4. Language Rights of the Russian-speaking Minority in Finland: Multi-sited Historical Arguments and Language Ideologies

Lähteenmäki, Mika; Pöyhönen, Sari

doi:10.21832/9781783092710-006

Cited by 9 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 6 publications

(6 reference statements)

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“…Russian can be studied as a foreign language or as a mother tongue in some Finnish schools and there are about 20 Russian-medium preschools in Finland. In recent times, there have been debates on whether the Finnish authorities should do more to promote the rights of the fast-growing numbers of Russian speakers and the teaching of Russian (Lähteenmäki and Pöyhönen 2015).…”

Section: The Finnish Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Palviainen¹,

Protassova²,

Mård-Miettinen³

et al. 2020

21st Century Pre-School Bilingual Education

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Section: The Finnish Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Palviainen¹,

Protassova²,

Mård-Miettinen³

et al. 2020

21st Century Pre-School Bilingual Education

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“…After Finnish and Swedish, Russian has the greatest number of mother tongue speakers in Finland. As an immigrant language, however, Russian in Finland does not have the same strong position as Finnish and Swedish (e.g., Lähteenmäki and Pöyhönen 2015). Differences in terms of status ought to have consequences on bilingual preschool teachers' aims and language practices and on how these languages are used and acquired by children who speak the majority language (e.g., Shohamy 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Palviainen

Protassova

Mård-Miettinen

et al. 2016

International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism

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Bilingual preschool education is under researched compared with bilingual school education. There is also a lack of research on bilingual preschool teachers' agency and how they negotiate between two languages in the classroom. We examined the language practices of five bilingual preschool teachers working within three different socio-linguistic settings, in Finland (Finnish-Swedish and Russian-Finnish contexts), and Israel (an Arabic-Hebrew context) and interviewed the teachers about their use of languages in the classroom. We found that in each context the teachers reported modifications to an initial bilingual education model over time: from a strict separation of languages, to flexible bilingual practices. A thematic analysis of the contents of the teacher reflections as they emerged through interviews revealed five shared categories:(a) the flexible use of two languages; (b) responsible code-switching; (c) contextual and linguistic supports; (d) adjustments for individual children; and (e) role-modelling.Despite the different settings and sociolinguistic conditions, the similarities in teachers' practices and the rationale they gave for applying flexible bilingual practices were significant. The shared practices across contexts may have important implications for bilingual education.Keywords: bilingual preschool education; flexible bilingual practices; teacher agency; early childhood bilingualism; language attitudes; code-switching IntroductionThe aim of this study was to compare five teachers' reflections on their own language practices and the challenges they faced in implementing bilingual language education within three contexts of preschool education in Finland (Finnish-Swedish and RussianFinnish contexts), and Israel (an Arabic-Hebrew context). Ricento and Hornberger (1996) as well as Menken and García (2010) place teachers at the very heart of language policy-making. However, little research attention has been paid to providing bilingual teachers with any deeper understanding of their own agency and their critical role in negotiating, constructing and reconstructing classroom language practices. This is especially true for the context of preschool education and young children's essential developmental and social needs.As Heller (2007) has pointed out, language practices are inseparable from beliefs about languages and attitudes towards them in the surrounding society. For this reason we also considered it important to examine how the teachers' reflections were embedded in the specific educational and socio-political context in which they expressed them, and which possibly had an impact on their language practices. The comparative contexts chosen for this study, Finland and Israel, are both bilingual countries, where Finnish and Swedish, and Hebrew and Arabic, respectively, are official languages. However, for socio-political and historical reasons, the minority languages Swedish and Arabic are differently presented in the linguistic landscape of these countries and also differ considerably in terms ...

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“…Finnish schools are not obliged to provide it. There is also debate on whether Russian should be included as a minority language considering that it is the second largest language minority group in Finland (Lähteenmäki & Pöyhönen, 2015). A minimum of four students is generally required for the provision of Sami and Romany Chib education in Finland; and, similarly, in Sweden the requirement extends to five students plus a "suitable" teacher (Swedish Education Ordinance, Chapter 5, Section 10).…”

Section: Language-as-rightmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spaces for multilingual education: language orientations in the national curricula of Sweden and Finland

Paulsrud

Zilliacus

Ekberg

2020

International Multilingual Research Journal

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Both Sweden and Finland have education systems promoting equity and equality. However, recent societal and political changes linked to increased immigration have created new challenges in efforts to support linguistic diversity. This paper aims to explore how multilingualism is represented in the national compulsory school curricula in the two contexts, using the language orientation framework: language as problem, right, or resource. The analysis reveals differences. In Finland, an explicit discourse on multilingual education exists, with an aim of integrating multilingual perspectives into the whole curriculum. In Sweden, however, the discourse is less explicit; and multilingualism as a concept is limited to minority language students. Considering language orientations in the two curricula affords an understanding of the spaces for multilingual education that are key to our possibilities as educators to promote linguistic diversity and social justice in the schools of today's global societies.

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4. Language Rights of the Russian-speaking Minority in Finland: Multi-sited Historical Arguments and Language Ideologies

Cited by 9 publications

References 6 publications

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Two languages in the air: a cross-cultural comparison of preschool teachers’ reflections on their flexible bilingual practices

Spaces for multilingual education: language orientations in the national curricula of Sweden and Finland

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