Alphabétisation en langue étrangère: art de la lenteur, de la lente heure
Literacy in a foreign language: the art of slowness, of the slow hour

Author(s): Rosine SCHAUTZ
Subject(s): Cognitive linguistics, Educational Psychology, Pedagogy
Published by: Editura Junimea
Keywords: expect; learn; settled; shift; speak;
Summary/Abstract: This essay outlines the “prospect” of a teaching practice, conducted in Geneva. It will outline a method addressed to illiterate non-French-speaking adults, recently arrived in Switzerland. As survivors of history and geography tragedies, they are quite shattered, cognitively and psychologically. Slowness in a literacy class is the cardinal point to take into account. Nothing goes fast, everything must be taken up again and again, rephrased, communication situations must be endlessly replayed. Slowness here is synonymous with patience, perseverance. And this is fully accepted. Why? Because these students have worked in jobs that require a certain amount of time: farmers, pearlers, weavers, fishermen, cooks, mothers with many pregnancies... Where does this audience come from? From almost all parts of the world, Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America. This slowness is illustrated here with concrete cases, and to enter further into the specificity of literacy in foreign countries, a documentary film, Nationalité: écrire, shot in the classroom, is visible on www.alpha-ville.ch.

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