TY - JOUR
T1 - Mother tongue reading materials as a bridge to literacy
AU - Leighton, Margaret A.
PY - 2022/12
Y1 - 2022/12
N2 - Children whose mother tongue is different from the language of instruction at school face additional challenges developing literacy skills. One approach to this favours immersion in the language of instruction, while another favours a transitional period of bilingual educa- tion. This paper evaluates the impact of a primary school literacy intervention. In addition to multifaceted literacy support, the programme included a component of transitional bilingual education for students whose mother tongue is not the usual language of instruction. Over two years, the intervention raised literacy scores in the language of instruction by +0.41 sd, and literacy in mother tongue for minority language speakers by +0.75 sd. Our findings suggests that a light-touch transitional bilingual component can support minority language literacy without crowding out acquisition of the language of instruction.
AB - Children whose mother tongue is different from the language of instruction at school face additional challenges developing literacy skills. One approach to this favours immersion in the language of instruction, while another favours a transitional period of bilingual educa- tion. This paper evaluates the impact of a primary school literacy intervention. In addition to multifaceted literacy support, the programme included a component of transitional bilingual education for students whose mother tongue is not the usual language of instruction. Over two years, the intervention raised literacy scores in the language of instruction by +0.41 sd, and literacy in mother tongue for minority language speakers by +0.75 sd. Our findings suggests that a light-touch transitional bilingual component can support minority language literacy without crowding out acquisition of the language of instruction.
KW - Primary education
KW - Literacy
KW - Intervention
KW - Language of instruction
U2 - 10.1016/j.econedurev.2022.102312
DO - 10.1016/j.econedurev.2022.102312
M3 - Article
SN - 0272-7757
VL - 91
JO - Economics of Education Review
JF - Economics of Education Review
M1 - 102312
ER -