College of Education faculty: Dual language approach shows promise for second-language learners

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — As challenging as school can be for any student, those whose first language is not English face even greater obstacles with which many public schools are un- or underequipped to address. However, a dual-language learning model shows promise both for students learning English and those for whom English is their first language, according to two Penn State College of Education faculty members.

Francesca Lopez, Waterbury Chair in Equity Pedagogy and professor of education, herself experienced growing up in El Paso, Texas as an English learner with Spanish being her first language. That and her experience as a parent of Spanish-speaking children is what motivated her to become a bilingual teacher of elementary school students. She later decided to return to school, during which a major policy decision regarding multilingual education was handed down at the state level.

“When I was pursuing my doctorate and my training was in educational psychology, I was in Arizona which banned bilingual education,” Lopez explained. “I had children who spoke only Spanish because we thought, ‘we're going to be in El Paso forever, and they'll just go through bilingual education and be bilingual.’ So those experiences, seeing how they were treated, how I was treated as a parent of someone who spoke only Spanish led me to want to research that. And so, a lot of my early research really focused on, how do these state policies trickle down into what teachers are required to know? What are the outcomes like for students in those different contexts?”

Bilingual programs were first mandated after the 1974 Supreme Court decision Lau v. Nichols. In that case, a group of Chinese parents in California brought a lawsuit claiming their children did not have access to the public-school curriculum due to a language barrier.

The court agreed, ruling that just providing the curriculum is not ensuring equal access to content, thereby requiring schools to ensure that everybody has access to the curriculum, which, Lopez said, gave way to many experimental programs.

“Early on, bilingual programs were segregated,” Lopez said. “So, you had students who were all being supported in their primary language. They're getting literacy skills. They're all in the same situation, basically, and then they exit the program. The law requires that they're tested every year for English proficiency, and then they can be what's called reclassified.”

Lopez explained that once a student is reclassified, they enter a mainstream English classroom with their peers, but still have to be monitored to make sure they are proficient enough in English and don’t need more support. 

However, states like Massachusetts, Arizona and California had English-only instruction policies in place until relatively recently, said Sophia Ángeles, assistant professor of education. 

Ángeles is an advocate for embracing multilingual learning, one of many issues she discusses with her pre-service teachers at Penn State.

“One of the things we talk about in class is how helpful it is to incorporate multilingual students’ home language. This is especially true for those who are going to be teaching in an early childhood or elementary school context. Encouraging families to continue to teach their home language is very important,” she explained. “If you have an understanding of one language, learning a second or third language tends to be easier. Students’ home language is not a barrier.”

By allowing the student to use the language most-frequently spoken at home as a “base,” Ángeles said students can be exposed to more English use with a higher engagement and success rate than forcing the students to use English exclusively.

“We want to use what languages students already speak to leverage their entire linguistic repertoire,” she explained. “Maybe you're writing an essay and what you're really looking for is their engagement. It is OK to use Spanish or Mandarin or Arabic to increase students’ access to content, but students will then do a presentation in English to practice their oral skills in English. So, you support their engagement with academic content by allowing multilingual learners full use of their home languages to use their bilingual skills, allowing them to process their thoughts and offering meaningful opportunities to hone their English skills.”

Lopez said that she favors dual-language learning because it avoids labeling students as “ESL” or English as a second language and isolating them from their peers. In dual-language education, the students are kept together and both languages are used in class. For example, Spanish speakers would be exposed to and learn English, but the students for whom English is their first language would be exposed to and learn Spanish, leading both groups to become bilingual.

It not only provides a benefit to both groups but avoids labeling and ‘other’-ing students whose first language isn’t English, Lopez said.

“In education we have many labels,” she said. “If we look at the term ‘English learner,’ it reflects the way the system views students. Unfortunately, it reflects, ‘Who cares what language they already speak? They're learning English. They still need to assimilate.’ Dual language eliminates that to a degree because all the students are learning another language. They are all becoming bilingual. It's a priority. And they're in that classroom together. So, it really does hold the most promise.”

One way that multilingual education and second-language learners can be prioritized is by training and hiring more multilingual teachers. Ángeles explained that while Pennsylvania is still seeing a lag in this area, other areas of the country with a higher level of second-language learners are seeing a spike in the number of teachers who can speak multiple languages.

She also said that while Spanish is the most-commonly spoken language other than English among second-language learners, similar needs are there for speakers of other languages.

“It seems like we're moving toward accepting and normalizing multilingualism,” Ángeles said. “There's nothing wrong with being multilingual. There is a lot more research about bilingual programs. Educational research continues to promote that a better solution than focusing on just learning English is isolation is sustaining and leveraging students’ home languages to develop their bilingualism and biliteracy.”

An obstacle for dual-language learning can often be the political climate of a region. While some are more open to multilingualism, there are other areas where the belief is that not only should English be everyone’s primary language, but that other languages should not even be spoken in school, other than as a course for middle and high school students because it could otherwise confuse or hinder younger children’s learning.

Lopez believes the opposite is true — that languages are much easier to learn early in life — and that states refusing to allow dual language learning in early grades are simply looking for a reason to justify actions that are politically, and not educationally, motivated.

“Language is one of those things that you can acquire, and learning more than one does not hinder your academic ability,” she said. “You have a state like Arizona that has pushed the agenda of banning bilingual education. The data show that they are the worst in outcomes for their students. The dropout rates, achievement outcomes, and high school graduation rates of Arizona ‘English learners’ are absolutely the worst when compared to other states with different policies. It's educational malpractice that goes on in that state. But the political pundits are going to claim that they're doing better than ever when that's absolutely not true. So, it is very much an agenda driven by politicians who stoke fear in people thinking that if people don't blend in, they will be a problem.

“People can speak multiple languages and come from many varied backgrounds and thrive in a multiracial, multiethnic, diverse society,” Lopez added.

One other area that adversely affects multilingual students, perhaps more than students in general, is teacher retention. Lopez said it takes time and effort to properly train teachers to work with these students, whether that’s through attending college or through professional development.

Because of that, it is more difficult to find substitutes and suitable replacements for trained teachers who leave for opportunities elsewhere or leave the teaching profession altogether.

Due to the high turnover rate in education, Lopez said that it is imperative that those who make educational policy decisions both on a government level and in specific school districts make those decisions based on sound reasoning and see the value of these and all specialized educators.

“Whether it's bilingual education, dual language, or for those communities that represent many different backgrounds with multiple languages represented, we need to ensure that students have access to highly skilled ESL teachers,” Lopez said. “That would be the non-negotiable, and that all teachers are compensated for the professionals that they are. I think if we can deal with the compensation issue and the professionalization of the profession, that is, treating them like the professionals that they are, we may see more retention. I just want everyone to lean in on the research and make sure that policies reflect that.”