills in the classroom. Insightful and informative, it provides practical strategies and valuable guidance for educators aiming to enhance students' communication skills, while also offering implications for teacher training and suggestions for future research. Oral language skills are a crucial predictor of children’s success in language and literacy, ultimately leading to academic achievement. Therefore, it is with great enthusiasm that we welcome this new edited volume, which offers a wealth of compelling discussions on the development of speaking skills in children learning a foreign language, making it an indispensable resource. This volume considers FL oracy development of YLs from several novel perspectives. It also offers insights into how different teaching approaches may cater for the new needs of YLs in today’s increasingly multilingual classrooms, and how teachers can best face the emerging new challenges. Innovative research methodologies and thought-provoking theoretical discussions add extra value to the included chapters.