The role of immigrants has become increasingly important in the developed countries’ population structure. The integration of immigrants into the society requires among other things education of the younger generations, which creates possibilities for succeeding in future work life. However, students’ immigrant background has in research often been associated with weaker educational achievement, which poses problems also for educational equality. The PISA studies have revealed that in international comparison, the difference between students with immigrant background and the native students is among the largest in Finland. It has been speculated that immigrant students’ lacking skills in the language of teaching could be reflected on their performance also in other areas of assessment, but there is only little evidence supporting this claim. Schnepf (2007) compared the differences between native and immigrant students in 10 countries based on PISA, TIMMS and PIRLS data, showing that in the USA, continental Europe and the UK, the performance gaps were largely explained by lacking language skills. However, there is little previous research on the relationship between the language utilisation rate and performance in assessments. Many studies support the hypothesis that language utilisation rate at home and with peers is associated with better learning outcomes (Brenneman, Morris & Israelian 2007; Dronkers & van der Velden 2013; Hannover et al. 2013; Levels, Dronkers & Kraaykamp 2008), but some studies have not found a link between them (Agirdag, Jordens & van Houtte 2014; Agirdag & Vanlaar 2016).

The aim of this study was to explore the effect of Finnish language utilisation rate on mathematics performance for immigrant students in Finland. The research questions were:

1.     Do native students and students with immigrant background differ from each other in the mathematical thinking and reading, and the time spent on tasks?

2.     How does the Finnish language utilisation rate explain the mathematical thinking performance of students with immigrant background, when their reading skills, time spent on tasks and gender are taken into account?

We used the data from one large municipality in Finland (N=942). We assessed 6th grade students’ performance in reading and mathematical thinking. We asked students which languages they used with their parents and siblings, and calculated language utilisation rate index based on the answers. Students’ reading skills were assessed by a curricular test developed by professionals working on the national curricular sample-based assessments. The items were first scored as correct/incorrect, and the total score was transformed into percentages of correctly solved items. Mathematical thinking was measured by an adaptive test consisting of two types of items. After four anchor items, the test adapted to students' performance level by selecting more difficult or easier items from a large item bank calibrated on earlier data from more than 10 000 students using Item Response Modelling. The test ended when the predefined accuracy rate was reached, or the student had completed 20 items. An estimate of the students' proficiency level was calculated and rescaled to a scale, in which 500 points was the average performance level in the calibration data. We analysed the results using multiple-group linear regression models in Mplus 8.0.

The results show that children of international families (2,5 generation), and native students performed clearly better in adaptive mathematical thinking tasks than 1st and 2nd generation immigrant students. In contrast to previous research, the Finnish language utilisation rate did not predict their results in the test. The strongest predictor of mathematical thinking was the time spent on tasks, followed by reading skills. In group analyses, reading skills predicted mathematical thinking only for the native students and 2nd generation immigrant students. In terms of reading skills, it is noteworthy that the level of proficiency in the language of instruction has been found to be related to mathematical competence, but in this study, reading predicted mathematical thinking only in some subgroups. In the future, it would be important to delve deeper into the underlying causes of the performance gap to promote equal opportunities for students with immigrant background in Finnish society. The results of this study suggest that the Finnish language utilisation rate is not related to mathematical thinking skills. In the future, more attention should be paid to the importance of peer learning in language learning, for example by examining the relationship between the use of Finnish with friends and the ability of students with immigrant background in different subjects. Such an approach would help to get a broader picture of the relationship between language utilisation rate and learning outcomes. This study was relevant because it added to the knowledge on the relationship between language utilisation rate and learning outcomes. The results also confirmed the view that time spent on tasks is a stronger explanatory factor than the mere level of proficiency in the language of instruction in school.

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