This pilot study investigates the performance in French of five English-speaking children, who are enrolled in their sixth year of a primary French immersion program in a Toronto elementary school. From speech data obtained in individual interviews, an analysis is made of the students' control of the French verb system. The subjects are found to…

A study of self-correction, or repair (the righting of the trouble source) among bilingual secondary students differed from most repair studies in three ways. It: (1) examined results in the form of description rather than in quantifiable analyses; (2) defined errors as trouble sources (hearable errors, breaks in communication such as word…

Research was conducted to investigate the development of linguistic competence in early French immersion programs. Fifty-five students in grades 3, 4, and 5 were administered a test of oral production in French. Twenty-seven grammatical features were examined by means of a detailed error analysis. The results show that there was little improvement…

This study explores the role of the language learning situation by comparing the speech of children in an immersion program, children learning a second language in a natural setting, and native French children. Three groups of children participated in the study: (1) 39 children (Grades K, 1, 3, 5) in a French immersion program in the U.S.; (2) 13…

A study examined minority-language use at a Tucson (Arizona) dual-language school and shifting patterns of language dominance in the surrounding Mexican American neighborhood. The minority-language resources most immediately available--held by fluent bilingual elders and recent Mexican immigrants--were less used than those of majority-language…

Three experiments from the late 1970s concerning second language communication strategies are studied for evidence supporting their classification as either avoidance or achievement strategies. The experiments had as subjects native English-speaking children in a French immersion program, adult second language learners of English who were native…

Examples of the spontaneous speech in French of native English speakers, average age 7.6 years, were collected at the end of their second year in a French immersion program. Results show that the native language strongly influences second language speech production. While vocabulary and pronunciation are of course predominantly French, the…

A structured immersion program, coupled with an effective curriculum and empirically validated teaching procedure, was offered to elementary Asian students entering a California school. This approach appeared to have significantly better results, and its effects were maintained for up to two years after completion. (LMO)

Identifies key components of U.S. Language immersion programs and offers a description of existing partial and full immersion schools. The survey parallels information-gathering efforts in Canada and Europe by providing details and summaries of demographic information, teachers, materials, target language proficiency and use, program structure and…

This thesis reports on a study of the use of first and second languages among students of a Spanish immersion program. Eight fifth- and sixth-graders with varying levels of Spanish proficiency participated in the study. Data were collected through student verbal reports, questionnaire-based interviews, classroom observations, and background…

Since the 1960s, the U.S. Department of Education has enthusiastically embraced bilingual education. In this paper, the author evaluates the federal bilingual education program. Based on her studies of the implementation of bilingual education in California, Massachusetts, and New York City, she concludes that the program is of dubious value. She…

The main goal of this practicum was to increase general science achievement and improve acquisition of Spanish as a second language in a group of 21 sixth-grade Spanish immersion students. The students were having some difficulty with Spanish learning due to lack of Spanish science vocabulary, lack of appropriate science materials accommodating…

The report presents results of a study of elementary and secondary school two-way bilingual immersion programs that focused on the program and contextual factors affecting student learning, student and teacher language use in the classroom, and teaching strategies used to promote target language use and increase language proficiency. The study…

This publication reviews research findings on selected aspects of home and school language usage in the Pacific region, which is a multilingual context with English as the common language. Patterns of indigenous and English language vary considerably across geographical areas. Traditional cultures and languages are changing rapidly. The wide…

Over the last 30 years, inquiry-based teaching has become a highly valued component of professional development and practitioner research in Australia and New Zealand. This volume of the Language Teacher Research Series focuses on teaching and learning experiences in those two countries, which encompass a large geographical area with diverse…