Community engagement and the method “Learning by Teaching”: A pilot project to embrace foreign language learning from the first days

Authors

Keywords:

Bilingualism, Community engagement, early education, learning by teaching, monolinguism

Abstract

The pilot community-engaged project, Niños y Niñas Bilingües y Biculturales (NNBB) forged through a partnership between the University Child Development Center and the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, combined the learning goals of upper-level Spanish courses with the benefits of learning a foreign language at an early age. College students worked cooperatively to develop a 3-week program covering basic vocabulary, geography, and cultural features from Spanish-speaking countries for monolingual English-speaking preschoolers. The purpose of the study is to understand the impact of the community-engaged program on a) college students’ perceptions on their involvement in the community and b) college students’ perceptions of foreign language learning at an early age. Students’ written reflections indicated that this program stimulated them to proactively participate more in the community and helped them to experience children’s fast ability to learn a foreign language. Participating parents revealed in the Likert-scale surveys a disposition to implement a systematic and consistent foreign language program in the preschool curriculum.

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Author Biography

Lucía Osa-Melero, Duquesne University

Dr. Lucía Osa-Melero is an Associate Professor at the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Duquesne University. She teaches upper-level Spanish community-engaged courses and co-leads the lower-level Spanish program. She holds a PhD in Language Teaching from Universitat de València (Spain) and an MA and an MAT in Foreign Languages Teaching from the University of Iowa.

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Published

2021-06-23

How to Cite

Osa-Melero, L. (2021). Community engagement and the method “Learning by Teaching”: A pilot project to embrace foreign language learning from the first days. Revista De Lenguas Para Fines Específicos, 27(1), 37–57. Retrieved from https://ojsspdc.ulpgc.es/ojs/index.php/LFE/article/view/1324