(1985). The Effects of Child-Centered Group Play Sessions on Social-Emotional Growth of Four- and Five-Year-Old Bilingual Puerto Rican Children. This study was designed to investigate the effects of child-centered group play sessions (using the play therapy interaction approach) and sex differences on self-control, free play, and sociometric ratings in young bilingual Puerto Rican children. The participants in the study were 48 bilingual Puerto Rican four- and five-year-old children from two predominately Hispanic Southeastern Pennsylvania urban communities. Analyses made of pre-test scores for the dependent measures yielded no significant differences among groups. The main anlayses consisted of three 2 (treatment) x 2 (sex) analyses of variance with repeated measures (ANOVA), using pre- and post-measures on self-control behaviors, free play ratings, and sociometric scores. Separate post hoc Tukey tests were run on each of the three main dependent measures. Results showed that children who received group play sessions outperformed those in the control group on the self-control and free play rating scales; boys in the… [PDF]
(1986). Project CHAMP, 1984-1985. OEA Evaluation Report. In 1984-1985, the second year of a three-year funding cycle, Project CHAMP provided instruction to 600 primarily Chinese-speaking students of limited English proficiency (LEP) in grades 9-12 at Seward Park, Washington Irving, and Martin Luther King, Jr. High Schools in New York, New York. Seward Park was the primary site of the project and most program staff were based there. Approximately 70 percent of the participating students were born in the People's Republic of China. Other countries of origin included Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and Korea. The program contained two instructional components. The goals of the basic component are to provide instruction in English as a Second Language (ESL), native language arts, science, mathematics, computer mathematics, and social studies. An intensive literacy component was offered at Seward Park to those students who were found to be functionally illiterate in the native languages and who lacked basic academic skills. Seward Park's…
(1985). Asian Basic 4 Adaptations. Basic 4 Food Groups. Nutrients for Health. Calcium: A Dietary Mineral. Iron: A Dietary Mineral. Guide to Good Eating. This package consists of various bilingual instructional materials for use in helping Indochinese refugees learn basic nutrition skills. Included in the package are translations in English, Vietnamese, and Lao of booklets outlining guidelines for adapting Indochinese dietary habits to incorporate foods available in the United States, including foods from the four basic food groups in the daily diet, nutrients for health, selecting foods rich in calcium, and a guide to good eating. A booklet about eating foods rich in iron is presented in English, Vietnamese, Lao, and Cambodian. (MN)…
(1980). English Language Problems of Chinese Students in South Africa. The status of English as learned and used by Chinese students in South Africa was investigated to provide perspective on the language policy. Language planners in South Africa require that all secondary school students be taught and tested through the medium of either English or Afrikaans, regardless of their mother tongue. The students are expected to achieve the same level in English as that of native speakers if they wish to enter the university. The important concern is whether English should be regarded as either the first or second language of the students, or even as a second dialect. A related criterion is literacy in the mother tongue. These issues were explored within the framework of a sociolinguistic analysis that defines the influence of certain societal factors on the students' learning of English. A questionnaire was administered to 75 secondary school students attending schools that cater to Chinese students and general public schools for all groups. Interviews with…
(1982). Issues of Language Assessment: Foundations and Research. Proceedings of the Annual Language Assessment Institute (1st, Evanston, Illinois, June 17-20, 1981). The following papers are included in this volume dealing with issues and research in language assessment: (1) "Sociolinguistic Foundations of Language Assessment," by J. L. Ornstein-Galicia; (2) "Language Proficiency Assessment: Research Findings and Their Application," by C. Rivera and C. Simich; (3) "The Role of Grammar in a Communicative Approach to Second Language Teaching and Testing," by M. Swain and M. Canale; (4) "Dilemmas in Diagnosis," by R. L. Thorndike; (5) "Language Proficiency Assessment: Issues and Definitions," by R. E. Baecher; (6) "Foreign Language and Bilingual Assessment: Issues Approaches," by P. Woodford; (7) "Integrating Language Assessment with Teaching Performance in Subject Areas," by G. D. Keller; (8) "On Assessing the Oral Language Ability of Limited-English Proficient Students: The Linguistic Bases of the Noncomparability of Different Language Proficiency Assessment… [PDF]
(1980). Cognitive Processing of Various Orthographies. In the hope of filling in a missing link for experimental psychologists' research on reading, this paper provides a general review of research on the issue of orthography and its relation to reading. The traditional classification of logographic, syllabic, and alphabetic modes are examined to see how much orthographic variations affect the processing strategy of both beginning and fluent readers. The examination leads to the hypothesis that different cognitive strategies are required to achieve reading efficiency in various writing systems. Issues connected with this hypothesis have been examined by cognitive psychologists, anthropologists, and neurolinguists. Those issues having to do particularly with bilingual literacy are reviewed: (1) reading disability incidence in syllabic and logographic systems compared with alphabetic systems, (2) neuropsychological research, (3) differential processing mechanisms and behavior consequences, (4) the process in reading of recoding the visual… [PDF]
(1981). The \Fundamental Pedogagical Principle\ in Second Language Teaching. Studia Linguistica, v35 n1-2 p50-70. A fundamental principle of second language acquisition is stated and applied to language teaching. The principle states that learners acquire a second language when they receive comprehensible input in situations where their affective filters are sufficiently low. The theoretical background of this principle consists of five hypotheses: the acquisition-learning, natural order, monitor, input, and affective filter hypotheses. The fundamental principle helps to resolve several problems in the professional literature, including the effectiveness of second language instruction and the effects of age on second language acquisition. The principal applied to pedagogy posits that any instructional technique that promotes second language acquisition does so by providing comprehensible input. This pedagogical principle can be applied to a variety of language teaching methods and settings, including the language classroom, the media, the language laboratory, subject matter teaching, and…
(1974). Classroom Instruction for Young Spanish Speakers. Exceptional Children, 41, 1, 16-9, Sep 74. …
(1974). Speech Communities and Schools. TESOL Quarterly, 8, 1, 17-26, Mar 74. Paper presented at the 1973 TESOL Convention in San Juan, Puerto Rico. (HW)…
(1977). A National Understanding: The Official Languages of Canada. The English and French languages have been in everyday use in some part of what is now Canada for almost 400 years. The constitution of Canada states that they have equal status in the Parliament and courts of Canada and in the legislature and courts of the province of Quebec. In 1969 Parliament passed the Official Languages Act, which declared that the English and French languages are the official languages of Canada for all purposes of the Government of Canada and that they possess and enjoy equality of status. This book reviews the origins of this policy and the country's experience with it. It consists of the following chapters: (1) Language, Culture and Government; (2) Language and Perspectives on Canadian History; (3) Language and Canadian Unity; (4) Principles of the Official Languages Policy of Canada; (5) Official Languages and Individual Canadians; (6) Official Languages and the Programs of the Federal Government; (7) Official Languages and the Provinces. Both English and…
(1976). The Imitation Technique: A Tool for Ascertaining an Index of Bilingualism and Bidialectalism in Primary-Grade Children through Analyses of Recoding Errors. In order to study the syntactic components which operate in the imitation and recoding of standard English by bilingual and bidialectal children, a sample of 20 multiethnic Spanish speakers and 20 black English speakers was drawn from children in the first, second, and third grades of a metropolitan bilingual program. The ability of these children to reproduce the syntactic features of the Linguistic Structures Repetition test gave an index of errors in the recoding of standard English. Results of the study show that repetition of standard English sentences by black nonstandard English-speaking children and by Spanish-speaking bilingual children is not merely mimicry of the surface structure of the utterance but is often a recoding into a first language or dialect. Teachers and teacher trainees, by noting imitations of standard English structures, can pay special attention to children's recoding processes and can become familiar with the characteristics of the linguistic production… [PDF]
(1969). The Adult Bilingual Experimental School. J Secondary Educ, 44, 5, 225-230, 69 May. …
(1981). The Mexican Approach of Developing Materials and Teaching Literacy to Bilingual Students. Bilingual literacy methods and materials used in Mexico for its linguistic minorities can also be used effectively in the United States. A system based on the techniques of Paulo Freire is being used in that country to create beginning reading materials in all the native languages of Mexico. In this method, generative words concerning foods, holidays, or practical aspects of adult life are discussed and carefully arranged from basic phonetic sounds to more complicated sounds (17 words can express all of the 24 sounds of Spanish). Students who are still deficient in basic skills but too advanced for Freire's method are taught Spanish skills while they learn English. A system, based on the generative word concept and an educational notebook discussed by Freire, was developed to teach English as a second language while reinforcing the primary language. First, problem areas are identified through evaluation of student essays and an error list is compiled, from which generative themes… [PDF]
(1980). Project C.A.P.I.S.C.O. New Utrecht High School. ESEA Title VII Final Evaluation Report, 1979-1980. This is the evaluation report for the fifth and final year of Project CAPISCO (Comprehensive Academic Program for Italian Students' Citizenship Orientation). The Title VII bilingual (Italian/English) program was carried out at New Utrecht High School, located in the Bay Ridge-Bensonhurst area of Brooklyn, New York, and served 140 students. The students participating in the program demonstrated superior performance in English reading, mathematics, science, social studies, and native (Italian) language arts. In addition, the attendance record of CAPISCO students was better than the rate for the general school population. The program's success is attributed to strong motivation on the part of the bilingual staff and to the involvement of program parents. In addition to discussing instructional activities and student achievement, this report describes administrative procedures, staff and curriculum development activities, family and supportive services, and the community relations… [PDF]
(1978). The Syntax of Bilingual Children: A Comparative Study. The interview techniques developed by Carol Chomsky were used in a comparative study of the language acquisition of 32 bilingual and monolingual third grade students. After these students were matched for age, socioeconomic status, IQ, family environment (both parents in the home), and reading ability, they were placed in four group–bilingual-high reading ability (BH), bilingual-low (BL), monolingual-high (MH), and monolingual-low (ML). Over a period of two weeks, the four boys and four girls in each group were interviewed in four situations designed to have students determine implicit subjects (ask/tell), verbs (promise/tell), underlying relationships not expressed in surface structure, and pronominalizations. The major group differences that were found for these patterns of language development were between high/low reading achievement groups, not between bilingual and monolingual children. Chomsky's major findings were confirmed, showing the late acquisition of some syntactic…