Development of communicative competence among plurilingual students in monolingual croatian language practice

Abstract

When starting school pupils begin to adopt the standard Croatian language (non dominant L2), which in some regions differs from the native idioms (dominant L1). In this situation the interlanguage field is created and most students become vertically plurilingual, i.e. the interweaving of different language codes is ref lected in monolingual school practice.In this research the greatest attention has been paid to the cognitivelinguistic para digm and the constructivist theory, within which the stimulus theory and error theory have proven to be an extremely purposeful part of the learning process in the early lan guage development. The aim was to examine the purposefulness of the application of the modern learning theories on the development of communicative competence of younger primary school pupils. The research results have confirmed that communicative compe tence can be successfully developed, among other, by taking advantage of errors as a stim ulus for further learning. Only in such a situation the interlanguage field in monolingual Croatian language practice should be treated as a positive and not a negative linguistic phenomenon.

The Impact of Drama Activities on the Development of Communicative Competence in Primary Education

“…Grammar, i.e. the Croatian language, should be taught clearly, with examples from everyday communication situations, including systems that transmit linguistic information and relationships between communicating persons, i.e., including cognitive, communicative, and psychosocial elements (Pavličević-Franić, 2005). Mastering the grammatical structures of the language is an essential prerequisite for its sovereign use.…”

“…Therefore, all participants in the educational process are expected to encourage the development of language competencies. The development of functional communication in a positive institutional environment, and with the purpose of better and easier communication, should be the central content of teaching curricula (Pavličević-Franić, 2005). In the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFRL-Council of Europe, 2001), communicating in the mother tongue is the first and most important of eight key competencies, and its development begins with the acquisition of basic language activities of listening, speaking, reading, and writing, which should ultimately result in a high level of communicative competences.…”

“…In early language learning, the child is in the phase of concrete thought operations, and it is necessary to teach them the language clearly, based on examples from everyday communication (Aladrović Slovaček & Pintar, 2013). According to Pavličević-Franić (2005), learning and selecting language content should be in the early phase of acquiring the mother tongue, connected with the pupils' language experience and psychophysical abilities.…”