Multilingualism in the Border Area

Mlekuž, Maja Melinc (2026) Multilingualism in the Border Area. JOURNAL OF ADVANCED STUDIES ON BORDERS COOPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT, 2 (1). pp. 159-178. ISSN 3057-9872

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Abstract

Schools with Slovene as the language of instruction in Italy are both institutions of minority-language continuity and educational spaces for pupils with diverse language biographies. This article examines a complete corpus of 18 published interactive learning units designed to supplement regular school work in Slovene at primary, lower-secondary and upper-secondary levels. The units address topics, communicative situations, text types and uses of Slovene that are not normally foregrounded in regular lessons. Primary- and lower-secondary curricula provide the baseline for interpreting this supplementary function, while three published studies supply contextual evidence on unequal exposure and use. The original contribution is a qualitative comparative content analysis of the final units, not of their development, implementation or effects. The analysis considers learner activity, linguistic and textual focus, literary engagement, communicative purpose and domain, interaction and modality, and the organisation of task sequences. Eight recurrent task families were identified. Across educational levels, activities move from recognition, matching and guided completion towards situated interaction, explanation, reformulation, interpretation, evaluation and the production of complete texts for specified purposes and audiences. The units extend school-based Slovene into service encounters, health, travel, technology, public information, language variation, reading and literary response. They therefore supplement the curricular development of language and literary competence by filling gaps in thematic and communicative coverage. The study does not establish effectiveness, but it shows how supplementary materials can represent broader textual, practical, public and interpretative participation through a protected minority language.

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