Session Information
31 SES 04, The Complexities of Multilingualism in Relation to School Achievement
Paper Session
Contribution
Cultural and linguistic diversity are essential characteristics of European societies that are reinforced by today’s international mobility and migration. The increasing political, economic, social and cultural networking and collaboration in Europe call for appropriate multilingual competences of individuals. According to the recommendation of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (1998) European citizens should be able to communicate in two European languages next to their mother tongue. Just as other European countries, Switzerland is in the process of reforming its foreign language education in primary schools accordingly, in order to provide learners with earlier and intensified foreign language education and to improve their foreign language competences. As a consequence of these reforms, (primary school) children in Switzerland are supposed to learn 1) the local language of instruction, 2) another national language (German, French, Italian, Romansch), and 3) either English or yet another national language.
In German-speaking Central Switzerland, where the present study was conducted, the following languages are taught: 1) German (local language of instruction), 2) English (starting in 3rd grade) and 3) French (starting in 5th grade). The reform of foreign language education at the primary school level meets with resistance from educational policy-makers, teachers and parents who fear that this might put excessive language demands on the children (especially those with a migration background) and that the foreign language lessons might negatively affect the children’s German competencies. Therefore they should focus on the learning of German rather than foreign languages.
In contrast, the theoretical and empirical underpinnings of Third Language Acquisition (TLA) commonly refer to the advantages of bilingualism for the study of subsequent languages. Learners of an L3 can draw upon a broader range of previous language resources than learners of an L2 including learning strategies (Jessner 2008, 39). It can be assumed that – under favourable conditions – learners of an L3 will learn the given language more successfully and also qualitatively differently from learners who learn the same language as an L2 as they have more opportunities for language comparisons (Marx & Hufeisen 2004, 145) and a higher multilingual awareness (Allgäuer-Hackl & Jessner 2013).
According to Cenoz (2003, 74) a facilitating effect of bilingualism on TLA can be observed in studies that examine the L2-L3 transfer of general receptive or productive skills rather than specific linguistic subskills, as L2 language proficiency does not seem to affect all aspects of TLA in the same way. Moreover, a facilitating effect of bilingualism on TLA generally emerges in studies where the languages investigated are taught at school and biliteracy is fostered among the students (e. g. Brohy 2001; Sanz 2001). More mixed results are reported from studies involving groups of bilingual immigrants whose non-dominant mother tongue(s) are in most cases neglected by the public school system. While in some studies they demonstrated either worse or equally good foreign language competences as their monolingual national peers (e. g. Bos & Gröhlich, 2010; Bos & Pietsch 2006; Rauch, Jurecka & Hesse 2010; van Gelderen et al. 2003), other studies suggest that students with an immigration background exhibit higher foreign language skills than students without an immigration background even in unfavourable contexts of linguistic assimilation (e. g. Goebel, Rauch & Vieluf 2011; Klieme 2006). In the Swiss study by Haenni Hoti and Heinzmann (2011) immigration-related bilingualism also turned out to be an advantage in the initial stages of foreign language learning at school. After two years of instruction, this positive effect of bilingualism had disappeared, however. Instead other (demographic) factors such as educational resources of the family played a more crucial role for the prediction of foreign language skills.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Allgäuer-Hackl, E. & Jessner, U. (2013). Mehrsprachigkeitsunterricht aus mehrsprachiger Sicht: Zur Förderung des metalinguistischen Bewusstseins. In: Vetter, E. (Ed.), Professionalisierung für sprachliche Vielfalt. Perspektiven für eine neue Lehrerbildung (pp.111-148). Baltmannsweiler: Schneider Verlag Hohengehren. Bos, W. & Gröhlich, C. (Eds). (2010). KESS 10 – Kompetenzen und Einstellungen von Schülerinnen und Schülern am Ende der Jahrgangsstufe 8. Münster: Waxmann. Bos, W. & Pietsch, M. (2006). KESS 4 – Kompetenzen und Einstellungen von Schülerinnen und Schülern am Ende der Jahrgangsstufe 4 in Hamburger Grundschulen. Hamburger Schriften zur Qualität im Bildungswesen, Band 1. Münster: Waxmann. Brohy, C. (2001). Generic and/or specific advantages of bilingualism in a dynamic plurilingual situation: The case of French as official L3 in the school of Samedan (Switzerland). International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 4(1), 38–49. Cenoz, J. (2003). The additive effect of bilingualism on third language acquisition: A review. International Journal of Bilingualism 7(1), 71–87. Council of Europe (1998). Recommendation No. R (98) 6 of the Committee of Ministers on Modern Languages. Strasbourg: Council of Europe. European Council (2001). Gemeinsamer europäischer Referenzrahmen für Sprachen: lernen, lehren, beurteilen. Berlin u. a.: Langenscheidt. Online: http://www.goethe.de/referenzrahmen (12.12.09) Goebel, K., Rauch, D. & Vieluf, S. (2011). Leistungsbedingungen und Leistungsergebnisse von Schülerinnen und Schülern türkischer, russischer und polnischer Herkunftssprachen. Zeitschrift für Interkulturellen Fremdsprachenunterricht. Didaktik und Methodik im Bereich Deutsch als Fremdsprache, 16(2), 50-65. Haenni Hoti, A., Heinzmann, S., Müller, M., Wicki, W., Oliveira, M. & Werlen, E. (2011). Introducing a second foreign language in Swiss primary schools: The effect of L2 listening and reading skills on L3 acquisition. International Journal of Multilingualism, 8(2), 98-116. Klieme, E. (2006). Zusammenfassung zentraler Ergebnisse der DESI-Studie. Retrieved March 31, 2009, from Frankfurt a. M., Deutsches Institut für Internationale Pädagogische Forschung Website: http://www.dipf.de/desi/DESI_Ausgewaehlte_Ergebnisse.pdf Lenz, P., Studer, T. / BKZ, EDK-Ost & NWEDK (Eds). (2007). Lingualevel. Instrumente zur Evaluation von Fremdsprachenkompetenzen 5. bis 9. Schuljahr. Bern: Schulverlag blmv. Rauch, D.P., Jurecka, A. & Hesse, H.-G. (2010). Für den Drittsprachenerwerb zählt auch die Lesekompetenz in der Herkunftssprache. Untersuchung der Türkisch-, Deutsch- und Englisch-Lesekompetenz bei Deutsch-Türkisch bilingualen Schülern. Zeitschrift für Pädagogik, 56, 55. Beiheft: 78-100. Sanz, C. (2000). Bilingual education enhances third language acquisition: Evidence from Catalonia. Applied Psycholinguistics, 21, 23-44. Van Gelderen, A., Schoonen, R., Glopper, K. de, Hulstijn, J., Snellings, P., Simis, A., & Stevenson, M. (2003). Roles of linguistic knowledge, metacognitive knowledge and processing speed in L3, L2 and L1 reading comprehension: A structural equation modeling approach. International Journal of Bilingualism, 7(1), 7–25.
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