Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Advanced Research in Teaching and Education
Year: 2024
DOI:
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Learning Multiple Foreign Languages in Secondary School: Croatian Adolescents’ Beliefs and Habits
Dr. Andrea-Beata Jelić, Ivana Franić
ABSTRACT:
Although multilingualism is viewed as a phenomenon related to the individual’s ability to use three or more languages (Aronin, 2019), it is nowadays considered to include not only proficient multilinguals, but also “emergent” ones learning a foreign language (FL) in the school context (Rutgers et al., 2021). In that sense, the Croatian educational system, despite various policy and pragmatic challenges, provides a good framework for learners’ multilingual development. The paper presents the results of the quantitative research aimed at exploring beliefs and habits of Croatian adolescents aged 14-18 (N=93) learning three FLs in school. Three research questions were formulated: (a) what is learners’ perspective about their language repertoire in terms of the importance they attribute to their FLs and the self-assessment of their FL competence (b) what are their current FL use habits and (c) what is their perception of their future multilingual self. The results suggest a positive current learner multilingual outlook with differences between English, as the global language, and other FLs learned as well as a clear positive view of their future possible multilingual profile. The implications of the study are discussed in the framework of multilingual education in Croatia as a monolingual country.
keywords: Croatian FL learners, FL learning in school, FL use, multilingual development, future multilingual self