A systematic review of empirical studies into multilingual pedagogies and their outcomes in primary education

A growing body of research has shown that multilingualism can be a resource in learning, and has suggested that a diverse array of pedagogical approaches can be used to support multilingual learners in primary education. However, the field is lacking a review of literature examining multilingual approaches in education in relation to their outcomes. Therefore, this study asks what multilingual pedagogies can possibly be beneficial in supporting linguistically diverse students. Based on a systematic review of 34 international peer-reviewed articles on multilingual pedagogies in primary education and their cognitive and socio-affective outcomes, a categorisation into four multilingual pedagogies is proposed: pedagogical translanguaging-based, affirming, scaffolding and cross-linguistic. Additionally, we report on two main categories of outcomes: cognitive outcomes (e.g. reported results on vocabulary growth, morphological awareness, content learning) and socio-affective outcomes (e.g. reported results on wellbeing, relational aspects, self-efficacy). The proposed categorisation of multilingual pedagogies offers ways to support the shaping of multilingualism in education from different angles. The outcomes of the present study show that multilingualism can serve as a meaningful resource for learning in primary education contexts.