Impact of emergency eLearning in a multilingual context with a minority language: how has the absence of school affected the use of Basque, English, and Spanish in the Basque context?

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on the use of language during the emergency eLearning period due to Covid-19 in the Basque Autonomous Community. Specifically, the main objective of this study is to analyze how the use of Basque (local minority language), English (foreign language), and Spanish (local majority language) changed during this period among children and the interactions that may exist between them. Four hundred eighty-four teachers and 410 parents participated in this research. The results revealed that teachers perceived a significant decline in the use of Basque that correlated with an increase in the use of Spanish. The decline in the use of Basque was particularly significant among children in kindergarten. The use of English also decreased but was not associated with the use of the other languages. It was also found that the perceptions of children's language use differed between teachers and parents. The findings are explained in terms of assumptions regarding language learning and use in relation to the context of the study. Finally, we discuss some implications of empowering minority and foreign language use in multilingual contexts during emergency eLearning and the measures that should be taken to mitigate the decline in their use at the current time.

KEYWORDS:

• Language learning
• language use
• multilingual education
• minority languages
• Covid-19

Data availability statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nahia Idoiaga Mondragon

Nahia Idoiaga Mondragon holds a PhD in psychology (with honors), degrees in psychology and educational psychology and two master’s degrees (Teacher Training & Research Methodology). Framed within social and educational psychology, she has researched and published impact articles on topics related to socio-educational inclusion, education, feminism and health. In the field of research, she is part of the research group KideON. She is also part of several projects, most of them European funded, working on the inclusion of young people and vulnerable groups. At a teaching level, she has been a lecturer in the Department of Evolutionary Psychology and Education since 2016 and in her teaching subjects she is implementing IKD methods (problem based learning and dynamic and cooperative learning). In addition, she is a PhD Co – director enrolled in the Doctorate programs in Psychology and Psychodidactics at the UPV/EHU. She is also the coordinator of the Infant Education degree and part of the equality and quality committees of the Faculty of Education of Bilbao.

Maria Orcasitas-Vicandi

Maria Orcasitas-Vicandi studied English Philology and postgraduate studies (European Master's Degree in Multilingual Education and a master’s degree in Teacher Training for Compulsory Secondary Education, Vocational Training and Teaching of Foreign Languages) at the same university. She received a MEC predoctoral fellowship (BES-2013-32191) and took part in a research stay at the University of Knoxville Tennessee (UKT) in the Department of Modern and Foreign Languages and Literatures. She received an international doctorate cum laude from this university (UPV/EHU). As a researcher, she has published several books, articles, and book chapters in national and international journals. She has also participated in 2 national projects (MINECO) and 3 international projects (ERASMUS+) and is leading today an Erasmus + project. Her research focuses on multilingual education and second and third language learning in educational contexts.

Gorka Roman Etxebarrieta

Gorka Roman Etxebarrieta holds an International Ph.D. in Political Science and is currently finishing another Ph.D. in Psychodidactics. He has Bachelor’s Degrees in Social and Cultural Anthropology, English Studies, and Basque Studies, and Master’s Degrees in ‘Conflict Resolution, and Migrations’, ‘Nationalism in the twenty-first Century’, and ‘Visual Anthropology’. His expertise includes discourse analysis, the processes of inclusion with foreign students, migrants, and refugees in diverse contexts and new didactic methodologies in the teaching/learning processes. He is conducting research in various international research groups working in fields related to sociocultural inclusion and youth/civil networks. He is a member of international research groups related to the learning mobility of youths (InclusiON Project. Erasmus+ K2. 2017-2019). He is also Principal Investigator in an Erasmus+ project working on new didactic techniques and school inclusion. He is also a member of the ‘KideOn’ Research Group of the Basque Government (Ref.: IT1342-19 / ‘A’ category) He has multiple publications on different topics such as education, youth mobility, identity formation, and social inclusion and has organized several international conferences in related topics.