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Future Preschool Teachers’ Perspectives on Integrating Multicultural and Multilingual Content

ideas of Bratož and Sila (2022a), who suggest introducing both concrete and
symbolic concepts into multilingual and multicultural preschool education.
Similar types of activities to those including multiculturalism were also sug-
gested in relation to multilingual activities, with participants defining multi-
lingual activities as those aimed at raising awareness of other languages and
language learning. Several respondents agreed that it is important to learn
about other languages and to develop positive attitudes towards language
learning, while four respondents also emphasised the importance of learn-
ing about the Slovene dialects, and the languages of Italian and Hungarian
minorities, as well as all the mother tongues of the children in the group.
They believe that encouraging language diversity and emphasising the im-
portance of all languages is crucial, with one of the participants pointing
out that ‘[it is necessary] to include multilingual content, but if this means
learning English because this is the trend nowadays, it is not ok’ (Intervie-
wee 13). The results also reveal that several respondents view multicultural
and multilingual content as one concept, which points to their perception
of language as being an inseparable part of culture. When analysing partic-
ipants’ attitudes towards integrating multilingual and multicultural content
in kindergarten activities, we found that they all acknowledge the immense
significance of such activities in everyday kindergarten activities, as they not
only develop children’s awareness of other languages and cultures, as well
as encourage children’s acceptance of people from different cultural and
linguistic backgrounds, but also help them ‘learn about their own culture,
including its language, traditions, customs and values’ (Interviewee 11). In
this way, children can compare other cultures and languages with their own,
thus developing their plurilingual and pluricultural competencies. The main
aims of involving multilingual and multicultural content in kindergarten ac-
tivities, as suggested by the respondents, are developing children’s linguis-
tic and cultural awareness, encouraging children’s acceptance of other lan-
guages and cultures, including people coming from diverse linguistic and
cultural environments, fostering children’s positive attitudes towards lan-
guages and cultures as well as towards language learning, and developing
children’s cognitive and social skills alongside their plurilingual and pluricul-
tural competences. They also emphasised the significance of these activities
in terms of including children from different linguistic and cultural back-
grounds in the kindergarten groups, thus promoting inclusion, tolerance
and respect for linguistic and cultural diversity. However, one of the partic-
ipants pointed out that ‘in kindergartens and primary schools in Slovenia,
teachers are still not sufficiently aware of the impact they have on the in-

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