The study of children’s household and community contexts as the base for an intercultural and bilingual early literacy programme

ROSEMBERG, C. R.; STEIN, A.; ALAM, F.; MIGDALEK, M.; OJEA, G.

Family and intergenerational literacy and learning: International perspectives

UNESCO

Lugar: Hamburgo; Año: 2023; p. 1 - 13

This chapter presents a project that articulates language research and educationalintervention actions aimed to ensure inclusive and quality education to Argentinian childrenliving in situations of extreme poverty in the city and suburbs of Buenos Aires and in Qom(Toba) native semi-rural and rural communities in Chaco province.The project involved the collection of an important empirical corpus of audio and videorecordings of natural daily interactions in which children participate in their households andcommunities. The documentation of the activities, the funds of knowledge, the learningstrategies, the interactional patterns, the language variant and uses in which these children aresocialised, as well as the analysis of the quantity and quality of the linguistic input to whichthey are exposed early in life, are used as the starting point for the design of educationalactions and materials aimed to widen children’s opportunities for vocabulary and discoursedevelopment and literacy learning.The chapter describes the cultural and linguistic features that characterise children’sexperiences and the way in which we used them in the intercultural and bilingual earlyliteracy programme to build an anchor to enhance children’s linguistic development, theacquisition of literacy and the broadening of children's knowledge. The chapter also showsand reflects on the collaborative work with the community members and the Spanish andQom native teachers involved in this process, and with whom we have created a series ofintercultural and bilingual educational materials: the ethnographic storybooks En la casa deOscarcito, En la comunidad Daviaxaiqui, Dany, and Dany na’aqtaguec, na’qaatqa, relatos,tolhomtes, as well as the software application “Huo’o na cuentos”, aimed to promote theacquisition of Spanish and Qom as first or second languages. We finally illustrate how theseeducational materials are used in teaching situations in children’s households and communitydaycare centres.