A Multimodal Pedagogical Experience to Teach a Foreign Language to Young Learners

LIRUSO, SUSANA

Punctum. International Journal of Semiotics

Punctum

Año: 2019

2459-2943

he notion of multimodality highlights the idea that communication takes place in multiple modes, linguistic and non-linguistic. Much of the information produced in our contemporary society is a combination of both, verbal text and image. It is fairly clear, then, that students should develop a set of skills to access and process information in various modes. In consonance with this idea, this paper argues that the inclusion of visual literacy to the teaching of Foreign Languages (FLs) to young learners can enhance communicative abilities, favor language understanding and engagement, and promote critical thinking. Drawing on the theoretical framework proposed by Kress and van Leeuwen (2006) who developed a grammar of visual design based on Systemic Functional Linguistics (henceforth SFL), this study concentrates on three aspects of multimodally construed interpersonal/interactive meanings: contact, social distance and subjectivity. Using three classroom interventions, learners´ interpr