Second-Language Literacy Instruction
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ll students come to school What is the International Reading SECOND- with strengths in their home Association’s position on second- language. Ideally literacy in- language literacy instruction? LANGUAGE struction builds on those Because of the prevalence of second-language lit- strengths.A The challenge for schools oc- eracy instruction, and because the consequences of Literacy curs when students’ home language is not learning to read are significant, the International Reading Association takes the following position Instruction not the language of schooling. on second-language literacy instruction. In the United States between 1986 Literacy learning is easiest when schools pro- A Position vide initial literacy instruction in a child’s home lan- Statement of the and 1998, the number of children with guage. Such instruction is consistent with building limited English ability rose from 1.6 mil- on children’s strengths and with connecting unfa- miliar material to the familiar to maximize learning International lion to 9.9 million. By the year 2050, the efficiency. Literacy skills developed in the home Reading percentage of children in the United language can then be applied to learning to read and write in a second language, which results in Association States who arrive at school speaking a students who have become literate and gained pro- language other than English will reach ficiency in two (or perhaps more) languages. Proficiency in the dominant language is the 40% (Lindholm-Leary, 2000). Many of goal of language and literacy instruction, and bilin- these second-language speakers of gualism or multilingualism is desirable. Families have the right to decide whether initial literacy in- English will also come from back- struction is delivered in the dominant language or grounds of poverty, have parents with the home language. Where such a choice is not feasible, the right of the child to choose to be bilin- low levels of education, and attend gual, bicultural, and biliterate, or monolingual, schools in urban and rural areas that monocultural, and monoliterate must be honored and respected. are plagued by limited resources, insuf- ficient numbers of certified teachers, What are some of the considera- and poor physical structures. tions to make when determining policy on second-language Although the increasing numbers learning? of children who do not speak the lan- The accumulated wisdom of research in the field of guage of schools is a relatively recent bilingualism suggests that while initial literacy learn- phenomenon in the United States, ing in a second language can be successful, it is riskier than starting with the child’s home lan- around the world many children arrive guage—especially for those children affected by at school speaking home languages dif- poverty, low levels of parental education, or poor schooling (Snow, Burns, & Griffin, 1998). ferent from the language of schooling. However, providing excellent initial literacy in- In fact, worldwide, bilingual and multi- struction to second-language learners is more com- plex than these brief paragraphs suggest. There is lingual speakers outnumber monolin- no single or simple solution to guarantee the suc- gual speakers (Tucker, 1999). cess of second-language readers and writers. Families of second-language backgrounds may have language policy for initial education and made the United States, the role of the federal govern- differing preferences in relation to initial literacy English the sole medium of instruction at all levels ment is to provide guidance and resources, not instruction. For instance, some families may want in state schools. This was done in the name of policy and curriculum. The federal government pro- initial literacy instruction to be delivered in the racial integration and nation building. vides only 7% of schools’ funding, and the rest of home language, while others may prefer initial liter- The situation in England has generally been the money and most decisions come from the state acy instruction to be delivered in the school’s domi- characterized by a feasibility approach. A survey in or local level. This means that in Canada and the nant language. the schools of inner London in the early 1980s re- United States, many policies coexist, and there is no In addition, the possibilities for providing initial vealed that over 150 languages other than English coherent national pattern of second-language litera- literacy instruction in the child’s home language are were spoken as first language by at least one child cy instruction in either country. dependent on local, state or provincial, and (see Gorman et al., 1988, 1991, and earlier reports The thrust of education policies in many Asian national policies that determine the language of cited there). Most of these languages had very few nations is toward children becoming literate in mul- schooling. The formulation of these policies is com- speakers, and the speakers of some of those with tiple languages. Hong Kong shares this notion and plex. The relative proportions of language groups significant numbers were too widely dispersed to considers English an important second language in the populations, the political and economic sta- make home-language provision practicable (for ex- (Ng, 1999). According to Yu (1999), “English is a tus of the various language groups, and the history ample, Greek and Turkish). Some areas did and do compulsory subject in the primary and secondary of the various language groups all influence the se- have substantial concentrations of speakers of par- curriculum and proficiency in English has always lection of language for initial literacy instruction. ticular languages (these tend to be South Asian been a ladder to success.” Thousands of young chil- The following examples suggest some of the di- languages, especially Punjabi and Bengali). Home- dren are exposed to English language lessons in al- mensions of the complexity. language provision in these circumstances would most every Hong Kong preschool classroom. Kenya became independent in 1963. There is therefore introduce an element of racial segrega- Teaching English language and literacy is ap- not and never has been a majority language in the tion and could all too easily be interpreted as proached as a curriculum subject. country. There are at least 20 indigenous languages, racist. As a result, language maintenance for all but since colonization by Britain, the official lan- minorities is seen as the responsibility of the vari- guage has been and remains English. Before ous communities. What do these policy examples Kenya’s independence, the initial stages of educa- In Wales, the situation is different. Though the show us about second-language tion were organized on home-language lines. majority of the population (over 80%) are monolin- literacy instruction? Beyond the initial stages, the medium of instruction gual English speakers, the Welsh language has been gradually shifted over to English. Once indepen- spoken since long before the English language exist- All these international examples show that the pro- dent, the new government abolished the home- ed. For this indigenous linguistic minority, there is a vision of home-language education varies from no special provision. Welsh is an equal official language provision to a complete system parallel to the main- with English, and Welsh-medium education is avail- stream; approaches can differ between countries able for all children whose parents want it, includ- with a majority language and those with a mosaic ing monolingual English-speaking parents who want of linguistic groups; and social, political, and eco- their children to have better chances of public-sector nomic concerns are as important to these decisions jobs in Wales, most of which require some com- as the question of what patterns of instruction are mand of Welsh. Welsh-medium education is avail- most effective in producing a literate citizenry. able from preschool up to university level (though In addition, the various language policies are at the higher levels, it is not available in every sub- associated with differences in second-language ject, for practical reasons). readers’ performance. For example, the different In both the United States and Canada, education situations in England and Wales provide valuable policy is set at the state/provincial or local levels. evidence on the effects of home-language versus For example, Saskatchewan Education recently national-language education and its interaction with conducted a needs assessment that identified the socioeconomic status. A series of national surveys numbers and locations of all school-age English of the attainment of English (reading and writing) Second-Language (ESL) Speakers and English of 11- and 15-year-old children was carried out be- Second-Dialect (ESD) speakers. The needs assess- tween 1979 and 1988 (Gorman et al., 1991). In all ment identified issues related to the needs of these these surveys, average literacy attainment was cal- speakers and called for the province to establish an culated separately for first- and second-language ESL/ESD policy (Saskatchewan Education, 2000). In speakers of English, and separately for England and Wales. The results consistently showed significantly schools should offer families choices for initial lit- decide whether initial literacy instruction is deliv- higher average scores for monolingual children eracy instruction. In situations where this is not ered in the dominant language or the