Teachers' Opinions of the Assessment of Sequential Bilinguals for Primary
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Teachers’ opinions of the assessment of sequential bilinguals for primary/specific language impairment in the first years of formal education in Norway Ivana Randjic Master’s Dissertation Department of Special Needs Education Faculty of Educational Sciences UNIVERSITY OF OSLO This dissertation is submitted in part fulfillment of the joint degree of MA/Mgr. Special and Inclusive Education – Erasmus Mundus University of Roehampton, University of Oslo and Charles University Autumn 2014 II III Teachers’ opinions on assessment of the assessment of sequential bilinguals for primary/specific language impairment in the first years of formal education in Norway IV © Ivana Randjic 2014 Teachers’ opinions of the assessment of sequential bilinguals for primary/specific language impairment in the first years of formal education in Norway Ivana Randjic http://www.duo.uio.no/ Trykk: Reprosentralen, Universitetet i Oslo V Abstract The study was set to look into teachers’ opinions on assessment of specific (primary) language impairment (SLI/PLI) in sequential bilinguals in the first grades of formal schooling in Norway. In order to achieve the main goal of the thesis 3 research questions were posed: What are the teachers’ experiences with bilingualism in their classroom? What are the teachers’ experiences with specific (primary) language impairment? What are the teachers’ opinions on tools and procedures of this assessment? SLI/PLI is affecting a certain percentage of monolingual as well as bilingual children. In the midst of sequential bilingualism SLI/PLI may be difficult to discover. The study was interested in teachers’ perspectives of the issue. Namely, what was to be seen was how teachers cope with this practical matter of every day incidence and what their opinions on the matter were. The study was conducted by conveying semi-structured interviews with 4 participants in one school in urban Norway. The school was almost entirely bilingual and the interviewees differed in terms of their expertise and experience in teaching. The interviews were conducted in English. The study had sample too small for any external generalizations to be made, but the goal of the research is to understand particulars rather than making claims of the general. Consequently findings of the study noted that teachers were preoccupied by semilingualism/emergentism in their classrooms. The difference between simultaneous bilinguals and monolinguals seemed to be obscure in practice. It appeared teachers were not familiar with any formal assessment tools for SLI/PLI, as the system procedures did not require it. Nevertheless, they employed pre-assessment observing phonological and social signs and background data investigations in order to help getting a bigger picture of their students’ capabilities. As a tool for assessment of language abilities of all the students NSL (Norsk som læringsspråk) test was used. VI Further research in the area is needed, especially in the domain of sequential bilingualism at schools. It might be recommendable to use either higher variety in sample or a questionnaire as the method of inquiry. VII VIII Acknowledgements I wish to express my gratitude towards EU that funded this programme, all the three Universities: University of Roehampton, University of Oslo and Charles University for their coordination of the programme and administrative support. Special thanks to the respective academic coordinators Leda Kamenopolou, Jorun Buli-Holmberg and Jan Siska who facilitated our way through the programme and helped us throughout the whole process. This thesis would not be the same without priceless help, guidance and advice from my supervisor Ivar Morken and valuable support of the University of Oslo coordinator Jorun Buli-Holmberg who was very committed to help during the entire research process. I also wish to acknowledge much of the open source tips and blogs that we all sometimes browse through, but are very often forgotten to be acknowledged. Moreover, special thanks to my mother and sister for providing me with the valuable encouragement and support and numerous colleagues and friends for help and understanding. Thank you everyone! IX X Table of contents 1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 Background and the problem statement : The views of teachers and the process of assessment .............................................................................................................................. 2 1.2 Why primary language impairment in sequential bilinguals? ..................................... 3 1.3 Gap in knowledge ........................................................................................................ 4 1.4 Purpose and research questions ................................................................................... 4 1.5 Research approach ....................................................................................................... 5 1.6 Organisation of the study ............................................................................................. 5 2 Literature review ................................................................................................................ 7 2.1 How did we come to bilingualism? ............................................................................. 7 2.2 How does the research see bilingualism? .................................................................... 8 2.2.1 Subtractive vs additive bilingualism .................................................................... 8 2.2.2 Simultaneous vs sequential bilingualism ............................................................. 9 2.2.3 Semilingualism vs sequential bilingualism .......................................................... 9 2.2.4 Recursive vs dynamic bilingualism (plurilingualism) ....................................... 10 2.2.5 Cummins’s contribution to the debate (language proficiency) .......................... 10 2.3 Specific/ primary language impairment .................................................................... 12 2.3.1 Identifying specific/primary language impairment ............................................ 12 2.4 What do the tests say? ............................................................................................... 13 2.4.1 Phonological issues ............................................................................................ 14 2.4.2 Morpho-syntactic issues ..................................................................................... 15 2.4.3 Pragmatic issues ................................................................................................. 15 2.4.4 Non-standardised assessment ............................................................................. 16 2.5 How does it look like in practice? ............................................................................. 17 2.5.1 Good or bad bilingualism in classrooms ............................................................ 18 2.5.2 Teachers’ role ..................................................................................................... 18 3 Methodology .................................................................................................................... 22 3.1 The research problem recap ....................................................................................... 22 3.2 Approach, methodology, method .............................................................................. 22 3.2.1 Approach and methodology ............................................................................... 22 3.2.2 Method ............................................................................................................... 23 XI 3.3 Similar research ......................................................................................................... 25 3.4 Sampling, selecting participants and settings ............................................................ 26 3.5 Negotiating access ..................................................................................................... 27 3.6 Data collection ........................................................................................................... 28 3.6.1 Tool - Interview guide ........................................................................................ 29 3.6.2 Piloting the interview ......................................................................................... 29 3.6.3 Interviewing actually .......................................................................................... 30 3.7 Data analysis .............................................................................................................. 32 3.8 Validity and generalization ........................................................................................ 33 3.8.1 Assessment of the method .................................................................................. 33 3.8.2 Assessment of the research ................................................................................ 33 3.9 Ethical considerations ................................................................................................ 35 3.9.1 Consent ............................................................................................................... 35 3.9.2 Confidentiality ...................................................................................................