An examination of the linguistic behavior of monolingual and bilingual Spanish-speaking children in an environment where there is opportunity to develop proficiency in two languages is examined. A review of the literature concerned with the relationship of learning processes to psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic contexts precedes an examination of the influence that language conflict may exert on minority students' academic achievement levels. Several intervention programs designed to equalize the social and language skills of minority children with those of a larger society are discussed. Criticisms and suggestions regarding the effectiveness of such programs are presented. A reference list of 43 sources is appended. (LH)