Francesca Festi

Ph.D. programme in Foreign Literatures, Languages and Linguistics - 35° ciclo (October 1, 2019 - September 30, 2022)

Doctorate research program

My PhD project focuses on reading comprehension of Italian as a second language.
During the first phase of this research, structures that are challenging for L2 Italian learners will be investigated, both at the local, sentential level, and at a global, textual level. The second phase of this project will be a pedagogical intervention which will be elaborated and proposed to children during school time. The activities proposed during the intervention will be based on the results of the pre-test phase, and they will aim at providing children with a better strategy which can help them familiarize with school texts autonomously. Finally, during the third experimental phase, the effects of the intervention will be assessed through the administration of the same tasks presented in the first phase, but with different items.
The long-term goal of this study is to develop a new and effective pedagogical method to help children strengthen their knowledge of Italian in order to improve their L2 language comprehension. The improvement of L2 Italian students’ reading comprehension skills would benefit not only their knowledge of the Italian language, but it will also be a valid aid in studying other school subjects.

Tutor: Serena Dal Maso
Co-tutor: Merete Anderssen