Children’s Rights in the 21st century: lessons from a border context for an axiological perspective on language teaching & teacher education
Learning new languages may not be an option. Migration is not just moving across borders but also crossing languages and cultures. These languages and cultures are, then, incorporated, in different degrees, to our translanguaging skill, adding layers to our plurilingual competence.
Thus, border contexts represent a powerful scenario for language research and educational praxis. The dilemmas speakers and teachers face in those situations may illuminate some key issues in language learning and teaching agenda which are relevant for early language learning and multilingual education: among others, identity and community, motivation and investment, learning and acquisition, formal and informal learning.
So, teaching a language is not just a technical affair but an axiological engagement with children’s rights. The question is how to work for children’s linguistic and cultural rights considering not just the teachers’ capacities but a societal approach in which the necessary resources are allocated to turn learning possibilities into realities.