Storytelling and digital art: tools for enhancing multilingual skills

The JASM (Open window onto the world: foreign languages, multimodal creativity and pedagogical innovation in higher education) project comprised a group of undergraduates, attending the Media Studies Course at the School of Education of Viseu, who made use of photography, digital art and cultural communication, collecting information pertaining to diversified cultural and linguistic contexts of the city (Beira Alta, Portugal), both in French and English, centered on a tradition or ritual of a migrant family. Storytelling and the creation of short movies about a migrant family's way of life were used as support for an innovative methodology, so as to ensure the acquisition of multilingual skills and the development of plurilingual awareness, towards the reinforcement of the linguistic, aesthetic, emotional and cognitive dimensions of language. Noteworthy is the fact that the target group of students are not likely to receive further language training. It is not yet clear how teachers can explore multilingual experiences of learners, both in terms of language learning dimensions, but also concerning the multiple cognitive connections, as well as the awareness of language diversity. However, this study allows us to disclose conclusions about our observations, namely the fact that such a methodology requires a creative, collaborative and multilingual work environment.