“It Makes Me Smarter”: Exploratory World Language Instruction in Catholic Elementary Schools

Brigid M. Burke & Eric D. HowardBowling Green State University

Introduction

Our collaboration● In 2011, began as a supplementary case study in order to earn honors

credit in EDTL 2290 (Introduction to Teaching and Learning of Foreign Languages)○ (2011) Kindergartners Learning French in an Urban Elementary

School: Making the Case for Exploratory World Language Education

● Validated further research, led to a BGSU Honors Project (in progress)

● Branched off into (2014) It Makes Me Smarter: Exploratory World Language Instruction in Catholic Elementary Schools

Partnership with Catholic Schools● 4 Catholic Schools (since Fall 2010)

● Connected through teachers and colleagues

● Administration very supportive and interested

● Two schools: St. Arthur’s and St. Gertrude’s○ Elementary focus for my course○ After 1 year, St Arthur’s hired Spanish teacher 7th-8th ○ After 1 year, St. Gertrude’s hired Spanish teacher 6th-8th

Problem● WL learning seen as too advanced or not as important as

core subjects for young children

● Typically, language learning begins in middle school or high school in the US (Pufahl, Rhodes & Christian, 2001)

● Children missing out on opportunity to learn WLs

● Children are rarely, if ever, consulted

Problem● �Young children are missing out on an important

opportunity to get a head start learning world languages

● World language educators and researchers are not doing enough to understand and advocate for world language learning for younger children

Pilot Study (Results)● Overall positive feelings toward FLEX program

● Desire to learn other languages, become smarter

I love learning languages...Daddy said I need to keep learning new languages...it makes me smart (Nicholas, kindergarten)

● Language learning is fun

● Students understood communicative goals of learning languages○ Socio-cultural competence○ Travel and communicate with others○ Mentioned basic principles of immersion

Pilot Study (Results)● Teacher methods make it fun

○ Manipulatives○ SMART Board○ Games○ Addition and Subtraction Problems, Content-Based Instruction

(Curtain & Haas, 1995)

● Language learning is challenging, “hard”

Pilot Study (Conclusions)● Kindergarteners were capable of and enthusiastic about language

learning

● Teacher and presentation of material is important (Krashen, 1981; Yao, 2002)

● Both novice and experienced learners developed linguistically○ Experienced learners developed confidence○ Certain novice students still required more scaffolding

Pilot Study (Conclusions)● Exploratory language learning is essential

● In accordance with the findings of Navarro-Villarroel (2011), children…○ view languages as a way to connect with other people○ want to understand other cultures○ understand importance of learning world languages○ recognize and appreciate the difficulty of language

learning

Purpose of present studyTo advance our understanding of:

● the general attitude of elementary-age language learners after experiencing significant exploratory WL instruction

● language acquisition/learning capability as a result of FLEX

Research questions1) What effect, if any, does exploratory world language instruction have on children’s acquisition of a world language?

2) What effect, if any, does exploratory world language instruction have on children’s attitude towards learning world languages and about cultures?

The hypothesis was that structured and continuous instruction would result in a more positive and expressive outlook on learning new languages and experiencing different cultures for elementary students.

Relevant Literature

Acquisition● Conventional wisdom (Tye, 2000) in the U.S. discourages WL instruction

before middle school○ Committee of Ten (1894) established first national education

standards○ Resulting depreciation in the value of WL education in the U.S.

● Children who begin learning WLs at an earlier age (<11) more likely to develop long-term proficiency equal to that of native speakers (Muñoz, 2011)

● “Children’s early mastery of language requires learning in a social context” (Kuhl, 2011, p. 128)○ School is the ultimate social context for children

Acquisition vs. LearningAcquisition (Krashen, 1982): a subconscious acceptance of linguistic knowledge that is stored in the brain through natural communication● meaningful, natural interaction > linguistic code or form● how children learn native languages● basically, you know language without thinking about it

Learning (Krashen, 1982): the conscious acceptance of linguistic knowledge about a language (i.e. grammar or form)● viewed as less important than acquisition for long-term proficiency● typically the product of formal language instruction● basically, you have to think about language you want to use beforehand

CompetenceCommunicative Competence (Canale, 1983; Canale & Swain, 1980; Savignon, 1997): the ability to function in a truly communicative setting, in a dynamic exchange in which linguistic competence must adapt itself to the total informational input, both linguistic and paralinguistic, of one or more interlocutors. ● grammatical● sociolinguistic● discourse● strategic

CompetenceCommunicative Proficiency (ACTFL, 2013): the ability to use language for real-world purposes in meaningful and culturally significant contexts.● communication● cultures● connections● comparisons● communities

Translingual/Transcultural Competence (Byrnes, 2008): the capacity of language learners to operate between two languages. Students are educated to function as independent, capable interlocutors with educated native speakers. Students are also encouraged to examine their worldview, how they view foreign cultures and how those cultures view them.

Communicative activity & IPACommunicative Activities (CAs) (Ellis, 1982, 1997; Burke, 2006, 2010): tasks in a language classroom designed to promote communicative competence.● communication purpose● focus on message over linguistic code● must be a gap (information or opinion)● opportunity for meaning negotiation● participants choose the resources required for performing the task

Integrated Performance Assessment (IPA) (Adair-Hauck et. al., 2006): assessment of student progress based on ACTFL learning standards. Creates an authentic situation with three separate, yet interrelated phases (CAs) that each focus on interpretive, interpersonal, presentational communication.

Attitude● Young students in immersive WL programs develop more positive attitudes

about world languages and different cultures than children of similar age who are taught in English-only classrooms (Navarro-Villarroel, 2011)

● 5 influential factors of children's’ attitude toward SLL (Yao, 2002)○ peer relationships○ schools and teachers○ parental involvement○ television programs○ linguistic factors

Attitude ● Self-esteem critical to successful language development

(Piechurska-Kuciel & Szymanska-Czaplak, 2013)

● Attitude and aptitude of WL learning act independently (Krashen, 1981)

● “When the practical value of second language proficiency is high, and frequent use necessary, instrumental motivation may be a powerful predictor of second language acquisition” (Krashen, 1981)

MotivationFlow: a state of mind during which teenagers derive great joy from a rigorously challenging, yet accomplishable task (high challenge, high skill) (Csikszentmihályi & Schneider, 2000)

○ Most rewarding educational experiences○ Applicable at elementary level○ Skill level is naturally high, opportune time for WL

learning (Muñoz, 2011)

Methodology

Context● Medium-sized university in the Midwest● Program supported by teachers and administrators who agreed to host

● St. Arthur’s (230 students)○ suburban/university town○ pre-K through 8 school○ 90% White, 9% Hispanic, .4% Black

● St Gertrude’s (421 students)○ urban area○ pre-K through 8 school○ 60.3% White, 36.6% Black, 2.6% Hispanic

http://www.movoto.com

Participants-Students● Eight 2nd graders (St. Arthur’s) and eight 4th graders (St. Gertrude’

s)

● Various backgrounds, some with multilingual heritage, some without

● Experienced about 8 months of continuous FLEX Spanish instruction from the same teacher (Srta Carmen or Srta Theresa)

● Several students (from St Arthur’s) had experienced previous instruction in French at the exploratory level (K & 1st grade)

Participants-Parents

● Parents of various backgrounds, with different native languages (English, Korean, Spanish, Russian)

● Mostly received questionnaire data from one parent of each student

● Two students had both parents respond

Participants-Pre-Service Teachers“Carmen”● no prior experience before intro methods course● taught 2nd grade Spanish at St. Arthur’s from October

2012-May 2013

“Teresa”● no prior experience before intro methods course● taught 4th grade Spanish at St. Gertrude’s from October

2012-May 2013

Data collection-studentsFocus group interviews

❏ 3 students per group to minimize any fears ❏ Both researchers present to facilitate❏ 45 minutes❏ Tape-recorded❏ Questions were prepared

❏ FLEX Interview Questions

Data collection-parentsOpen-ended questionnaire❏ 21 open-ended questions about students’ attitude,

parents’ attitude, students’ acquisition

❏ Parent FLEX Questionnaire

Data collection-PSTsOpen-ended questionnaire❏ 19 questions about what they taught, what they thought

students learned, liked, disliked❏ PST FLEX Questionnaire

Online blog discussions❏ Open-ended online discussions with classmates and

Prof. Burke❏ Only during October-December

Data analysisConstant comparison method (Glaser and Strauss, 1967, 1999) ➢ compared and contrasted, coded student interview data,

parent questionnaire data, PST blogs and questionnaire data individually (triangulation)

➢ categories➢ compared and contrasted, coded across data sources

(triangulation)➢ categories and sub-categories

Data analysisTwo main categories

LEARNING❖ Acquisition❖ Communicative competence❖ Cultural proficiency❖ Communicative proficiency❖ Transcultural competence

ATTITUDE/MOTIVATION

Data analysisSubcategories/themes

LEARNING/ACQUISITION

ABCs, Numbers, Colors, Food, Animals

Communicative activities*

Games, Greetings, Conversations (student-student)

Culture (not mentioned in pilot with K)

Data analysisATTITUDE & MOTIVATION

Positive feedback about learning WL*

Challenging

Heritage

Goal is to communicate

Important for travel* (PSTs did not note this)

Results

Learning and Acquisition

ABCs and AnimalsABCs➢ Students with prior experience (class or heritage) did

better when asked to recite

Animals➢ Both classes mentioned learning➢ “..if you go to Spain you can tell people you have a dog”➢ Liked learning animals with Srta. Teresa (Bingo)

Numbers*● 2nd and 4th graders, and K in pilot study knew at least

#1-10○ 7 out of 8 2nd graders (Carmen’s students) able to

count higher○ 5 out of 8 2nd graders counted in 2-3 languages

(French, Spanish, German)

● Most parents did not seem to think to get them to count beyond 10 (only 3 did)

Colors● Varied in ability

○ Average was 5 colors, Range 1-10

● 2nd graders seemed to remember more

● Parents’ data confirmed all but one (2nd grader) was able to name some colors○ Only 8 students’ parents actually recorded colors○ 1 parent noted “She remembers the rainbow”

Food● Not very specific about what they know

● Discussed lessons○ “...like sometimes she’d put us in groups and we’d

get boards and she’d hold up a food [item] and we’d have to write it down on the board” (Julie, 4th)

○ “my favorite category she taught us about is food because I like to eat” (Junior, 4th)

Food“the whole class remembers that carne is meat...because it kind of sounds like carnivore (Richard, 2nd)

(Favorite Lesson) “Food! She taught us like spaghetti and all the different foods...chicken and steak...she got these plastic foods out and she’d say the Spanish word and we’d have to hold it up” (Maddie, 4th)

Communicative activities* (CAs)★ Student to Student, Teacher to Class/Students,

Students/Class to Teacher (Burke, 2012; Savignon, 2002)

★ Target language is used by students and teacher (Burke, 2010)

★ 3 types were discussed○ Games○ Greetings○ Conversation (student to student)

CAs--Games ➢ Board games (4th grade)

➢ Bingo (4th grade)

➢ Food identification game (4th grade)

➢ Monster drawings (2nd grade)

Actividad Monstruo“While creating their monster, they had to label the body parts along with how many of each, i.e. 4 brazos, 9 piernas, 5 ojos. After the monsters were finished, the groups presented their monster to the class and pointed out each body part. They really enjoyed this lesson because it involved a fun game where they got to get up out of their seats along with a chance to be creative and work in groups.” (Carmen, 2nd grade teacher, questionnaire)

“We drew a bunch of monsters. Each pod had a monster. We were learning body parts.” (2nd graders)

Favorite lessons→ GamesWith Srta. Teresa Gertrude #1: 28:30 Gertrude #2: 20:30

“she like makes learning Spanish fun...she makes it fun and funny and stuff….she makes learning exciting...she lets us play games...she had us write down on the board and hold it up...and she let us play Spanish Bingo and that was really fun” (Junior, 4th)

“I liked the little games she did...my favorite game was when we had the boards and she’d hold up the play food or she’d put it up on the board and you’d have to write it down and whoever got it first got a point” (Julie)

CAs--Greetings/Conversation2nd graders (both parents and students)➢ Hola, Buenos dias, Gracias, Como estas➢ Hola, Bonjour Senorita➢ Adios

4th graders (both parents and students)➢ Buenos dias➢ Como estas, Muy bien“students are able to greet one another, introduce themselves, and ask how one another are doing” (Julie)

Gertrude #1: 44:15 Gertrude #2: 34:07

CultureParents: (did not record much) Day of the Dead, Cinco de Mayo, Fiesta

Students: Day of the Dead, food, music, Feliz Navidad, Happy Birthday, Fiesta

It seems PSTs did not focus on culture for themes

Teresa did lesson for Day of Dead, making skulls

Attitude and Motivation

Positive feelings

Enjoy, Like, Appreciate, Fun, Cool

Like learning/Like learning language

Want to learn more

Gertrude #1: 10:25; 11:11; 11:49

Challenging-students“it’s cool and all but it’s very difficult...like the first day I knew what she was talking about but when it went on and on I was like huh?...I like that I’m learning a different language” (Emily, 4th)

“when I don’t know what she’s saying and then I’m confused and I’ll probably get a check for not having the right materials (Phillip, 4th)

“when she talked I didn’t know what she was talking about sometimes...she would call on me and I didn’t know what to say (Julie, 4th)

“it’s difficult...hand gestures would make it easier and having people act out what she says” (Emily, 4th)

Gertrude #1: 10:54; 12:22

Challenging-students“at first it was a little hard but then it got a little easy…this year Spanish was a little hard, because it was…just learning it was a little hard…in kindergarten it was hard doing French but when I got to 1st grade it was a little easy because we did it already in kindergarten” (Richard, 2nd)

“it’s just kind of fun to like speak like different words or something...sometimes it’s kind of a challenge, but I still like it” (Alex, 2nd)

“well some of them [the lessons] were hard for me...I think the clothes were kind of hard” (Alex, 2nd)

“the siblings were kind of hard...we drew family members on a piece of paper and then we had to label them in Spanish (2nd grader)

Challenging-parents“She likes Spanish class. She did not like Spanish club because it was boring.” (4th grade parent)

“Yes, [she likes learning Spanish] because she can learn different languages and because it’s hard sometimes.” (4th grade parent)

“she likes learning new things--sometimes it is very hard” (4th grade parent)

“he is afraid of miscommunication” (2nd grade parent)

Heritage Many parents were from other countries, studied or worked abroad, spoke other languages

“She is Spanish and half her family is Spanish….Christina’s experience is a little different from the rest of the other students in her class. She has been raised in a bilingual household and our relatives are from Spain. She loves going to Spain and can communicate fluently with her relatives and friends there. We really appreciate that she is learning Spanish at school. I think she values the language more now!” (4th grade parent)

“My mom likes when I Iearn new languages...she knows a lot of Russian...she speaks Russian and Spanish at the same time” (Emily, 4th)

Heritage“My mom, she’s from Mexico too because my grandma is...she likes it because sometimes she talks to me in Spanish and she expects me to talk back” (Julie, 4th)

“My dad thinks it’s cool when I Iearned French because he went to France...he said it was really cool there and he wants to take me there...my grandma went to Spain once with my grandpa too” (Richard, 2nd)

“I travel lots of different places...just a warning, it takes an overnight to get to Austria...I took a 747” (Alex, 2nd)

Other languages mentioned: Russian, Greek, Indonesian, Chinese, Korean, Italian, German

Important--communication“when I go somewhere and everyone is speaking a different language I should know how to communicate with them” (Emily, 4th)

“i would like to learn how to get into more of a conversation” (Emily, 4th)

“like maybe if one day someone spoke Spanish...if someone tried to speak Spanish if I learned Spanish I’d be able to understand what they’re saying” (Junior, 4th)

“my mom I think she likes that I’m learning new languages so that I can relate to other people” (Junior, 4th)

Important-communication“if someone asks you something you would know how to respond” (Claire, 2nd)

“when I go all those different places I’ll know how to get in conversations with people and stuff” (Alex, 2nd)

“They [my parents] think it’s awesome that I’m learning different languages...they know the languages that I’m learning so they want to speak them with me” (Ryan, 2nd)

“like it’s pretty cool to learn different languages so you always don’t have to speak the same...it gets boring sometimes...like one time I was talking to my mom in Spanish and she was like what did you say?” (Jessica, 2nd)

Important--travel“if you go someplace like Mexico and you didn’t know Spanish you’d have a hard time communicating” (Addie, 4th)

“before [I travel] I’d have to learn more to actually have a conversation with somebody...if I have to go somewhere I want to know how to speak the languages so I don’t have a hard time” (Emily, 4th)

“if Srta Teresa came back to teach us more, then maybe I could actually have conversations with people there...I could understand what they’re saying and they could understand me” (Junior, 4th)

Important--travel“because if I go to any of those places I’ll know how to say it” (Richard, 2nd)

“it’s awesome because my dad says we’re going to take a vacation to a different country and I want to be able to speak to other people” (James, 2nd)

“when you go places like that you know how to communicate with other people and stuff...it’s kind of fun to liek speak like different words or something” (Alex, 2nd)

“if I went to the Spanish part of New York I would be able to speak...like how to have like conversations with people” (Richard, 2nd)

Discussion

Research questions1) What effect, if any, does exploratory world language instruction have on children’s acquisition of a world language?

2) What effect, if any, does exploratory world language instruction have on children’s attitude towards learning world languages and about cultures?

Learning (acquisition)● Elements of both acquisition and learning (Krashen, 1981)

seen to promote development of communicative competence

● Teacher methods greatly impacted student learning and were mentioned often by students (Krashen, 1981)○ CAs (Burke, 2012; Savignon, 2002)

■ Games■ Actividad Monstruo■ Greetings■ Conversation

Learning (acquisition)● Evidence of development of communicative competence at a basic level

(Canale, 1983; Canale & Swain, 1980; Savignon, 1997) ○ Greetings○ Conversation

● Support for school as an appropriate social context for learning (Kuhl, 2011)

● Inconclusive results concerning long-term proficiency, but is not typically the goal with FLEX (Muñoz, 2011)○ FLEX Goal: provide limited exposure to one or more foreign

languages at the pre-secondary level

Attitude and Motivation● Concept of flow (Csikszentmihályi & Schneider, 2000)

very prevalent○ Students found great enjoyment in language

learning, many wish to continue○ Still acknowledged that it is challenging○ Supports the implementation FLEX programs at the

elementary level, refuting conventional wisdom (Tye, 2000) that says otherwise

Attitude and Motivation● Students were very open to the idea of learning new

languages and traveling to places with cultures and people different from those found in the U.S. (Navarro-Villarroel, 2011)

● Many (if not all) of Yao’s (2002) motivational factors were mentioned during the interviews by students, however, new factors appeared as well○ Desire to communicate with, and learn about, people of

other cultures○ Learning new languages is important to travel

Conclusion

Conclusions● Results corroborate those of the pilot study, suggesting that FLEX

programs are beneficial to elementary students, who are○ enthusiastic about language learning○ capable of developing communicative competence○ willing to learn about other people and cultures related to the

target language

● Large impact of the teacher and methods on both learning and attitude

● Students are aware of the communicative and cultural aspects of language

Conclusions● In the US, we should be starting World Language

instruction earlier, in early and elementary school when students are motivated

● Is it too late to provide this opportunity in 6th-12th grade?

● Would this help motivation and possibility for advanced-level proficiencies and higher?

● Is waiting until college too late to promote transcultural competence?

Thank you

for coming to our presentation

&

for supporting WL learning at the elementary level!

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