Heritage Language Instruction (HLI) is a resource used in many immigration-receiving countries that allows students with an immigrant background to continue to be in contact with their Heritage Language (HL). However, many of the psycholinguistic effects of this instruction are still unknown. This study aims to provide an in-depth view of the…

Many parents in the UK enrol their children in Greek supplementary schools so the children can learn and maintain the Greek language and culture in parallel with English mainstream education. Despite fears about the effects of this heritage language (Greek) use on children's skills in the majority language (English), research on these somewhat…

The present paper reports on a questionnaire survey conducted in the course of a broader research project on bilingualism (BALED). It compares two groups of Albanian immigrant parents in Greece with respect to their practices for supporting minority language development. The first group includes parents (N = 35) whose children receive systematic…

In this paper, we present a synthesis of a series of studies, carried out by our research groups, from the Greek educational context on teachers' and immigrant students' views on issues of bilingual acquisition and of heritage language learning and teaching. Albeit including heterogeneous samples and employing quantitative and qualitative…

The growing population of young English language learners (ELLs) in American schools creates an urgency for educators to understand, value, and support the wide array of students' native language practices as a way to support both the ELLs' first language and their native cultures and communities. Considerable research shows the importance of…

A discussion of the use of native languages in the instruction of limited English proficient Asian students addresses three questions: (1) whether the students' native language should be used as a means of instruction; (2) whether there is a transfer of skills from the native language to the second language; and (3) how the language and culture of…

This handbook is designed to assist California's public school teachers of limited-English-speaking native Cantonese-speaking students in understanding this minority group. The first two chapters address general background factors concerning this language group: immigration history, educational background, and historical and sociocultural factors…

This methods and materials guide for native language instruction for immigrants in British elementary and secondary schools includes discussions of the needs of the learners, the traditional approach to native language instruction, experimentation with new methods through bilingual books, the teaching of reading for information and pleasure, the…