Abstract:

Heritage language is the home language, different from the major language of the country of residence. It is the language that immigrants wish to pass on to their children. According to Kagan, Carreira and Chic (2017), the pedagogical basis for their formal education is still being constructed. The heritage language can be considered a mother tongue, but this does not mean that it will always be the language of heritage speakers. This term, initially coined in Canada, a country with a high rate of immigration, spread to the United States and other countries (Cummins, 2005). Heritage speakers are the children of immigrants, born in or who migrated at a very young age to the country of residence. These children are usually slightly bilingual to varying degrees.

The issue of heritage language learning has been studied by Montrul (2015), who identified two types of factors that directly affect learning a heritage language: Psycholinguistic Factors (quantity and quality of input in the heritage language, linguistic attitudes and communicative competence in the heritage language) and Sociolinguistic Factors (family and state language policies and the closeness between the languages of the environment and the heritage language). Considering that these heritage speakers move between several linguistic repertoires, the challenge lies in providing access to educational situations that enhance the psycholinguistic factors related to the heritage language.

Today, we know that printed books and technology used in different formats coexist in the transmission of the heritage language (Little, 2019). Mlearning uses mobile technologies to encourage learning. This type of technology enables children to experiment with new ways of applying and sharing knowledge within a digital learning environment, enabling for collaboration in some cases (Sarrab, Elgamel and Aldabbas, 2012; Crompton, Burke and Gregory, 2017). The greatest advantage in the situation of heritage speakers is the transversal results from the combination of more than one methodology and learning strategy, which takes the student’s characteristics into consideration (De Araujo Junior et al, 2019).

Since there is no app aimed at teaching a heritage language, this paper seeks to identify the potential of mlearning and the psycholinguistic factors that affect the learning of a heritage language based on its characteristics. For this purpose, the paper begins with constructivist foundations (Vygotsky, 1989, 2001, Coll & Salvador, 2007) to propose a mobile application design aimed at children 2 to 5 years of age, who speak a heritage language, and are only minimally exposed to bilingual contexts.

The proposal model includes four basic categories: the construction of meaning, the interaction between peers, a focus on previous experiences, and formative feedback. These bases would make it possible to increase the quantity and improve the input quality in the heritage language, to foster motivation, self-esteem and good attitudes toward the heritage language, and thus improve communicative competence through interaction in the heritage language, which are key factors in this form of learning.

Keywords:

m-learning, Educational App, Heritage language.