Vol. 7 No. 3 (2025): Fostering a plurilingual curriculum: from theory to practice [Special Issue]

This special issue is drawn out of the ‘plurilingualism in School’ day held at Collège Sévigné, in Paris, France, December 2024. A day where academics, teachers, researchers and government stakeholders came together, to discuss plurilingualism in school and articulate connections between theory and practice.

The school is a pioneer in bilingual education in Paris, France and offers a bilingual curriculum with equal access to English – French. It is a rich context where teachers and students enter in constant dialogue, reflect and innovate.

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) principles, are at the core of Collège Sévigné’s metamorphosis into a plurilingual school nearly a decade ago. Sévigné’s higher education department (founded in 1885) and almost as old as the school itself (founded five years earlier, in 1880), makes it possible to combine innovative teaching practices with theoretical underpinnings. This makes it both a school and a place for reflexivity. Action research is active and encouraged in Collège Sévigné which enables teachers to act as researchers who constantly reflect and strive to improve their own practice. The collaborations between higher education institutions and Collège Sévigné allow for the development of a fruitful dialogue between higher education academics who are experts in their field and teachers in our school. In this way everyone benefits.

In this issue we have curated two sections to this special issue to allow the space for dialogue between higher education experts and teachers in the field and discuss theory and practical applications. To this end there are two sections to the special issue: one of peer reviewed articles and one of reflective accounts of teachers based on their experience in plurilingual classrooms.