Effectiveness of Student Engagement in a Bilingual Education Two-Way Immersion Program - Research Paper Example

Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Student Engagement in a Bilingual Education Two-Way Immersion Program Abstract Students’ engagement in bilingualism is one of the most important issues of concern in the modern education system within the domain of Western social context. While the conventional approach to education has remained more focused over monolingual ways of studies, the modern educationists are of opinion that such educational philosophy is incapable of satisfying the dynamically changing requirements of education for social and individual benefit. The cosmopolitan and multicultural nature of social existence, on one hand, provide ample opportunity to common people to explore the benefits of community existence, on the other, there always exists certain cultural gaps, resulting in differentiating people as people fail to realize the benefits. Students’ engagement in bilingual studies not only solve these issues, at the same time, also helps in nourishing complete aptitude of a child as a sensible and social human being. Introduction The increasing rate of socio-cultural cosmopolitanism, apart from affecting political, cultural, and economic behavior of common existence has also casted tremendous influence over education sector across the globe. Magnitude of such impact can best be observed among those nations, where multiculturalism has been expanded to a great extent. While education procedure in these nations were following certain specific guidelines and undergoing a gradual process of transformation, cosmopolitan social structure changed the preconceived notions about educating people. As communication is considered as one of the most important factors for education, unless that aspect is satisfied, it cannot be expected that students would be benefitted to the best possible extent. A multicultural social setting automatically comprises of people from different social, cultural and linguistic background. Thus, when it comes to either receiving or providing education, in both ways, it also is equally essential that linguistic barrier does not remain an insurmountable obstacle to realize the benefits of education process. In this context, importance of bilingual education and student’s engagement in the system have been emphasized by modern educationists so that benefits of education can properly be realized and appreciated at the same time, irrespective of cultural and linguistic differences. Bilingualism in Education and benefits of the system Judging from the perspective of common interpretation, bilingualism signifies the capacity of an individual, capable of communicating verbally in two languages. However, theoretical definition of bilingualism is surely a more complicated issue and encompasses several assumptions and considerations within its scope, such as, an individual’s level of competency in two languages, the varying degree of competence, flair in both writing and reading the two languages and his efficacy in communicating. Researches on bilingualism have proved that competence, depending over four essential factors of communication through language, such as, listening, speaking, reading and writing can vary from one person to the other at different points of time; however, keeping in mind the varying degrees of competence in all these methods of communication, a bilingual can be defined as a person, who tends to use his knowledge for various functions and intentions (Baker, and Jones, 1998, p. 2-3). However, in the modern education scenario, one of the main reasons that bilingual communication and students’ engagement in the process have been provided with so much of importance because apart from helping them to attain a better hold over their professional life, in the context of personal, social and develop better relationship in family, bilingualism is of great help. The benefits of bilingual education act as major sources in the context of generating effectiveness for student engagement. Some of the most important advantages of bilingual communication are, better relationship with parents, incase both of them have hailed from different linguist background, bridge the generational differences, social and communal benefits and finally, flexible attitude towards different cultures. There is no denial of the fact that Cold War, global level political and economic crisis and globalization have emerged as the important factors in the development of a multicultural society. Multiculturalism is surely a benefit and if its potentials can properly be utilized, a society will surely be benefitted in many ways. Unfortunately, on frequently occasions it has been observed that rather than being more concerned about churning the best benefits of multiculturalism, people have taken quite a hostile approach regarding appreciation of cultural differences. Modern theorists of education and sociologists emphasize over student engagement in bilingual studies as it contribute to a great extent in understanding the benefits of other cultures through the methods of communication and reading the traditional documents; consequently, an empathetic approach is developed towards other cultural and the path of attaining social harmony becomes easily accessible (Baker, and Jones, 1998, p. 6-7). Research Questions While evaluating the importance of students’ engagement in bilingual education, certain questions have drawn considerable attention in the context of judging the effectiveness of such education, such as, first, whether bilingual education is more effective than monolingual education, second, does bilingual education helps in complete personality development of a child, third, does it reduces a child’s efficiency in the study of first language, fourth, does it help in enhancing a student’s capacity in studies of both language and non language studies and finally, whether bilingual education helps in enhancing the scope for social attachment. The Effectiveness of Bilingual Education and Importance of Students’ engagement The modern education system has adopted quite an advanced approach towards bilingual education as it has been realized that unless bilingual practices are encouraged beyond limited scope of academic disciplines, a student’s competence over the language will remain limited: “The term bilingual education usually refers to the use of two (or more) languages of instruction at some point in the student’s school career. The languages are used to teach subject matter content rather than just the language itself” (Cummins, and Corson, 1997, p. xi). While the effectiveness of engagement with bilingual education has been emphasized by early scholars during the Greek and Roman civilization, with the purpose so that students can read texts of both cultural disciplines in original form and receive considerable information about cultural diversity of both civilizations, the modern education system, though has emphasized on the same issue, however, also has suggested that use of second language as an effective avenue of communication as that of the first language, would surely help a child to receive a greater hold over the language both from cultural and utilitarian perspective. Thus, since 1920 onwards, on one hand, while bilingual education was encouraged, on the other great deal of researches have been done that aimed at reflecting over benefits and positives of student engagement with such education process (Cummins, and Corson, 1997, p. xi). While it comes to realizing the benefits of student engagement in bilingual education, receiving an overview of development from socio-historical perspective becomes important. Both in the UK and US educational scenario, academicians and students used to enjoy monolingual method of education at the primary level and compared to the US, in UK, monolingualism was more pervasive (Baker, 2006, p. 10). While, during the Cold War period, due to prevailing social, economic and political crisis among Latin American nations compelled a large number of people to migrate in the US, a sudden necessity to change the conventional standards of education was realized (Faltis, 1997, p. 189). Throughout the 70s and 80s, in the US education system, several changes occurred regarding enhancement of the benefits of bilingual education, among which contribution of Latin-American theorists and changes in educational policies have attracted considerable attention (Faltis, 1997, p. 193-194). The era of 1990s witnessed considerable progress in the field of bilingual education and as it was experienced by school authorities that pursuing the process of bilingualism is contributing in the development of children, in terms of their personality, IQ and cultural flexibility, greater stress was provided by encouraging students to join such programs: “As bilingual education becomes increasingly less focused on English achievement and more focused on school achievement, a new generation of bilingual educators and teachers are likely to incorporate an alternative set of guiding principles for learning and language acquisition” (Faltis, 1997, p. 194). It becomes clear from such observation that bilingual education is effective not only from the perspective of enhancing students’ proficiency in language studies, but it contributes to a great extent in developing overall aptitude and personality development as a sensible human being. In the US scenario, specifically, cultural diversity is one of the major reasons that resulted in social disturbances and cultural conflict among common people. Apart from that, communication gap, empathy towards others and social isolation are other crucial factors that proved to be antagonist for young generation and their complete upbringing. Students’ engagement in bilingual studies provides them with flexibility of approach, greater scope for social attachment and development of empathetic approach. Even if it comes to progress of a child in terms of his academic achievement, both in the fields of language and non-language studies, engagement in bilingual studies has proved to be highly effective and consequently encouraged by modern educationists in a cosmopolitan social scenario. Several years of research and reflection over nature as well as effectiveness of bilingual education came up with wide range of theoretical interpretations that suggested proper following of these theoretic principles would help students in their overall improvement from the perspectives of cognitive functioning, attitudes, motivation to enhance expertise over other languages and development of their total aptitude (Baker, 2006, p. 149). Theoretical approaches, such as, balance theory, the think tank model, and the threshold theory are considered as most fundamental in the context of enhancing effectiveness of bilingual education (Baker, 2006); consequently it has also been emphasized that empathetic practicing of these theoretical approaches would help in generating a “shift toward the constructivist, social nature of learning and language” (Faltis, 1997, p. 194). However, irrespective of complete awareness of the US education department, the bilingual education process did not receive adequate support from common people as they did not have clear idea regarding its effectiveness over students and it also was argued that involvement in two different languages would also reduce expertise of a student over academic affairs. However, the Canadian immersion model proved to be an effective solution in this context: “Immersion is one of the most extensively researched aspects not only of languages education but of education more generally” (Johnstone, 2007, p. 19). Further researches on the immersion program, with the purpose of making it more effective among students to enhance the scope of bilingual education, the “two way immersion” process has been introduced. The new variation of the L2 immersion can be effectively adopted “when a school draws on two language communities. …the two-way immersion in the USA shows … that Hispanic and anglophone learners may share a common programme in which the Hispanic learners have Spanish as L1 and learn English as L2, while the reverse applies in the case of anglophone learners. As a consequence, each learner experiences a bilingual Spanish-English programme” (Johnstone, 2007, p. 25). One of the most important benefits to be engaged in the two way immersion program is that “learners are exposed not only to bilingual teachers but also to classmates who have the immersion language as their L1” (Johnstone, 2007, p. 25). However, irrespective of the advantages of the bilingual education, it has been widely argued by the common people and a particular section of educationists that bilingual education is not very effective when it comes to better performance in the English language in particular and it also does not help students to perform more effectively in when it comes to study of non-language subjects (Baker, and Jones, 1998, p. 555). Both these arguments received a strong foundation due to review from Baker and De Kanter. However, the Baker and De Kanter review was reevaluated by Willig in 1985 through statistical meta-analysis method. Through this method she found that students pursuing bilingual education process enjoy only a small extent of advantage in case of developing efficacy with the English language and other non-language subjects. Aftermath, a more elaborate research, for a period of eight years, was conducted by the educationists that was known as “longitudinal study of bilingual education” and results of this research showed that students undergoing bilingual education program, are showing better expertise in addressing issues both in language and non-language studies, compared to students belonging to any other educational program (Baker, 2006, p. 264-265). Conclusion The bilingual education and students’ engagement in the two way immersion program are increasingly becoming important in the context of multicultural social setting, especially in nations like the US so that people from different cultures develop empathetic approach for each other and consequently motivate themselves to enjoy a better social existence. Apart from such extensive and philosophical goal of bilingual education, students’ engagement in the program provides them with the impetus to undertake quite a flexible perspective towards study of both language and non-language subjects; consequently, also adds to the benefit of enhancing the a student’s scope of enjoy his intelligence, IQ and personality to handle the immediate situations, requiring attention. References Baker, C. (2006). Foundations of bilingual education and bilingualism. (4th Ed.). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Baker, C. and Jones, S.P. (1998). Encyclopedia of bilingualism and bilingual education, Volume 1997. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Faltis, C. (1997). “Bilingual Education in the United States”. Encyclopedia of Language and Education. Vol. 5: Bilingual Education. Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers. p. 189-197. Johnstone, R. (2007). “Characteristics of Immersion Programmes”. Bilingual education: an introductory reader. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. 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