Dr Kerry Taylor-Leech researches early childhood education in an English-Samoan bilingual preschool
Early childhood is an important period in the physical, social, emotional, cognitive and linguistic development of a child. To support child development during that period, care for young children has been increasingly professionalized and moved out of the family and into preschools. Formal early childhood education, particularly in the year or two before entering primary, is widely considered to enhance school readiness. Overall, preschool is assumed to be beneficial for educational success.
But how does institutional childcare affect bilingual families? Most of what we know about early childhood bilingualism comes from research conducted with families where one or both parents are not only the main caregivers but also the main providers of linguistic input.
What happens to bilingual development when young children spend a significant amount of their time in institutional childcare is still an under-researched field. One reason it is under-researched is that it is rare. Where it does not exist and where childcare is through the medium of the dominant language we know that the minority language loses out early, even in institutions and contexts that ostensibly value diversity.
Against this background any form of bilingual childcare is to be welcomed. But how do they actually work?
Bilingual signage in the a’oga amata (Image credit: Kerry Taylor-Leech)
In this week’s Lecture in Linguistic Diversity, Dr Kerry Taylor-Leech from Griffith University addressed precisely this question for an English-Samoan bilingual preschool program in Queensland. The preschool, or a’oga amata in Samoan, was established in 2018 in Logan City, and the researcher and her colleagues followed the children in the program for seven months.
Although designed as an early bilingual immersion program, English dominated as medium of communication. Samoan was mostly used symbolically: it was on display in the preschool’s linguistic landscape and was used to greet, thank and praise children.
Dr Taylor-Leech explained that the main reason for the relatively limited presence of Samoan was that not all children in the room were of Samoan heritage and even those who were did not necessarily speak the language. In fact, one mother reported that, as a result of attending the program, her four-year-old daughter was more proficient in Samoan than she was herself.
Parents valued the program very much. Even more than the language, they valued that their children were oriented to Samoan values of usitai, faaaloalo, alofa and tautua – obedience, respect, love and service. In addition to providing the children with a sense of cultural belonging and a positive affirmation of their Samoan identity, the program also succeeded in enhancing the children’s school readiness.
While the program was highly successful with regard to cultural affirmation and preparation for mainstream education, it was not so successful with regard to bilingual proficiency. Because English was the dominant language in the program, the children’s exposure to Samoan was ultimately limited. Furthermore, as the presenter explained, there was no program available that would continue to support Samoan after the children had transitioned to primary school.
Bilingual childcare by Dr Victoria Benz (Multilingual Matters, 2017)
To me, the bilingual development – or rather lack thereof – in this Queensland a’oga amata sounded uncannily similar to that in the Sydney-based English-German bilingual childcare center studied by Victoria Benz. This researcher observed a number of asymmetries between the two languages – with regard to teaching practices, material resources and student proficiencies – all of which resulted in the predominance of English in this ostensibly bilingual childcare center.
If you are up-to-date with your 2019 Language on the Move Reading Challenge, you will have read the full study, the gripping sociolinguistic ethnography Bilingual Childcare: Hitches, Hurdles and Hopes, in May.
Dr Benz also found that the predominance of English was further assured by the policy environment and the attitudes of parents and teachers. Unwittingly, these meant that the two languages were pitted against each other. Even more problematically, the goals of developing bilingual proficiency and ensuring school readiness were conceptualized as in conflict with each other because when we talk about “literacy” in Australia we mean “literacy in English” and in English only.
That school readiness and bilingual proficiency are currently conceived as incompatible was also confirmed in another study investigating parental attitudes towards bilingual childrearing conducted by Livia Gerber and myself.
As long as our education system is based on an artificial tension between bilingualism and educational success, it is hard to see how even the most well-intentioned bilingual early childhood programs can actually support the aspirations of bilingual families.
References
Benz, Victoria. 2017a. Bilingual Childcare: Hitches, Hurdles and Hopes. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
Benz, Victoria. 2017b. Bilingual parenting in the early years. Language on the Move
Piller, Ingrid. 2015. Paying lip-service to diversity. Language on the Move
Piller, Ingrid, and Livia Gerber. 2018. “Family language policy between the bilingual advantage and the monolingual mindset.” International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
Vaá, Unasa LF. 2009. “Samoan custom and human rights: An indigenous view.” Victoria U. Wellington L. Rev. 40:237
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What an insightful article! I was raised in a bilingual household where English and Filipino are spoken. I usually talk to the people around me in Filipino while I always watch television in English. I think this had brought advantages when I started schooling since the medium of instruction is in English. Though my mother tongue is Filipino, I still have difficulties writing using the language. By the time I reached college, I had learned more about Mother-Tongue Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE). This learning mode should be immediately implemented since it is essential that children also focus on their mother tongue. If MTB-MLE had been implemented before, I might have been more proficient in both languages compared to now.
I grew up speaking three languages by the time I was 5 years old. Later it did help solidify my fluency in these languages when i also had to study those as part of my school work. I attribute the ease i experienced while learning these languages formally to the fact that I was able to speak and understand this from my personal experiences. Even though I did not go to a childcare center, I did spend quite some time with neighbors who spoke these other languages, and that increased my fluency.
In this day and age the more languages you know the better it is. I wish I was raised in a bilingual home where I learnt more than English. However, the case where languages seem to be fighting each other does not seem rational. Both can exist and be respected. However, it can be observed in many cases that children are more fluent in English than their mother tongue as the spend most of their time in school where English is the medium of instruction.
It is better for children to be bilingual, but that should not affect their mother tongue. In my opinion, I think that children in preschool have to focus on their first language because it is important for them even if they are not live their country. And after the school they can be bilingual; because they have managed their mother tongue first.
Hi, Ingrid. Thank you for sharing the article. Bilingual education is widely appreciated by household in my home country. Young children have a better ability to learn a new language than adults. Many parents let their children learn the second language from the preschool. I have the experience to be a teaching assistant in the English class in preschool in my country. In my experience, children learn and practice English in the school, but they seldom use it in the home with their family. As a result, some children cannot speak the mother tongue or the second language fluently. Bilingual education is beneficial to young children but the education system and family education may improve the weakness of bilingual education.
Thank you for this interesting post which has been one of the most concerning topics within the realm of linguistic. To me, it’s kind of a paradox for those children who were born to be bilingual since they have to acquire their second language to fulfill their development in the foreign living environment and are, at the same time, asked to keep their traditional mother-tongue. Therefore, it will be a huge responsibility for childhood workers to help these children to overcome their language challenges through a dedicated learning curriculum with positive communication approaches and appropriate learning activities.
Last week I had met my friend’s family including his five years old son who is regularly attending Australian preschool classes in Sydney since his age of three. The family wants him to speak Nepali so that he can continuously be connected with Nepali culture, Nepali language, and heritage. They have restricted to speak English at home but still, this child prefers and feels comfortable to speak English. Interestingly, whenever I asked a question about his school experience in English, he corrected my question and answer the question in Nepali. His Nepali was also perfect. Then I asked him “Why did you answer my question in Nepali?’ He answered me ‘…my mother doesn’t understand English and she may feel bored if we talk in English.” Oh!!! fantastic… I spent almost two decades to learn English still I feel that I have to do more for perfection in English speaking but this five-years child’s English speaking was not only fluent but also syntactically correct. Then I realized that the bilingual childcare environment is the boon for learning languages; a child can easily learn the family language as well the language that is used outside the home especially school.
It is a popular trend that children learn in bilingual languages. It can help students to think in different language ways and learn more culture. In addition, for example, a Chinese child who is born and growing up in an English-speaking country, learning Chinese can help that child to improve the sense of belonging (China), and learning English can help to live in that country.
For my personal experience, it is true that children, at one point, will focus on the dominant language and abandon another language. I found that this study of bilingual in child development is a good start point. Even though the research is still on process of improving, considering about how can we develop the curriculum and teaching design can be one interesting point. As I have friends who are Chinese-American, most of them are fluent in both Chinese and English. They admitted that being fluent in both language helps them to build their career path. If that is the case, by studying this project allows us to learn more and improve the teaching-learning program for children.
Thank you for sharing the article. I have noticed an interesting phenomenon for the second generation of immigrants in Australia. Most of the younger generation are using the dominant language – Australian English to communicate with their parents while most of their parents are using their own mother tongue rather than Australian English to communicate. In fact, most of immigrants were trying to educate their children bilingually (teaching them both their mother tongue and English) when their kids were young. The younger generation used to be good at two languages in their early age. However, when they started to go to primary school, they were gradually losing their mother tongue as they did not need their mother tongue to communicate as frequently as before. Eventually they became not even willing to communicate with their family in their mother tongue. In other words, although the parents are intentionally providing the environment for their children to acquire two languages, without the support from the school and society, this kind of bilingual program seems to be ineffective and superficial.
Thank you for sharing. Before arriving in Australia, i do not have much experience and ideas about bilingual children in preschool. I am living with my uncle’s family in Australia and my cousin, who is 5 years old and he is in preschool now. He speaks mandarin at home because we all speak mandarin and his parents are not good at English, and he speaks English at his school. In fact, according to my observation, it is more difficult for him to express meaning in Chinese. He often talks with me in both Chinese and English because sometimes he does not know how to express his feelings or describe items in Chinese. In the future, i think English may be totally replace Chinese for him. From this affair, context and environment are important for children in preschool. For my cousin, he just uses mandarin at home, but others he talks with are all speaking English. As a result, English is much easier for him to understand. But it is obviously that attitudes and guidance from parents and preschools are very crucial for bilingual children. The combination of multiple language for children is beneficial for their future development.
Thank you Ingrid for your discussion of a literacy issue that is continuously concerning bilingual families and educational policy makers in countries with high proportion of immigrants like Australia. As given an opportunity to work as a tutor and caregiver in Australian primary educational contexts, I completely understand how the tension of academic developments conflicts with the bilingual literacy aspiration of immigrant parents. Despite being provided with early linguistic support in mother tongue from parents and childcare centers and in fact, the proficient linguistic skills obtained by each child by the time of their first school year, these students struggle to continue developing their bilingual skills and gradually shift to the English competency completely. Some students are lucky if their native language is a dominant one which is used by a large community or surrounded by a large number of speakers in that language such as Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese. However, other students of minority languages like Samoan as mentioned might have more limitations in continuing their parental language literacy practices in later years. This calls out for more innovative policy in improving kids’ literacy in mother tongue to preserve these ethnic languages.
Thank you for your interesting article. In my opinion, all children, whether bilingual or monolingual, need a high quality, language-rich environment and opportunities to use language to communicate and connect within social situations. A child’s first language, the language of home, is vital for a child to feel connected to their family, culture, and heritage. We need to recognize bilingualism as a gift to be nurtured and understand that language development needs to be viewed holistically and across all languages. Language immersion is the quickest and easiest way for children to learn a second language. If we provide a rich language environment with quality models of vocabulary and opportunities to practice, bilingual children will develop proficiency in the language of instruction given time.
This article highlights the importance of bilingualism in childhood. In preschool age children can learn different language and this age is perfect to teach bilingualism. Nowadays there are bilingual preschools every where in the world, for example in Nepal English became compulsory subject it is because each children has to learn English in their childhood. Multilingual or bilingual education policy in Australia is very good because it makes children perfect in multi language. I also came from bilingual background, from primary level my teacher taught in multi language (English and Nepali). Hence, bilingualism is good for childhood for their better future.
Personally, I am deeply into the idea of providing bilingual immersion programmes to young children at pre-schools because bilingualism does benefit children a lot (according to to-date studies). To implement them efficaciously, I suppose it requires educators and educational staff much effort and time. As far as I know, in most bilingual programmes, there is always one language – either children’s mother tongue or children’s target language – dominating. For example, the majority of wealth-off families manage to send their young children to international schools where they are educated in both languages including Vietnamese and English; however, all academic subjects at school are delivered in English, resulting in the predominance of English at school. Those children familiarized with English tend to speak their mother tongue – Vietnamese more slowly compared to those enjoying monolingual education. At home, children are encouraged to watch English channels or communicate in English; thus, they gradually develop interest and comfort with English rather than Vietnamese even though they are born Vietnamese.
Hence, from my own angle, education is not only the responsibility of school but also the responsibility of families and the whole society. To make one educational program effective, all should give their hands and support each other.
Bilingualism and multilingualism of a children in school is one of my concern while living in Australia. I have an Australian cousin who is Vietnamese-English bilingual. While Vietnamese is dominantly spoken in his family, his favourite language to use daily is English. His parent told me that although they tried to teach him Vietnamese in his early childhood, he tends to use English for most of the time. Now he forgot a great deal of Vietnamese recently. I am convinced that language used in school could play a key role in school language use of a child.
True story: His parents told me to teach him Vietnamese, but I am his English learner now.
As a child, I never went to pre-school because my parents were new immigrants and the idea of pre-school was foreign to them. My experience as a bilingual person was using Arabic at home with my parents, and learning English from my older cousins when we played together (since they were already at school). I wasn’t fully exposed to English until I was in Kindergarten. My mum tells that back then, I couldn’t speak English too well and I used to point to my shoelaces and just cry when I needed my teacher to tie them for me. And thankfully, I had great teachers in my early school years so I caught up to the desired language proficiency. I think it’s amazing how a child’s language proficiency changes based on exposure and the balance of the 2 (or 3) languages shifts. My condition would’ve probably been worse if I wasn’t exposed to English through playtime with my cousins. Perhaps it would have taken longer for me to learn English then? I consider the playtime I had with my cousins as the “pre-school” I missed out on.
Nevertheless, I do agree that pre-schools hold an important role in preparing children for school, but it shifts the focus of maintaining bilingualism to perfecting the language needed for school education.
Thank you for an interesting post. When I was younger, I was attending a bilingual preschool. Looking back on my education, I thank my parents who educated me as a bilingual. I strongly believe that the language education I received at this school improved both my English and Japanese. However, everything wasn’t a good story. When I just entered this bilingual preschool, I had many difficulties learning both English and Japanese cultural values. I was also caught behind with my Japanese speaking skill. Luckily, I soon caught up with the other Japanese friends but this was the first time I felt isolated due to my language competence. As a student who always had difficulty in both English and Japanese, I do not know if I want to send my future child to a bilingual preschool.
Hi Ingrid, thanks for your insightful post about the tension between bilingualism and ensuring school readiness. The early bilingual immersion program has a positive expectation for improving bilingual proficiency and contributing to children’s future educational success. Although the bilingual program is beneficial for cultural affirmation, I agree that bilingual programs cannot completely develop children’s literacy in mother tongue and laid a solid foundation for their first language development. The reasons are the predominance of English was emphasized by the policy environment, educators and parents, and also there are limited materials and teaching practices towards teaching mother tongue in the childcare institution.
I have little expertise in bilingual education here in Australia; however, in my home country of Vietnam, more and more bilingual kindergartens and schools are popping up, and the proliferation of such institutions seems to offer the youngsters who have access not only to favorable environments for their linguistic development both in the second language (usually English) and their mother tongue but also to an enlightening appreciation of the culture and values associated with the outside world beyond their immediate locality. Despite the potential benefits of bilingual education from an early age, concern does exist among parents regarding the confusion of the two languages in these young minds.
The idea of having a bilingual preschool or childcare is, in my opinion, brilliant despite its following consequences. Educational demand has made English as a compulsory subject to learn since primary stage and as early childhood is the golden time for children to develop their linguistic and cognitive capital, the decision of putting children in a bilingual preschool (e.g. Indonesian and English) can benefit both parents and children in terms of their readiness in the next stages of children’s education. However, since it seems impossible to gain the same amount of exposure and input for each language when the bilingual conception is only applied in children’s preschool, parents should invest more effort into the language less studied. Moreover, the main important point to raise children as bilingual is that the parents should also be bilingual so the preschool program can holistically reach its goal. In several cases in the Indonesian context, children are required to be bilingual; at least in their schools but none of their parents speak English. Therefore, the holistic goal of bilingualism promoted in school is somehow unachieved then the L2 learning ends up to be no more than just learning the language for the test.
As mentioned in the article, early childhood is an important period for supporting bilingual development. At the same time, preschools as an important setting for bilingual development of children due to they spend a significant amount of time in the preschools. Unfortunately, English as the dominant language is used in the vast majority of situations in communication although the second language as a less used language is used in practice. Therefore, these children don’t have many chances to use the second language in preschools. In addition, English is the dominant language because of the policy environment and the attitudes of parents and teachers. These factors are the reasons for limiting the development of children’s bilingualism. These factors include the fewer chances to use the second language in preschools, the limitations of the policy environment, and the attitudes of parents and teachers.
ATTITUDE!
Attitude is everything is an aphorism often heard in the USA, Iuwen: 100%!
Assigning a numerical value to each letter of the English alphabet where ‘a’ equals 1, ‘b’ is 2, and ‘z’ is 26 gives ATTITUDE 100%
Bilingual and International kindergarten and preschool are now ubiquitous in developing countries as parents are well aware of the importance of English to their children’s future. However, normally the parents of such children are not good at English to even know what they are taught at school. Some children can be very good at English but are not able to communicate naturally by their mother tongue. But their parents seem to be happy with that because for them English should be prioritized. By contrast, in Australia, children with immigrant backgrounds are highly encouraged by their parents to learn and speak their mother tongue so that they wont forget their origin. A totally different picture in different countries with different views towards bilingual education.
Bilingual education is also a hot topic in China. As the status of English has increased, more and more parents have recognized the importance of bilingual education. However, most of the parents around 40-50 years old do not have English Beijing. Parents around the age of 30 have a basic level of English but cannot achieve the level of English for their children. Therefore, preschool bilingual education in China is full of problems. The parents’ solution is usually to ask the child for a special teacher to start learning English when the child is very young. But this is not enough. To really get English, you still need family involvement.
Hi Ingrid, Thank you for your interesting post concerning the consquence of early childcare on the chiildren’s language development. I think it is obvious to admit that early education shape the chidren’s linguistic repertoire. Because language learning is the matter of interacting with the available lingustic resources to internalise them. For example, if a child is born in Vietnam, and then he is mostly nurtured by a American nanny, then his linguistic resourses tend to be more English than Vietnamese. So it is the matter of what resources that he interacts with rather than who gives birth to him or where he lives. Hence, I agree with your point that early chidlcare , especially, bilingual education, significantly defines chidren’s later language.
Dee
Bilingual parenting and education have also been a valuable issue in my country, Taiwan. Although English and Mandarin have a significant difference regarding language system and culture awareness, some private preschools have increasingly developed. Some children have acquired English successfully and are able to express their ideas in English because at least one of their parents is educated in an English background. Other children whose parents do not own English-educated background may not involve well in preschool, hence they will attend other public or private preschools which contains no bilingual education. Because Taiwan is a multi-dialectic country, some grandparents may only speak dialects, such as Taiwanese or Hakka, in their family and they may be the main caregivers for the children. Therefore, bilingual preschools are still the minority and are private schools, but the majority of preschools provide a short-time dialect class in order to connect with their family and know our own culture better.
Well, bilingual education is a big topic I wish could be magically fixed; and I agree with you Ingrid that schools are focused mostly on English literacy. I assume it would be a similar story in other coutries with other majority languages, thus is probably not a problem of English as of the system in general. I have spoken to my friends recently about my perception of Aussies (for this purpose any Anglophone person) and their attitude towards bilingualism. I work as an assistant at a local primary school where many children are from bilingual households. Also the staff have various backgrounds, although most of them are from the Anglophone countries (Australia, UK, Canada, USA). The thing I find interesting is that while people in general probably believe that bilingualism is great, once it does not suit them or makes their work life more complicated they dismiss it as something negative (I get to hear comments from my colleagues when they evaluate child’s progress and utterances such as “yeah, they probably don’t speak English at home” or “oh yeah, parents don’t know much English) are quite common sadly. There’s also this fear coming from parents that children will fall behind in English if they are spoken to in a heritage language by their relatives and communities. Having said that, I know a handful of families who did an amazing job raising their children bilingually (some of them are highly proficient in three languages) but then – the responsibility lies mostly with parents, their decision-making, perseverance and resourcefulness because they won’t get much support from the system.
Bilingual development at the early age is an interesting issue as the family migrates to a country that another language is spoken rather than their mother tongue. For example, Vietnamese parents migrate to Australia and their children were born in Australia. Because English is the dominant language here, their children speak English to communicate with others. However, these parents teach children to speak Vietnamese at home and encourage them to use Vietnamese when they meet Vietnamese people as a way of speaking practice. Moreover, some families take their children back to Vietnam on school holiday, so that their children can speak Vietnamese with their relatives and friends naturally. I do not know much about the English – Vietnamese bilingual childcare centers in Australia, but if yes, they should develop because they help children develop their bilingualism while their parents are busy with work. Besides, parents also have their own ways to help children have opportunities to practice language in real life and discover both cultures.
Hi Leo
His Excellency the Honourable Hieu Van Le AC, Governor of South Australia, attained our shores as a refugee from Da Nang about four decades ago. http://governor.sa.gov.au/ He kindly replied in writing to this writer in order to congratulate the Asian-Oceanic Esperanto congress held in his home town about six months ago.
BTW, Da Nang IMO is by far the most Aussie friendly of Vietnam’s big cities, its most beautiful, most clement and easily traversable. https://www.austrade.gov.au/news/latest-from-austrade/2019-latest-from-austrade/vietnam-asia-s-creativity-hub-for-2019 https://hcmc.vietnam.embassy.gov.au/hchi/IntroductionofAVACDaNang.html
The Governor is very approachable and his state in Aussie history is considered avant-garde. Given that his kids faced language issues raised here, maybe he and his dear wife might weigh in with sound advice, or even with helpful contacts, vis-a-vis bilingual education. Open Day at Government House in Adelaide is coming up.
I am deeply touched by this post since my family is trilingual (Spanish-English-Italian) and we have a 3-year-old boy. Initially, when we were looking for a childcare centre for my son our idea was to find a bilingual Spanish-English centre, but we were unsuccessful. The only centre in Sydney that is bilingual in English-Spanish (at least to my knowledge) is “Amigos” located in Glebe. The location of this childcare centre was very inconvenient for our family since it is on the other side of the city from where we live and work, but regardless we were keen to make the effort to drive our son there every day. However, after enquiring further about the program we realized that the Spanish input was minimal. The “school ready program” classes offered in preschool were in English only. The contact with Spanish was left for interactions during meal times and greetings, when the Spanish speaking staff talked to the children in the target language. I asked the school why they devised the program in such a way, and they mentioned that children needed to be ready to enter school in Australia, where the main method of instruction is English. Also, they mentioned that not all children in the centre were of Spanish heritage, and therefore would not understand the content in Spanish.
I find this approach to multilingual education severely tainted of ideological views about language learning. I grew up in Argentina, where bilingual education for middle and upper classes is the norm and children as young as 2 years old are exposed to English instruction. I went to a bilingual school myself, and we used to have Spanish classes in the morning and then English classes in the afternoon. I suppose that in a country like Australia where the main language is English, other languages are given less importance since children grow up speaking the lingua franca of the world. I hope this view of language learning and early childhood education gets reassessed by future researchers and the approach to it changes.
Thank you for sharing such research, Ingrid. As I come from a monolingual country, I can not aware of what difficulties that bilingual students may encounter in their early age. However, studying and living in a multiculture nation like Australia, I can observe that bilingual education is really important. I think that language is an salient evidence of culture and the act of maitaining individuals’ mother tongue as well as the language they use in everyday communication should be treated equally
I think it’s way too hard to have such an ideal of an artificial tension between bilingualism and education success. Because there are different types of bilingual languages (English + something else), policymakers must find it challenging to implement any programs that cater to the needs of various families. It’s even harder to devise a common program for all. This one-size-fits-all program will definitely not address all the aspects that a bilingual family wishes their child to gain. So, it might be better if there are communities where the children can come and immerse themselves in the language and cultural values.
This topic is much relevant to my major-TESOL. Recently I have become a casual early childhood educator in an early childcare organization in Sydney. There are nearly 77 children from 1-5 years old and my duty is to supervise pre-school children, ranging from 3 years old to 5 years old. There are about 30 children in my classroom and many of them are bilingual children or from bilingual families. There is no doubt that English is there first language because they were born in Australia and will live in Australia. As for second language, there are Chinese, German, Spanish, Japanese and so on. Among diverse second languages, Mandarin is spoken frequently. Most bilingual families will use second language to communicate at home and teach their children to speak that language consciously. This childcare institution respect and encourage multi-cultures and language diversity. The staff are from different cultural backgrounds and we are encouraged to communicate with these bilingual children using their second language, which aims to improve the cultural identity of bilingual children. However, the fact is that English is the dominant language for bilingual children to learn and use. Bilingual children may have less opportunities to communicate with others who also speak the same second languages at school.
As you know 2019 is the UN’s International Year of Indigenous Languages. https://en.iyil2019.org/
Less known are UNESCO’s official resolutions in favour of Esperanto in 1954 and 1985 in Sofia and Montevideo: http://lingvo.org/un
We Esperantists are chuffed AND SURPRISED that the UN itself in the last couple of days has granted us a voice which perchance is a turning point. Given the French government’s quashing of Esperanto a century ago at the League of Nations it’s ironic that the same famous venue in Switzerland is deployed again. On ‘the death of Esperanto’ at the Palace of Nations: ‘Later History’, para. 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto#Duolingo
Declaration of The Universal Esperanto Association (UEA)
during the 42nd session of UN
Human Rights Council
Palace of Nations, Geneva, 9-27 September 2019
https://ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/RegularSessions/Session42/Pages/42RegularSession.aspx
Mr. President, representatives of various indigenous peoples and minorities and to all in attendance: Hello, Saluton.
My name is Stefan Keller and I represent the Universal Esperanto Association (UEA), the global organisation of the speakers of the neutral international language, Esperanto.
Our principal objective is to achieve a just means of communication among all the peoples of the world. We hold that achieving the human rights of all persons is impossible unless everyone’s mother tongue is respected. The right to utilise one’s mother tongue should be a fundamental human right.
UNESCO too is rightly emphasising on the occasion of the International Year of Indigenous Languages that the mother tongue plays a crucial role in the everyday life of all people.
Together with all Esperanto speakers in general, our association supports all initiatives in favour of linguistic and cultural diversity.
Therefore, we strongly support the initiative of the Union of Teachers of the State of Oaxaca (‘Ŭahaka’) in Mexico by which English language tuition is to be excluded in favour of learning indigenous mother languages grounded in the history, art and traditions of the local people. We congratulate them on account of said initiative.
Our association is ever alert vis-à-vis bolstering cultural and linguistic diversity which must not be “sacrificed” for an impoverished international means of communicating such as the use of a language by a privileged people as occurs for example with English today.
Thank you for your attention
Stefan Keller for the Universal Esperanto Assoc
Bilingual childhood benefits children a lot. However, these benefits mostly come from family with at least one parent is bilingual. professional pre-school centers are increasingly popular in many countries, where the parents wish to immerse their kids in bilingual environment as early as possible. there are successful examples. But language learning is a long term task that needs to persist and continue. Some children perform well and demonstrate language talent in pre-school learning can not continue their language learning when they enter primary school as most schools can not provide them with bilingual environment. I think it is a challenge for education system in one country rather than an isolate case in one particular school. The education system should be reviewed with regards to providing children with sustainable support on bilingual learning environment from pre-school to primary and secondary school.
Thank you Ingrid for the interesting article.
As you mentioned, in Australia, ‘literacy’ means ‘literacy in English’, and their seems to be this prevailing attitude that in a bilingual household, a child’s English language development needs to be given the highest priority to set them up for success in the education system and into the future. Whilst the idea of bilingualism is generally viewed positively by parents, as covered by your article Livia Gerber, language seems to be viewed primarily as just a ‘commodity’, rather than as an expression of identity and a ‘bridge’ to access other cultures and communities, which to me seems a bit sad. Though I can appreciate that second language proficiency is something someone can add to their ‘repertoire’ to increase their potential ‘economic value’, it should be better acknowledged that bilingual education can benefit a child cognitively as well, as opposed to just something you can throw on a resume. Until bilingualism can be appreciated more for its cognitive and cultural benefits, it seems unlikely that such early childhood education programs in Australia will give the alternative language as much weight as English as a means of communication and self-expression.
Bilingualism being in competition with school readiness, or at least its perception is indeed an obstacle for bilingual proficiency. It all comes down to how much value is placed on bilingualism. Unfortunately, Australia, in my opinion, does not place much significance on it. However, Latin American countries, for example, place immense worth on bilingualism, as it is viewed as a status and economical symbol. So I guess it’s about idiosyncrasy more than anything and what is perceived to be of benefit.
Hi Ingrid. What an interesting topic!
In my hometown, although bilingual families are not as common as they are in Australia (actually they are much more rare!), terms such as “early childhood bilingualism”, “bilingual education” are becoming more popular in recent years. I do agree that early childhood plays a key role in children’s physical, cognitive and linguistic development. I haven’t been in Australia long so I am not familiar with preschool education here. However, in my country, bilingual kindergartens and bilingual schools have been increasingly developed. Equally, parents place great importance on children’s early childhood education, especially English education, so that they tend to send children to such institutes. Although some parents don’t even understand or can’t speak English very well themselves, they are trying to “create” bilingual environment for children.
The idea of bilingual childcare is amazing and really helpful for young children as they have chances to be well equipped with fundamental knowledge before entering primary school where English is seen as the mainstream language. In my country, there are also some preschool programs, however, their mother tongue is still the key using language. To me it is pretty difficult to make it balance between teaching on the students’ first language and other target languages. It would be better if children are proficient in the one they will continue studying in the future.
Hi everyone,
Bilingualism has been an interesting aspect in Applied Linguistics study and we all have known the benefits of bilingualism in terms of cognitive development and also recognision of own identity. It’s indispansable that parents whose children are raised in bilingual environment wish to make their children speak their native language. But if a child learns 2 languages at the same time, it is tend to one languages becomes dominant and it is usually English because of its influence and strength in the society. In my view, acquaring two languages is real benefit and it can be used as financial benefit as I’ve known many people who earn money using bilingualism. Thus, parents shouldn’t give to get children acquire their native language and strive to speak in that language at least.
Thanks for reading 🙂
Hi Ingrid,
Thanks for your sharing. I can’t make any comments because I don’t know much about early education in Australia, but I can give an example of my country. I worked in a preschool in China for a while. In order to better grasp the golden period of children’s language learning, bilingual learning is added to the curriculum of preschool. However, in fact, bilingual courses do not improve children’s bilingual ability very well, not only because the courses only teach some simple basic languages, such as greetings, thanks, Numbers, but also because the courses are very short, most of which are mainly in mandarin.
Coming from a vastly diverse and multilingual nation I have witnessed the discrepancies Dr. Taylor- Leech speaks of firsthand. What I would like to know, is how do we approach building a bilingual education system in developed countries that have an innumerable amount of languages and cultures to adhere to? How do we even begin building schools which adhere to Hispanic culture, and the number of languages that fall under that umbrella, such as Mexican-Spanish, Dominican-Spanish, and Cuban Spanish? Each culture contains its own linguistic nuances that are vital to their spoken languages. How would be approach this if we needed to build schools for students whose parents were French-speaking? Or Polish? Or German? Where do we build them, and how do we find the resources to staff them? How do we ensure each school has the proper skillsets, teachers which proper academic and cultural proficiency and who speak in the correct dialect? Most of all, how do we economically support these schools while simultaneously pushing for more, in countries where hundreds of languages and cultures are experienced by millions of individuals all with different levels of literacy, interests, and personal experiences? All of who will need or want some level of fluency in their native tongue as well as English, and who will all have the ability to make an argument as to why the funding for such schools should be for them and not for others. Qualitative studies are useful because they show us the gaps in our research and locate a niche in something that needs to be addressed, but at some point, we have to start answering these questions from the perspective of a nation. A very diverse one. How do we begin a conversation about bilingual education to a country with millions of citizens all asking the same questions, but in a hundred different languages?
I believe that bilingual education at an early age is of value. I have so far interacted with a number of Vietnamese-Australian-born local friends in Sydney. They says that each summer break, they often send their kids (who are often 4-5 years old) back to Vietnam (their home country) so that the grandparents can raise them and help them exposed to not only Vietnamese language but also Vietnamese culture. And they all admit that this method is really beneficial in that their children can acquire a number of communication skills when interacting with their Vietnamese peers. When the children came back to Vietnam, it could be noticed that their Vietnamese improved significantly. So, I do not think that bilingual education at institutions is as advantageous as in real-life social interactions.
I think that it would be very difficult for this problem to be resolved. It is not only a problem of preschool but also of the whole education system. The education system itself has to realize the needs of the society where it functions, and in a society where English is dominant, it is questionable whether efforts and resources should be allocated equally to the teaching of all languages that are used there. Meanwhile, the tension in preschool seems to be multi-dimensional rather than binary because children are also taught things like life skills or survival skills that are not for future academic success nor bilingual proficiency. With a lot of skills and knowledge to taught within limited amount of time, it is important to prioritize those that the students need the most.
Jamie has correctly identified that the education system itself needs a change of direction. Just how one goes about that in a polite but firm fashion is rather difficult given that the greatest beneficiaries of the status quo and the most talented communicators re matters pedagogical gain their livelihoods, at least in part, because of their professional skills in English and their ability to use it for teaching kids in a liberal and multi-cultural society every language under the sun.
Sadly, methinks we’ve missed a golden opportunity recently:
The Gillard government’s 700-page White Paper outlining policy toward 2025 – Australia in the Asian Century (chapter 6.2) – calls on the nation’s schools to start emphasising Bahasa Indonesian, Hindi, Japanese and Mandarin which are to receive “government funding of foundation courses in priority Asian languages.” “All Australian students will have the opportunity, and be encouraged, to undertake a continuous course of study in an Asian language…All students will have access to at least one priority Asian language…” Though not stated directly the policy Paper implies, by recommending Asian languages for Aussie kids, that English is hardly the lingua franca fait accompli for the whole of Asia as opined in some circles. That Arabic’s widespread usage in Asia and as the number one second or LOTE language in Australia’s largest city is not included among other Asian languages worthy of Australian government financial support, indicates too, that more consultation is needed.
Much more than a mere commercial equation, a knack long enjoyed among many advocates for the language of Shakespeare, is acknowledged in Julia’s stance. And, given, sadly, over many decades, poor pedagogic outcomes here teaching French, Italian, Latin etc. in a historically Eurocentric land, time will reveal, I feel, a more attainable solution in the Baha’i principle of one universally agreed upon or universally accepted universal auxiliary language. As Utopian as that sounds to many an academic, it’s by discussing said principle and recommending it to the UN that we’ll exit Babel at long last. BTW, I’m not such an Esperanto-tragic that I’m opposed to the English language being selected by the UN or the EU (or our parliament) for every school in question. It’s discussion on the auxlang principle itself, whatever is best for all children, that is long overdue.
I don’t know much about the true nature of bilingual education in Australia and here in Sydney specifically to make a valid judgment, but most (if not all) of those Vietnamese-Australian people I’ve come across, who are supposed to share the same L1 with me (which is Vietnamese), find it more comfortable for them to communicate in English. They admit using Vietnamese at home, but only with a limited range of daily vocabulary, and that is partly because their parents are (or might be) not very effective communicators in English. From those I know, I found out that some families, while taking their children to English-speaking schools like all others, let the kids go to Vietnamese schools at the same time to acquire literacy in the language at a very young age. Interestingly, parents who are more proficient in English try to make their kids speak Vietnamese at home, while those with less proficiency in English tend to use more English with their children. I think this somehow reflects the parents’ perception of bilingual education and they do play a significant role in their children’s progress in acquiring proficiency in both languages. However, I feel concerned about whether the children are willing to learn both languages when they identify themselves as a native English speaker and see English as their L1, and whether those parents’ efforts turn out to over-pressurise their children in their very early years of education.
Bilingualism has always been an area of interest during my studies in linguistics. I have a few thoughts regarding this post, however as I am not an expert or have any personal experience with bilingualism at an early age, these are just personal thoughts.
My first thought is that bilingual education would be extremely beneficial, not only for native-like competency in the language, but for cultural identity and belonging. An example that is in line with this is my partner, he grew up speaking Tongan and English both at home and at his daycare. Although he was born in Australia, I believe his sense of self, and Tongan pride is incredibly strong because of this experience.
Secondly, a part of me agrees with Judy in the comment below, in that perhaps a naturalistic setting would be more appropriate for learning pragmatics, as well as language appropriate to various real-life situations. On the other hand, bilingual education could provide the child the opportunity to become more of a balanced bilingual, that is of course only if the parents or caregivers provide sufficient language support outside of schooling as well.
I also believe that such bilingual programs would have to continue into the later years of schooling in order to be optimal for bilingual language development.
I have actually doubted the value of bilingual education since the age of preschool because despite the benefits for acquiring more natural pronunciation as many studies show, I feel it is the best to learn a language in a naturalistic setting rather than in a classroom setting. Classroom settings have limitation in terms of pragmatic aspects in a sense that naturalistic settings have more various situations in our daily lives. Besides, children would feel the culture and the language more of their identity when they are naturally exposed to the environment where their family are using the language around them.
In my opinion, bilingual programs for preschool study support children a lot. The asymmetries between two linguistic systems will become foundation knowledge for children when they grow up. The linguistic input of each language, such as in my mother tongue Vietnamese and the L2 English, will create comparison in linguistics that comes from inside the the consciousness of the children. Because language and culture are inseparable so the preschool bilingual acquisition will expand curiosity and allow children to question and wonder more, then they will make an effort to solve out their own questions. Little by little, thinking and self solving skills will become autonomy in learning which is precursor for further study career. In general, diversity in bilingual preschool study brings linguistic input to children, cultivate creativity and curiosity to make comparison between two worlds of cultures, or even more such as three or four or multicultural interactions among people. However, preschool level should not be too much complex, but stop at entry level to enhance the perception about the existence of objects’ names, stories, songs, colors and animated children films, manual drawings.
Hi everyone,
I think the parents should learn and teach their children how to speak and write in their mother tongue because it is still their mother tongue even if they born and raise in another country. In other words, the language and its culture are still a part of the child’s identity, which they should be proud of. I appreciate the institutions that take initiatives for bilingual programs like the one mentioned in this article, and hope that there are more bridging programs available for higher educational levels as well.
It is my conviction that bilingual education is effective for children at the early age. I am living with my uncle’s family in Australia. I perceive that although my cousins were born in Australia, they speak Vietnamese very well. To meet my curiosity, I asked my uncle about the reason why his children are good at speaking Vietnamese. He revealed that he taught them how to speak Vietnamese when they were young; moreover, he always requires them to use Vietnamese at home or when communicating with their grandparents, relatives via mobile phones. Furthermore, he stated that this way assists his children in reaping an array of communicative skills in Vietnamese successfully. Therefore, I think that apart from the positive effects from bilingual education at institutions, getting exposure to real-life interactions in the society will help children acquire their language learning easily and effectively.
As usual, it is an interesting article and the education system is full of flaws but what is a possible solution? I don’t have any knowledge or expertise in this area to make any useful comment on such a topic and would rather read an expert discussion than write a novice comment. I fully believe that development of bilingualism is extremely powerful on learning and growth – as is music education – but with limited time in school and in the day, it is not surprising that other areas take priority that are seen as more “essential” in todays world and for what will be needed in a child’s future to be competitive in that world. Perhaps it’s the parents that need to take the greater initiative – not the education system.
After reading Professor Piller’s post three times, pondering on the informative information and discussing it with one of my work colleagues earlier today I decided to do some extra reading on bilingualism and families. One major question Professor Piller raised sparked my curiosity about how institutional childcare affects bilingual parents.
The subject is fascinating and the quick aptitude of very young children and even toddlers learning another language reveals their ability to speak and understand both L1 and L2 has in the past often been dismissed as impossible to achieve. Unfortunately, both parents and teachers have frequently raised their concerns that “bilingualism could lead to language delay, the mixing of languages, and the inability to speak either language well” (Chumak-Horbatsch, 2008; Schwartz et a., 2011).
However, significant research reveals important advantages at being bilingual at an early age, including: “cognitive flexibility, metalinguistic awareness, and executive functioning skills” (Genesee, 2008; Lauchland, Parisi & Fadda, 2012; Poulin-Dubois, Blaye, Coutya & Bialystok, 2011; Yoshida, 2008).
According to Rodriguez (2015:178), parents who are not consistently enforcing the second language within the home have difficulty with their child grasping the importance of using it. Contentious issues are faced by parents in regards to motivating their child or children to make use of the desired second language due to the main language in the culture they are living in is being used in the childcare institution as well as by other children influencing their child to use the main language spoken in that given country’s culture. In other words, often the second language is overshadowed by the main language both at the childcare institution and at home by older siblings.
Analyzing reports and investigations on how parents use strategies to encourage their child to learn the second language showed that the results pointed to the childcare institutions and those working at them needed to further promote, acknowledge and lead by example by accepting and respecting the second language in order for the children to gain a positive attitude in using the L2.
The literature indicates that parents often play a vital role in raising their child bilingually, but simultaneously the childcare institute has key responsibility in ensuring the child has sufficient input in understanding the L2 and using it.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1085717.pdf
Thank you for the great article, Ingrid! I am an Early Years Teacher at the Russian Language School on the Gold Coast. We start teaching Russian from 2 years old and immerse children both in culture and language. If you are interested, you are more than welcome to observe and discuss our programs and materials. We are working hard towards establishing a bilingual kindergarten group for the kids with Russian heritage as well. It is in our plans and dreams:))
Sounds brilliant! Best wishes and keep up the good work!
‘There’s the rub’ in Ingrid’s candid closing paragraph and here too: ‘there was no program available that would continue to support Samoan after the children had transitioned to primary school.’
An aside: About 15 years ago the Esperanto society of NZ employed me to teach Dr Zamenhof’s auxlang in Apia and Pago Pago, pr: pango pango.
(Somerset Maugham’s depiction in ‘Rain’ is A1)
Dichotomies, trichotomies and so on around language pedagogy exist in that former German colony because American Samoa is much richer than the independent country, Samoa, and so are the professional classes. Anglo-American Samoans seem overly represented in the latter.
My Esperanto classes in both capitals really amused me: By chance it was mainly white Baha’is who came to class at the Baha’i centre in Apia – with their books, pencils and screens etc. https://www.bahaisamoa.ws/ They sat down in an orderly fashion in a modern setting and waited for lessons on grammar, pronunciation etc. The emulative m-o! Outcomes were so so.
In Pago Pago it just so happened that my students were all indigenous Samoans. They brought to class ukuleles and their fine singing voices. They even had me moving around on the ‘dance floor’. The creative m-o that they deployed taught me a thing or two and resulted in better outcomes
This is important research. Thank you! I don’t understand, but I’ve observed that languages are often set in competition with each other in the West. In simplified terms, speaking non – native English indicates a deficiency to be cured, while the lamest attempt at any other language indicates intelligence. Bilingualism is considered a hindrance to English mastery.
It is a popular trend that children learn in bilingual languages. It can help students to think in different language ways and learn more culture. In addition, for example, a Chinese child who is born and growing up in an English-speaking country, learning Chinese can help that child to improve the sense of belonging (China), and learning English can help to live in that country.