Trilingual Education Daniela Puga

Purpose of this Study To evaluate the effectiveness of teaching an L2 and L3 simultaneously vs. sequentially in various education systems.

Simultaneous Cognitive Advantages – Performance on English tests Content based instruction

Examples Philippines – English – Filipino – Ilokano – Spanish Brunei Darussalam – Indigenous language – English – Bahasa Malay Luxembourg – Luxembourger – German – French

Sequential More focus on the L1 – Cultural benefits May enhance the development of language learning strategies

Examples Basque Country – Basque – Spanish – English Guatemala – Various Mayan languages – Spanish – English Namibia – Local languages – English – German, French or Latin

Luxembourg Monolingual by birth Luxembourger is medium of instruction Kindergarten and first year German grades 1-6 French is introduced in grade 2

European School Brussels Emphasis on L1 Emphasis on multiculturalism and multilingualism. Kindergarten: L1 is medium of instruction for most of primary education L2 is taught as a subject from grades 1-5 Secondary School – L1 & L2 Grade 8—L3 is introduced

Canadian multilingual schools English, French, Hebrew English is native language Great Jewish community Delayed second language instruction Double immersion

Canada cont. Early Double immersion: all curricular instruction from K-3 or 4 is in French and Hebrew. No English In Delayed double immersion: English along with French and Hebrew were used for curriculum instruction from the beginning of schooling

Achievement sores on three standardized tests for Luxembourg, the European School, and Canada immersion pupils. French as L2 LUXStand. dev ESStand. dev CANStand. dev. Total Calls hours Written Comprehe nsion max= Auditory comprehe nsion max= Cloze max=

Results Diverging programs can attain comparable results. Baetens Beardsmore: even complex language learning environments can cope with bilingualism in education No single model. Success stories like Canadian immersion take blue-print in circumstances where they do not satisfy local needs. In most cases simultaneous instruction is as effective as sequential instruction

Future Works Teacher Qualifications Native Speaking Instructors Application to the US?