University of southern california according to many reports in the media, the war between english only advocates and supporters of bilingual education is a war between rational people who think children should acquire english and irrational fanatics who think children should be prevented from learning english. Articles have proclaimed that bilingual education simply doesn't work, that children in bilingual programs do not learn english. So many immigrants have acquired english successfully, the argument goes, without any special help: why should today's immigrant children be different? moreover, it is popularly assumed that immigrants are resisting english language acquisition, and are holding tight onto their first language and culture. They are, instead, distortions that survive only because of the tendency of some journalists to read only what other journalists write a phenomenon known as pack journalism parenti, 1993. When one looks at actual research, published in respectable academic journals, the picture is very different. The contrast between media reports and academic reports has been confirmed by mcquillan and tse 1996 , who reported that 87% of academic publications on bilingual education between 1984 and 1994 had conclusions favorable to bilingual education. I review here what academic research says, focusing on the impact of bilingual education on english language development and on the retention and loss of heritage languages.

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bilingual education and english language development before looking at the research, it will be helpful to first discuss how educating children in their first language can help their acquisition of another language. It seems counterintuitive to some people: if we want children to acquire english, why not teach them english? but using and developing the first language can help second language development a great deal. When we use the first language to teach subject matter, we give children knowledge, and this knowledge helps make the english children hear and read more comprehensible. A limited english proficient child who knows her math, for example, thanks to math instruction in her primary language, will understand more in an english language medium math class than a child without a good background in math. This results in better achievement in math and more english language development.

The second way first language development helps occurs when children develop literacy in their primary language. The reason literacy transfers is simple: because we learn to read by reading, by making sense of what is on the page smith, 1994 , it is easier to learn to read in a language we understand. Subject matter knowledge and literacy, gained through the primary language, provide indirect but powerful support for english language development and are two of the three components of quality bilingual programs. The third component is direct support for english language development, through english as a second language classes and sheltered subject matter teaching, classes in which intermediate level esl students learn subject matter taught in english in a comprehensible way escamilla, 1994 krashen, 1996.

what the research shows a number of studies have shown that bilingual education is effective, with children in well designed programs acquiring academic english as well and often better than children in all english programs willig, 1985 cummins, 1989 krashen, 1996 greene, 1997. Willig concluded that the better the experimental design, the more positive were the effects of bilingual education. My conclusion is that when programs have the three components described above subject matter teaching in the first language, literacy development in the first language, comprehensible input in english , they succeed especially well krashen, 1996. Several critics, for example, have claimed that english immersion programs in el paso and mcallen, texas, were superior to bilingual education e.g.

In each case, however, programs labeled immersion were really bilingual education, with a substantial part of the day taught in the primary language. In another study, gersten 1985 claimed that all english immersion was better than bilingual education. However, the sample size was very small and the duration of the study was short also, no description of bilingual education was provided. This framework helps answer one of the most frequently stated arguments against bilingual education: how did some immigrants do well in school without it? here is one case, one of the many that has been described in the professional literature krashen, 1996, 19, ramos and krashen, 1997 tse, 1997.

It is particularly interesting because it was published by us english as an argument against bilingual education: fernando de la pena grew up in mexico and came to the us at age nine, with no knowledge of english. He reports that he learned english quickly, and by the end of my first school year, i was among the top students de la pena, 1991, p. But de la pena had de facto bilingual education: had he stayed in mexico, he would have been in the fifth grade, but when he came to the us, he was put in grade three! his knowledge of subject matter was superior to the other children in the class and he was already literate in spanish, thanks to his education in mexico.

This helped make the input he heard comprehensible and provided a shortcut to english literacy. Cases like these provide strong support for the principles underlying bilingual education and are confirmed by numerous empirical studies showing that those who have a better education in their primary language excel in english language development research reviewed in krashen, 1996. recent evidence against bilingual education some media reports have given the impression that california's proposition 227 was successful, that children are doing better under all english programs than they were under bilingual education. did la students take to immersion ? anyone glancing at the headline and opening paragraph of an article appearing in the los angeles times on january 13, 19 would get the impression that proposition 227 was a clear success. Students take to english immersion and the first paragraph stated that teachers are delivering promised reports that their children are learning english more quickly than anticipated.

The reporter conducted only! 13 interviews in the los angeles unified school district, and concluded that children were picking up verbal english at a surprising rate, but also reported that there were concerns that children were falling behind in their studies many teachers were questioning whether most of the youngsters have acquired the language skills necessary to comprehend math, reading or history lessons in english. One teacher noted that children were picking up social english, not academic english, that new concepts still had to be presented in the primary language, and that we won't have as many readers in our class as we did last year under bilingual education. No comparison was made with conversational english spoken by children in bilingual programs. The challenge is to help them develop what cummins 1989 calls academic language, the language of school.

the sat9 scores newspaper articles reported that lep children in california in certain districts dramatically increased their scores on a standardized test, the sat9, after proposition 227 was implemented. Much of the attention was focused on oceanside, a district that claimed to have dropped bilingual education completely. But a look at the actual scores shows that not much happened that was noteworthy. In table 1, i present sat9 scores for all lep children in california for 1998 and 19, as well as scores for oceanside. This table reveals two facts of interest: first, oceanside's sat9 scores for both years were very low, compared to state averages.

In other grades, and in california in general, differences between 1998 and 19 were quite small. And there are other questions and concerns: we have no idea what kind of a bilingual education program they had, e.g. In addition, hakuta 19 reported that some districts that claimed growth in the sat9 did not have bilingual education in 1998 e.g. Westminster and cypress , and growth was also seen in districts that kept bilingual education vista, santa ana, ocean view. Sat 9 scores for lep children in california and oceanside school district posted by admin as essays there is a great deal of controversy in regard to bilingual education.

Some individuals are for bilingual education and some are against bilingual education. Many individuals like to argue that bilingual education is best for a non english speaking student. Bilingual education could possibly be the worst thing for a non english speaking person.

A student who is attending a bilingual education class may not experience the type of learning needed to perform in college in the future. Students that are being pampered through middle and high school may create a lower self esteem due to the awkwardness of being disassociated with the majority of the school population. These feelings may cause the student to perform poorly in the bilingual education classes being taken to avoid becoming apart of the majority of the school. Richard rodriguez is an excellent example of how not attending bilingual education courses can actually help a student learning english. Rodriguez states that he would was finally able to raise his hand in class and speak out, after learning english on a more elaborate basis.