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In a progressively interrelated world, the advancement of strong multilingual literacy skills among learners is of great importance. This article showcases successful multilingual literacy initiatives, analyzing their implementation and impact. The study revealed great positive influence on communities and individuals after the initiatives. The predominant aim is to give extra weight to the indispensable importance of appreciating and paying attention to linguistic diversity through effective multilingual/translanguaging literacy opening moves. Using a survey design, this study paid attention to documenting instances of multilingualism implementation in educational settings, purposefully selecting South Africa and Nigeria as central points. Using a qualitative approach, the research examined success stories by analyzing reports, publications, archival materials, and scholarly articles associated with the projects. Special attention was paid to the Ife 1970 Nigeria’s Project and the 2002 Western Cape LOITASA’s project and the findings were presented in a descriptive narrative format. The study elaborated on the objectives, strategies, and results of these projects, presenting findings in a descriptive narrative format. Moreover, the study contributes valuable insights to the debates surrounding effective literacy practices in multilingual contexts. By presenting success stories from these African nations, the study provided practical guideposts for policymakers, educators, and practitioners who want to develop or improve multilingual literacy programs. Lastly, the findings stressed the significance of culturally responsive and context-specific approaches to literacy, proposing the adoption of multilingual/translanguaging pedagogies within school systems. Through these, the study will promote inclusive and efficient educational practices that honor and celebrate linguistic diversity.

Background/Objectives: Research suggests that metalinguistic and cognitive/attentional-control processes are key variables in literacy development in young learners. Interactions between these variables are complex, and this complexity is increased in multilingual learners. With data on the interplay between metalinguistic and cognitive awareness, literacy, and multilingualism being scarce, it is far from clear how these variables interact and how they impact the individual child. This article sets out to shine some light on the interconnectedness and interactions between metalinguistic awareness, cognitive/executive functions, and (multilingual) literacy. Conclusions: We argue that the three dimensions are strongly correlated and that this correlation comes with important implications for language learning, language processing, and language development. However, the exact nature of these correlations is yet to be established. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ivan (pseudonym), the son of Mexican migrant farmworkers, rarely spent more than six months in the same school and by high school was still classified as an English language learner. This article traces Ivan’s experiences as a language learner and writer, telling his story in his own words through his writing and ethnographic data collected during his junior year of high school and his first year of college. I examine how literacy sponsors (Brandt, 2001) helped or impeded his reading and writing as he worked to change his life. Through Ivan’s writing and oral reflections, I argue that rather than solely supporting their reading and writing development, literacy sponsors for immigrant second language writers support learners as a whole. Central to Ivan’s evaluation of his literacy sponsors is the role of caring relationships—or lack thereof—that endured longer than the technical literacy skills he learned from any one sponsor.

For over a decade, the authors have worked collaboratively to better understand and address the challenges and possibilities of promoting multilingual literacy in Uganda, a country of over 44 million people where over 40 African languages are spoken and English is the official language. This article focuses on the diverse ways that teachers promote early literacy in large multilingual classrooms, and how the innovative African Storybook digital initiative might support primary school teachers in both rural and urban areas. We begin the article with a description of our collaborative work on the African Storybook (http://www.africanstorybook.org/) and one of its derivatives, Storybooks Uganda (https://global-asp.github.io/storybooks-uganda/). Then, drawing on a collaborative study of primary school classrooms in eastern Uganda, we analyze four common strategies that Ugandan teachers use to promote multilingual literacy in their classrooms: the use of the mother tongue as a resource; songs and multimodality; translanguaging; and linguistic strategies for classroom management. We follow this with a discussion of a 2015 teacher education workshop in eastern Uganda, which illustrates how the African Storybook can help support Ugandan teachers as they navigate the challenges of large classrooms. We conclude that the African Storybook has much promise for addressing the United Nations' 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In applied linguistics, creativity has traditionally been conceptualized as an anthropocentric activity where semiotic resources are used as mediating tools to generate new meaning. This article challenges that view by exploring the non-representational forces that vitalize creativity to keep language moving in a theatre game played with multilingual youth and pre-service language teachers. In particular, it operationalizes Deleuze's notion of stuttering to map the contours of linguistic movement in the literacy activity. This paper also gestures toward retheorizing creativity as difference-in-itself, making a break from previous research where creativity is determined on the basis of its relation to something else. Implications include the need to explore creativity in general on its own grounds, and linguistic creativity in particular as part of a moving assemblage of human and non-human forces, bodies, and agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Drawing on a corpus of annotated images that capture the linguistic landscape of a residential neighbourhood in Greater Manchester (UK) with a large Hasidic-Haredi (so-called 'ultra-Orthodox') Jewish population, we show how choices within a multilingual repertoire are both indicative and constitutive of different communicative acts and illocutions. Written Yiddish is embedded into an established tradition of literacy where creativity is accompanied by authoritative citations from Hebrew scripture. We discuss the use of Yiddish in affective, appellative, mobilising, regulatory and prohibitive actions. Semi-public use of written Yiddish is directed at participants who share a repertoire of closely intertwined social, religious and linguistic practices. Unlike many other lesser-used languages, the use of Yiddish in Haredi communities is not restricted to indexical identity flagging or commodification purposes. We show how in this multilingual setting, the indexical ordering of languages on written artefacts does not represent a hierarchy of absolute valorisation but rather a complementarity of functions that draws on simultaneous activation of several repertoire components. Highlights • The linguistic landscape offers a record of communicative action that is anchored in shared community practices and linguistic repertoires. • Use of written Yiddish in semi-public signage draws on centuries of literacy and is intertwined with other components of users' language repertoire. • Yiddish is used on signage for affective, appellative, mobilising, regulatory and prohibitive actions. • Unlike many other lesser-used languages, use of Yiddish on signage in Haredi communities is not restricted to indexical identity flagging or commodification purposes. • In the setting investigated, the indexical ordering of languages on written artefacts does not represent a hierarchy of absolute valorisation but rather a complementarity of functions that draws on simultaneous activation of several repertoire components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The African Storybook (ASb) is a digital initiative that promotes multilingual literacy for African children by providing openly licenced children's stories in multiple African languages, as well as English, French, and Portuguese. Based on Darvin and Norton's () model of identity and investment, and drawing on the Douglas Fir Group's () framework for second language acquisition, this study investigates Ugandan primary school teachers' investment in the ASb, its impact on their teaching, and their changing identities. The study was conducted in a rural Ugandan school from June to December 2014, and the data, which focus on one key participant, Monica, were drawn from field notes, classroom observations, interview transcripts, and questionnaires, which were coded using retroductive coding. The findings indicate that through the ASb initiative and its stories, Monica and other teachers began to imagine themselves as writers, readers, and teachers of stories, reframing what it means to be a reading teacher. Teachers' shifts of identity were indexical of their enhanced social and cultural capital as they engaged with the ASb, notwithstanding ideological constraints associated with mother tongue usage, assessment practices, and teacher supervision. The authors conclude that the enhancement of language teacher identity has important implications for the promotion of multilingual literacy for young learners in African communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is the guest editor's introduction to the special issue of theJournal of Multilingual and Multicultural Developmenton ‘Multilingual Literacy and Social Change in African Communities’. Norton examines the diverse contributions with reference to the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals, formulated in 2000 to ‘make poverty history’ by 2015. Bamgbose argues convincingly that language is central in the struggle for educational progress, gender equality and improved health. Makoe and McKinney, for example, highlight continuities in language practices in post-apartheid South African schools, while Early and Norton address the challenges of teaching through English as medium in Uganda. As discussed by Sherris and colleagues, programmes likeSchool for Life, which validate the local languages of out-of-school Ghanaian youth, are exemplary, and can be contrasted with the troubling pedagogical practices identified by Higgins in her HIV/AIDS educational research in Tanzania. The validation of local knowledge is also a theme in Namazzi and Kendrick, who insightfully address multimodal educational practices in Ugandan child-headed households. Lemphane and Prinsloo provide a window on the future, cautioning that the digital literacy practices of diverse youth can be indexical of social inequalities. The promotion of multilingual literacy remains an urgent priority in African education. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The main focus of this article is on the multilingual literacy practices and values of English-educated university students (aged 14-20) in Brunei Darussalam, Southeast Asia. Multilingual literacy is used as a lens to examine the impact of globalization on the communicative practices of these young people and to investigate the specific ways in which they are engaging with the new technoscapes of the twenty-first century. The article draws on several research projects carried out between 2001 and 2007 and on case studies of 23 students. The different data sources include literacy diaries, samples of texts produced by the young people, narratives about their literacy histories and diary-based interviews. The article gives an account of the ways in which these young, cosmopolitan Bruneians positioned themselves vis-a-vis the reified language and literacy values encountered in the institutional and 'regulated' spaces of their lives and it provides insights into the ways in which they articulated both local and globalised identities through their digital and multilingual literacy practices, in 'unregulated spaces', such as on the internet or in SMS messaging with members of their peer group. The article contributes to the growing body of research on digital literacy in multilingual settings and to the debate, within the New Literacy Studies, about how the link between local and global should be conceptualised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article has evolved from teaching future teachers about literacy and language in multilingual contexts. The examples are taken from contexts in the United States with learners from around the world. Professionals in the classrooms, in the teacher development programs, and in schools and colleges of education have been doing responsible research for many years, and have learned much regarding the learning of multilingual people who represent a multitude of histories. In this article the focus is on rethinking literacy, languages (home languages and target languages of host countries), the connections between personal and communal history and learning texts, and how all of the above relate to the curriculum in various learning arenas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the way in which bilingual children of primary school age who have become dominant in English are learning to be literate in the language of the home using dual language books provided by the school. It reports on how the mothers and their children used both texts to transfer skills from one language to another; to negotiate meaning in both languages; to compare reading strategies and how these vary depending on the language learned (Albanian, Turkish, French and Urdu). The study highlights the positive impact on children's confidence, on their personal identity as bilinguals in a multicultural British society, on their achievement in English literacy as well as the involvement of their parents in their schools. The study identifies the crucial role of the teacher and the school in providing a positive ethos in the classroom, and support and resources for parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores how, using a multimodal approach to integrating language and content teaching, high school students with limited English proficiency can be supported to engage in rich, complex interpretations of literary works in English and to realize their interpretations linguistically in written academic discourse. Findings suggest that a multimodal approach, in combination with cooperative group work and L1 use, has considerable potential in promoting ELL students’ academic success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Facebook interaction favours multilingual literacy of young new writers migrated from sub-Saharan Africa to Europe. • Strategies to develop literacy through Facebook interaction reflect the process of acquisition in naturalistic contexts. • Emerging writing on Facebook does not reflect new writers' interlanguage and literacy level as measured through other tests. Recent migration towards Europe is characterized by the massive presence of adults whose educational paths have been interrupted and who are thus developing literacy for the first time in a new language. A literacy test elaborated at the University of Palermo, Italy, showed that, on a sample of 774 migrants, about 30 percent could not read and/or write short words. This test assessed the learners' abilities to read and write, whether in the Roman alphabet or in other writing systems, and whether in Italian or in other languages of learners' repertoires. These learners with emergent literacy mostly came from sub-Saharan Africa, an area characterized by diverse forms of multilingualism, and are representatives of "connected migrants" due to the centrality of digital communication practices in their migration experience; hence, the importance of research on such communication practices. This study examined the multilingual writing on Facebook of 10 migrants in Italy with emergent literacy. Findings demonstrate that these learners engage in multilingual practices which enhance their literacy competence by adopting strategies reflecting the general process of acquisition in naturalistic contexts. However, emerging writing on Facebook does not reflect participants' interlanguage and literacy levels elicited through the test. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]