Dutch and English literacy and language outcomes of dyslexic students in regular and bilingual secondary education

An increasing number of schools in the Netherlands offer bilingual (secondary) education, usually combining Dutch with English. As yet, it remains unclear whether students with dyslexia are able to cope in this type of educational setting. To address this question, the oral language and literacy skills of dyslexic and non-dyslexic students attending regular and bilingual VWO (pre-university) secondary education were compared. Results confirmed the benefits to English proficiency offered by this type of education as found in earlier studies (Van der Leij et al., 2010; Verspoor et al., 2010). In addition, dyslexic students at bilingual schools scored significantly higher on English literacy and language tasks than their dyslexic peers in regular programmes, suggesting that bilingual secondary education is not too difficult for students with dyslexia and may in fact be just as beneficial for this group as for non-dyslexics.