Page 7 - ELG1601 Nov Issue 441

ELyoung learners

An EL Gazette supplement with the British Council: English language and international education • 2016

highlight a positive Creating a Clil controversy?

hile many studies

Wlink between bilin-
gual programmes (Clil) and
foreign language learning, it is Claudia Civinini reports on a controversial new study investigating bilingual education in
not yet clear what impact these
programmes have on the learn- Spain, while Bilingual Teaching Association president and study authors join the discussion
ing of the actual content of a
subject course taught in a for-
eign language. In academic year 2013–14 experience) and balanced distribu- the OECD’s Pisa exam, it does schools after the introduction of first and the second cohort of stu-
This is the focus of a 2016 schools in the autonomous region tion of selected schools between not have academic consequences. the programme, particularly for dents, starting in 2004 and 2005
research paper authored by Pro- of Madrid introduced a bilingual different geographical areas. As Exams are conducted with ques- children whose parents had less respectively, with the latter show-
fessor Antonio Cabrales from programme whereby 40 per cent of 2005 the third criterion was tions in Spanish for all students, than upper-secondary educa- ing a slight improvement. The
University College London, of instruction, including all the changed to ‘English level of the whether or not they attend a tion. Reading and mathematics, researchers asked if this was due
Professor Jesus Carro of the Uni- science curriculum, was taught teachers in the school’. bilingual school. The exams test taught in Spanish, did not show to the effect of the new applica-
versidad Carlos III de Madrid, in English. Schools had to apply The researchers analysed mathematics, reading (literacy in significant differences. The tion criterion (the language level
and Professor Brindusa Anghel to implement the programme. the results of the Prueba de Spanish) and general knowledge. demographics also changed in of the teachers) introduced that
from the Universidad Autonoma The original call for applica- Conoscimientos y Destrezas According to the study, general schools after the introduction of year and if improved language
de Madrid, three economists tions, which selected 25 schools Indispensables (CDI). This is a knowledge includes content areas the bilingual programme, with an proficiency for teachers was
whose research areas include the (later scaled up to 316), required standardised compulsory exam taught in English in bilingual increase in the number of children linked to better student learning
economics of education and who institutions to fulfil three criteria: for all sixth-grade students (age schools, though Spanish bilingual whose parents had university in the foreign language.
have a track record of research degree of acceptance of the edu- 12) that tests the skills and knowl- teaching specialists dispute this degrees and were in professional The paper generated contro-
papers about education published cational community, feasibility of edge that should be acquired by (see comment). The research- occupations, characteristics that versy in the Spanish press (see
in peer-reviewed journals. the application (staff, resources, the end of primary school. Like ers analysed the results of the are positively correlated with page 2 of the main Gazette).
test in bilingual schools before academic performance. We asked the president of the
and after they became bilingual, The study offers various ave- Bilingual Teaching Associa-
Spain’s Bilingual Teaching Association president and used the results that non- nues for further investigation. tion in Spain, Xavier Gisbert, to
Xavier Gisbert (pictured) comments bilingual schools obtained in the The three researchers point out comment on the findings – and
same academic years as a control there are two factors to consider, the authors of the paper then
Economists are normally very good in their only a part of the Spanish language exam. group. The data collected from the as the bilingual programme could responded to his comments.
field but know very little about education. However, the authors state that gen- exams also included information affect both students’ ability to See the full study: Carro, J.,
The study is based on the academic results eral culture is taught in English and is about students’ background, such learn the subject course content Cabrales, A., & Anghel, B. (2012),
obtained at the end of primary education the equivalent of the content of science, as country of origin and parental and to perform a test in their Evaluating a bilingual educa-
by the students that started the Madrid which is not the case. Taking this into education levels. native language when the subject tion program in Spain: the impact
bilingual programme in 2004 and 2005. account, it is clear that the study, which The analysis found that results was taught in a foreign language. beyond foreign language learn-
The authors use the data obtained from compares results between bilingual and in the general knowledge test Findings also pointed to a dif- ing. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/
CDI exam taken by all students in Madrid non-bilingual schools, is based on a actually worsened for bilingual ference between the results of the doi/10.1111/ecin.12305/full n
in their last year of primary education. false premise, which makes it invalid.
This is not a high-reliability test, therefore In any case, the study found no signifi-
results can be compared between schools cant difference in the CDI results between
within the same year but not between dif- students from bilingual and non-bilingual
ferent years in the same school. schools. It found a slight negative effect in
In Madrid’s bilingual schools any sub- the group of children who started in 2004
ject can be taught in English – which disappears in 2005 –
except Spanish and mathemat- except perhaps for children
ics. The CDI includes only two whose parents have less than
subjects: Spanish and math- upper-secondary education.
ematics. The Spanish exam But in general these children
consists of dictation, text have worse results. Taking
comprehension and general into account that none of the
culture, or general knowledge subjects taught in English
as it’s in known in the UK. Gen- has been analysed, the study
eral culture is not a subject has little to do with bilingual
taught in primary schools – it is education.

Study authors respond (Antonio Cabrales pictured)

Perhaps it is true the exam is not reliable public record.
(although we do not know of any evi- The study found insignificant effects in
dence about this), but the way we analyse those exams where the content was taught
the data will not suffer from any potential entirely in Spanish. It found very signifi-
problem coming from inconsistencies cant negative results for both children that
across years. Precisely because of that started in 2004 and those that started in
potential problem, we do not simply 2005 for the exams where the content was
compare raw grades of a single school taught largely in English for the bilingual
from one year to the other, nor do we schools. This significant negative effect
compare results across schools within was on the average student.
the same year, because they can (and we Then we divided the sample between
found evidence that they do) have differ- children with high and low educational
ent students. What we can definitely do status of the parents and discovered
is compare the relative positions in the that, by comparing children whose par-
within-year distribution of the schools in ents had low education both in bilingual
the treated and control groups. and non-bilingual schools, the
Even though it was adminis- negative effect came mostly
trated in the same exam sheets from those children. It is true
as part of the ‘language and that those children have gen-
general culture exam’ it is most erally worse results but we
definitely the case that a large are comparing children with
part of that exam refers to the less-educated parents in both
content of the subject of ‘knowl- types of schools, so the effect
edge of the environment’, which cannot come from low-edu-
puts together social and natural cated parents, which are held
science. The exams are in the constant across groups.

Inside your 4-page Young Learners supplement:

The ‘missing middle’ mystery p ii
Prime time for pre-primary p ii
On board for excellence (left) p iii
Why families lead the way p iii
Navigating education (right) p iv

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