Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education - Volume 1, Issue 2, 2013

This classroom intervention study investigated the effects of biliteracy instruction on Grade 2 students’ morphological awareness in French and English. Three pairs of partner teachers (French/English) participating in a professional development project co-designed and implemented biliteracy tasks across their French and English classes, which together comprised a total of 80 students identified as dominant in either French or English or as French-English bilinguals. The biliteracy instruction integrated a linguistic focus on derivational morphology with a thematic focus on illustrated storybooks. Before and after the intervention, separate measures of morphological awareness in French and English were administered to a subsample of their students (n = 45) as well as to a comparison group of students (n = 20) not receiving the instruction. The experimental group significantly outperformed the comparison group in French, but not in English, yet when students’ language dominance was accounted for in the English measure, English-dominant students in the experimental group significantly outperformed their counterparts in the comparison group.

With extensive numbers of English learners in public schools worldwide, content-based language instruction (CBI) is prevalent in the preparation of second language (L2) teaching professionals. This study investigated how aspects of Teacher Language Awareness (TLA) manifest as pre-service L2 teachers develop lesson plans for CBI contexts. The authors examined the interplay between three factors: the participants’ perceived utility of their teacher preparation coursework, the participants’ ability to identify language demands in a content-area text, and the types of pedagogical activities participants suggested for subsequent CBI lessons. Descriptive and qualitative data were obtained by combining a survey with a constructed lesson-planning task. Findings yielded paradoxical results pertaining to participants’ perceptions of language-focused coursework and their ability to apply TLA during CBI lesson plan development.

This mixed methods study approached the issue of foreign language (FL) anxiety in a unique population of students in the U.S.: English-dominant students who had attended French or Spanish elementary immersion schools. One hundred thirty-one students from five immersion schools responded to surveys, and 33 of those students were interviewed. Data analysis procedures included a statistical analysis of the surveys, a theme analysis of the interviews, and an integrated consideration of the findings. It was found that the immersion students did experience some FL anxiety, but it was largely dependent on the situation and mediated by other aspects of being language learners. Their FL anxiety did not correlate with their decision whether or not to continue with the immersion program. Implications include a need to reexamine the importance of extracurricular learning experiences in immersion education, and a suggestion to expand FL anxiety research to different educational and methodological contexts.

This study examined the challenges and successes related to classroom management in a new French Immersion Elementary School (FIES). Framed by language immersion research and theories of culturally responsive classroom management (Weinstein, Curran, & Tomlinson-Clark, 2003), the study focuses on teachers’ decision-making processes in a one-way immersion setting. Using a case-study approach on one kindergarten classroom, qualitative data over one year included field notes from participant observation; transcripts of interviews and focus groups with teachers and administrators; classroom artifacts; and videotapes of classroom sessions. Results showed that classroom management was strongly shaped by several factors: the political context, lack of school-wide curricula and policies, built environment, and teachers’ prior experiences. The discussion examines how language educators and researchers must look beyond teachers’ beliefs and students’ cultures when devising solutions to social and behavioral challenges. Recommendations for new language immersion schools that deal with behavior management challenges are made.

In this ethnographic study of language socialization I investigate how a monolingual language norm is instituted, maintained, monitored, resisted, and subverted by participants in a first and second grade English medium class in Finland. In this setting language choice and use are an integral part of membership in this class. This study foregrounds the social implications of managing a monolingual norm by examining student agency, resistance, the achievement of voice, the uptake of a teacher-like discourse, and the practice of repair. The end result is a detailed exploration of peer-talk among students engaged in a variety of activities, highlighting the diverse trajectories of individuals, and giving evidence of the creative and agentive use of language among young learners.