Multilingualism as a resource in the foreign language classroom

Abstract

Foreign language classes are becoming increasingly multilingual even in countries that until recently have been remarkably monocultural, such as Finland. Teachers may not be prepared for this new situation, and the needs of students with immigrant backgrounds may be overlooked. This article reports a study in which both students with immigrant backgrounds and teachers of English were asked how they experienced multilingualism in the language classroom and how the students' multilingual background was taken into account in English classes. Both groups answered a questionnaire with closed and open questions. The results indicated that the children found English relatively easy to learn and they were able to use their L1s especially to benefit vocabulary learning. The majority of the teachers had not received any training in teaching students of immigrant background, but they reported having developed some strategies that utilized their students' multilingualism for the benefit of teaching English.