Plurilingual competence or repertoire of languages refers to all individuals being potentially plurilingual. As plurilingual competence and language repertoires are individual, assessment modes targeted to the individual and localized to the context should be encouraged. This study explored and depicted the plurilingual profile of Italian Studies…

This article introduces the CELI corpus, a new learner corpus of written Italian consisting of ca. 600,000 tokens, evenly distributed among CEFR (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages) proficiency levels B1, B2, C1 and C2. The collected texts derive from the language certification exams administered by the University for Foreigners…

L3 acquisition is influenced by L1-L3 typology, learners' proficiency in those languages, and metalinguistic knowledge. However, the precise patterns of cross-linguistic influence (CLI) in L3 acquisition are still unclear. This study aimed to examine how the abovementioned factors affect learners' sensitivity to subject placement in L3 Italian. We…

Metacognitive awareness of listening strategies has a supporting role in explaining L2 listening comprehension. Although metacognitive awareness is language-independent, language proficiency may determine whether learners can utilize such a cognitive resource during multiple language development. The current study explores the listening strategy…

Multilingualism is often associated with advantages for acquiring additional languages. Theoretical approaches explain these advantages by assuming a Common Underlying Proficiency or a Metalinguistic Awareness. At the State Europe School in Berlin, students from different language backgrounds receive instruction in German and a partner language…

Purpose: Pragmatics is receiving much attention in both the fields of developmental and clinical psychology; however, there is a dearth of instruments to assess pragmatic abilities specifically among young toddler-age children. The aim of the current study was to test the psychometric properties of the Italian version of the Language Use Inventory…

This study focuses on the assessment of working memory and linguistic skills in 21 Italian-Russian speaking bilingual children who were born in Italy and inherited Russian from their parents. Their performance was compared to that of 21 monolingual Russian-speaking and 21 monolingual Italian-speaking peers. For the assessment of the two languages…

This study investigates the acquisition of null subjects by Mandarin Chinese native speakers ('Chinese NSs' hereafter), with different levels of L2 English proficiency, at initial stages of L3 Italian acquisition. The aim is to find out if, when acquiring Italian null subjects, Chinese NSs resort to their L1, which, like the L3, allows null…

In this study, we present the results of an original experimental protocol designed to assess the performance in a pluralization task of 52 Italian children divided into two groups: 24 children with developmental dyslexia (mean age 10.0 years old) and 28 typically developing children (mean age 9.11 years old). Our task, inspired by Berko's Wug…

The present study looks into the effects of early multilingual education by investigating linguistic knowledge and metalinguistic awareness in young learners at the primary level. The study aims to establish whether children in multilingual education programmes perform higher on a measure of metalinguistic awareness and with regards to their L1…

Heritage language (HL) speakers seem to diverge from monolingual speakers in the acquisition of syntax-discourse interface phenomena. However, most of the studies reporting this finding do not make any distinction between different types of syntax-discourse interface structures. Therefore, it is an open question whether these structures are…

Verbal working memory resources may impact syntax comprehension. Thirteen Italian children with cochlear implants (CIs) were assessed in relative clause (RC) comprehension, digit span and nonword repetition and compared to 13 chronological age peers (CA) and 13 younger controls (LA) with normal hearing (NH). The RC comprehension task tested…

Since 2012 an interdisciplinary and culturally heterogeneous team composed of more than 30 people has been engaged in the complex process of conceiving, designing and validating an online placement test with formative orientation called SELF (Système d'Evaluation en Langues à visée Formative), developed and already deployed in six different…

The global quarantine measures and restrictions have posed a challenge to the structure and procedure of university summative assessment process. Foreign Languages Acquisition and Linguistic Education assessment are interdisciplinary processes, informed by the nature of linguistic content and types of communicative and professional activities…

The global pandemic and subsequent quarantine measures and restrictions have posed a challenge to the structure and procedure of university summative assessment process. Qualification assessment for Foreign Languages major programs in particular is a strict regimen process that involves different stages (oral and written exams, final project viva,…