Un cadre de référence pour les approches plurielles

Le CARAP et les approches plurielles
Basics

Vue d'ensemble du CARAP:

De quoi s'agit-il? Il s'agit de la description systématique et de la mise en oeuvre de compétences et de ressources plurilingues et pluri-/interculturelles que les "approches plurielles" permettent de développer dans l'enseignement. De ce fait, le CARAP contribue de façon significative à ce que soient atteints les buts éducatifs préconisés par le Canada dans le domaine des langues officielles et des cultures représentées dans le pays.

Qu'appelle-t-on Approches plurielles? 
On appelle Approches plurielles des langues et des cultures des approches didactiques mettant en oeuvre des activités d'enseignement-apprentissage qui impliquent plusieurs (=plus d'une) variétés linguistiques et culturelles. ...en savoir plus

Qui devrait connaître le CARAP? Enseignant-e-s de toutes matières s'intéressant à la formation plurilingue et interculturelle des apprenant-e-s, Formateurs/formatrices d'enseignant-e-s, Responsables éducatifs, Concepteurs/conceptrices de curricula et de matérieux d'enseignement.

Ce que le CARAP propose:

Approches plurielles des langues et des cultures 

Nous appelons « Approches plurielles des langues et des cultures » des approches didactiques qui mettent en œuvre des activités d’enseignement-apprentissage qui impliquent à la fois plusieurs (= plus d’une) variétés linguistiques et culturelles.

Nous les opposons aux approches que l’on pourrait appeler « singulières » dans lesquelles le seul objet d’attention pris en compte dans la démarche didactique est une langue ou une culture particulière, prise isolément. Ces approches singulières ont été tout particulièrement valorisées lorsque les méthodes structurales puis « communicatives » se sont développées et que toute traduction, tout recours à la langue première étaient bannis de l’enseignement.

L'évolution de la didactique des langues au cours des trente dernières années a vu l'apparition de quatre approches plurielles :

Awakening to languages

Several European projects have enabled awakening to languages movements to develop on a broader scale, defining it as follows: “awakening to language is used to describe approaches in which some of the learning activities are concerned with languages which the school generally does not intend to teach.” This does not mean that the approach is concerned just with such languages. The approach concerns the language(s) of education and any other language which is in the process of being learnt. But it is not limited to these “learnt” languages, and integrates all sorts of other linguistic varieties – from the environment, from families… and from all over the world, without exclusion of any kind... Because of the number of languages on which learners work – very often, several dozen – awakening to languages may seem to be the most extreme form of pluralistic approach. It was designed principally as a way of introducing schoolchildren to linguistic diversity (and the diversity of their own languages) at the beginning of school education, as a vector of fuller recognition of the languages “brought” by children with other home languages, as a kind of preparatory course developed at primary schools, but it can also be promoted as a support to language learning throughout the learners’ school career.

L’Eveil aux langues (Awakening to languages) as it has been developed specifically in the Evlang and Jaling programmes is explicitly linked to the Language Awareness movement initiated by E. Hawkins in the 1980s in the United Kingdom. However, the éveil aux langues nowadays is to be seen as a sub-category of the Language Awareness approach, which is also generating research which is more psycho-linguistic than pedagogic and which does not necessarily involve confronting the learner with a number of languages. For this reason those promoting éveil aux langues prefer to use another term in English – Awakening to languages – to describe this approach.
 

Awakening to languages today - a Powerpoint by Michel Candelier and Ildikó Lörincz (6th EDiLiC Conference, Györ, July 2016)

Intercomprehension between related languages

In the approach termed Intercomprehension between related languages the learner works on two or more languages of the same linguistic family (Romance, Germanic, Slavic languages, etc.) in parallel. One of these languages is already known, being either the learner’s mother tongue, or the language of education, or even another language having been learnt previously.

In this approach there is a systematic focus on receptive skills, as the development of comprehension is the most tangible way of using the knowledge of a related language to learn a new one. Of course, this does not exclude some added benefits for productive skills.

In the second half of the 1990s there was innovative work in this area with adult learners (including university students), in France and other countries speaking romance languages, as well as in Germany, Scandinavian and Slavophone countries. Many were supported at a European level in the programmes of the European Union. Examples of this approach are to be found in certain materials produced for awakening to language approaches, but in general there has been little development of intercomprehension in schools.

Intercultural approach

The intercultural approach has already had a clear influence on the methodology of language teaching and is therefore relatively well-known.

Its many variants are all based on didactic principles which recommend relying on phenomena from one or more cultural area(s) (conceived of as hybrid, open and dynamic) as a basis for understanding others from one or more other area(s).

They also advocate developing strategies to promote reflection about contact situations involving persons with different cultural background.

Integrated didactic approach

Integrated didactic approaches are directed towards helping learners to establish links between a limited number of languages, which are taught within the school curriculum. Integrated didactics work on the central principle advocated by pluralistic approaches of capitalising on what is already known in order to access what is less known : the language of schooling for accessing the first foreign language, which can then be used as a springboard to facilitate the acquisition of a second foreign language etc., keeping in mind that mutual support between languages goes in both directions. This approach does not neglect, either, the home languages of the learners, especially when they are explicitly taught. One can therefore have two (or even three or four) languages which are being “tackled” simultaneously.

This was an approach advocated as early as the beginning of the 1980s in the work of E. Roulet. It is also the direction taken by numerous projects exploring the idea of German after English when they are learnt as foreign languages (cf. the studies relating to Tertiary language learning). Other studies investigate ways of linking the language of schooling and other languages taught in an integrated perspective. It is also present in certain approaches to bilingual education, which seek to make learners identify similaries and differences between the languages used in teaching, irrespective of the subject being studied.
 

 “German after English”

  Some references

Compétences et ressources

Nous concevons les compétences de la façon suivante :

  • les compétences sont liées à des situations, à des tâches complexes, socialement pertinentes ; elles sont donc « situées » et ont une fonction sociale;
  • ce sont des unités d’une relative complexité ;
  • elles font appel à différentes « ressources » internes (relevant généralement à la fois des savoir-faire, des savoirs et des savoir-être) et à des ressources externes (dictionnaires, médiateurs…).

Les compétences et ressources retenues dans le CARAP relèvent essentiellement de deux ordres de compétences :

  1.  la compétence à gérer la communication linguistique et culturelle en contexte d’altérité ;
  2. la compétence de construction et d’élargissement d’un répertoire linguistique et culturel pluriel.

Le CARAP identifie les ressources mobilisées par ces compétences. Les ressources sont présentées sous forme de descripteurs.

Les ressources (savoirs, savoir-être, savoir-faire)

Le terme « ressources » est généralement utilisé dans le CARAP pour désigner des « ressources internes ». Les « ressources » sont parfois nommées capacités, dispositions, ou encore connaissances ou composantes. Nous avons retenu le terme « ressources » - quoiqu’il ne soit pas très courant - car c’est celui qui est le moins connoté.

Les ressources internes (de même que l’usage des ressources externes, mais pas les compétences) peuvent être enseignées dans des situations / tâches au moins partiellement décontextualisées.
 

Les compétences sont conçues principalement comme relevant du domaine de l’usage et des besoins sociaux, alors que les ressources semblent plutôt appartenir au domaine de la psychologie cognitive (et développementale). En effet, ce sont bien les compétences qui entrent en jeu lorsqu’on est engagé dans une tâche.

Cependant, ce sont vraisemblablement les ressources mobilisées par ces compétences qu’il est – jusqu’à un certain point – possible d’isoler et de lister, de définir en termes de maitrise et d'enseigner dans les pratiques éducatives.

The database

The database FREPA – Online teaching materials, offers teaching activities which fall within the scope of pluralistic approaches to languages and cultures.

The purpose of this collection of materials, which include input in different languages, is to facilitate access to classroom activities which will help learners master the knowledge, skills and attitudes which the framework lists as resources and which can be developed by pluralistic approaches. All the materials proposed refer explicitly to descriptors of resources as they can be found in the FREPA framework. 

The database can be consulted either in English (tab Teaching materials at the top of the present page) or in French (tab Matériaux didactiques).

You will find below some examples of materials in LLL.

under development

The online training kit

The online training kit is available for teachers (and teacher trainers) who wish to train autonomously in pluralistic approaches and in the use of FREPA materials. The materials can be used by trainers in the preparation of, and during training sessions.

The training kit comprises 4 modules :

0. The Discovery module 

The aim of this module is to allow the participants to carry out an activity as learners themselves and to discover pluralistic approaches, their link to the notion of plurilingual and pluricultural competence, as well as the tools proposed by FREPA.

1. FREPA and educational language policies

The module allows language professionals to situate FREPA in today’s context of language teaching/learning at school, especially as far as educational goals are concerned.

2. I am having difficulty in my teaching … How can FREPA be of use to me ? 

This module supports teachers in organising a concrete use of the FREPA, as well as the pluralistic approaches, in view of certain difficulties concerning teaching and general pedagogical issues which teaching staff are likely to encounter in their everyday practice.

3. I wish to carry out a project with my students … How can FREPA be of use to me ? 

This module aims to support teachers in making use of the framework and pluralistic approaches in the design and implementation of class or school projects which involve other languages and other cultures.

The training kit can be accessed either in English (tab Teaching materials at the top of the present page) or in French (tab Matériaux didactiques).