Looks at early immersion in Irish among children from diverse language backgrounds. Examines the children's frequency of target language use and the effect of the group's linguistic mix on that use. Results show relatively low levels of target language use even by native speakers. (Author/VWL)

Evaluated the effect on French language proficiency of an integrated formal, analytic and functional, communicative approach to second language teaching in the immersion classroom. Impetus for the study arises from previous research indicating that immersion children show persistent weaknesses in their grammatical skills despite the fluent,…

Illustrates the pedagogical potential of advertising messages in the French immersion classroom. Students learn to develop a critical analysis of the advertising messages they see and hear. (Author/VWL)

Describes the successful organization of 2 foreign language days for middle school students and provides a synopsis of why an immersion day is an important activity and what steps a teacher might take in order to attempt such an endeavor. Guidelines for planning an immersion day are included. (Author/VWL)

The Attitudes towards Japan and the West questionnaire was constructed to examine how English immersion students in an elementary school in Numazu City, Japan subjectively perceive themselves in relation to Japan and the West. Five subscales were identified.The questionnaire was also given to Japanese immersion students and to comparable…

Investigates the learning of sociostylistic variation by students in French immersion programs in Ontario. Focused on their learning of the four expressions of restriction ("ne . . .que,""seulement,""rien que," and "juste"). (Author/VWL)

This micro-ethnographic classroom-based case study explores the teaching methodology in a first-grade French-immersion class. This study was carried out in a public elementary immersion school in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where English-speaking children throughout the school learn the school curriculum through a second language (French), starting in…

Purpose: This study aims to provide substantive data on the effectiveness of the total-student-body approach to school-based conflict resolution training. The authors investigated the effectiveness of the Peacemakers (D. W. Johnson & Johnson, 1995) program, a total-student-body conflict training program taught bilingually to all students in a…

One of the advantages of having students work in pairs on language-related tasks is that teachers and researchers can listen to what the students say as they carry out their assigned tasks. What they say offers insights into the students' beliefs about the target language they are learning and using, and reflects the cognitive processes they use…

The purpose of this paper is to argue that the traditional division between bilingual education programmes offered to speakers of majority languages and those available to minority language speakers in Colombia should be reconsidered within a wider, integrated vision of bilingual provision. Initially, developments will be situated in relation to…

In dual language programs, children who speak a majority language are grouped with children who speak a minority language, and instruction is delivered in both languages. This focus on structural rather than instructional design can lead to a recipe approach to design: add the ingredients (native-speaking children, content language instruction) in…

This paper explores the role of negotiation in teacher-student interaction and argues that the negotiation of meaning, defined as a set of conversational moves which work toward mutual comprehension, is too narrow a construct to fulfil its pedagogical potential in teacher-student interaction in communicative and content-based second language (L2)…

In this testimony, Dr. Willard Sakiestewa Gilbert talks on behalf of the National Indian Education Association with regard to the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) and challenges facing BIE schools in improving student achievement. Founded in 1969, the National Indian Education Association (NIEA) is the largest organization in the nation dedicated…

In 2002, Massachusetts voters passed Question 2, a law similar to its predecessors in California (Proposition 227) and Arizona (Proposition 203) to replace bilingual education with structured English immersion (SEI) programs. Using Ruiz's (1984) framework for language planning as an analytical lens, this study examined how three Massachusetts…

Differences between early and late Irish-immersion secondary school students are examined, not only in terms of academic outcome and target language ability, but also in terms of attitudes to learning the target language. Participants included a gender-balanced group of 97 students in Irish-immersion in fourth year of secondary school (mean age…