Early Immersion Teaching Principles Petra Burmeister PH Weingarten

Early Immersion: Teaching Principles Petra Burmeister (PH Weingarten) Anja Steinlen (Kiel University) E L I A S Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies Multilateral Comenius Project funded by the European Commission

Background: EU Action Plan E L I A S Mother tongue plus two foreign languages "Language competencies are part of the core of skills that every citizen needs for training, employment, cultural exchange and personal fulfilment … It is a priority for Member States to ensure that language learning in kindergarten and primary school is effective, for it is here that key attitudes towards other languages and cultures are formed, and the foundations for later language learning are laid, … in particular by teaching at least two foreign languages from a very early age. " European Commission: Promoting Language Learning and Linguistic Diversity: An Action Plan 2004 – 2006, S. 7 Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Immersion E L I A S Bilingual education through immersion method: to be "immersed" in the second language (L 2) the second language as medium of communication, not as focus of grammatical learning in bilingual preschools: all daily routines and activities in immersion schools: as classroom language [ at least 50% of content matter or daily activites are taught in L 2 (Genesee 1987, Wode 1995, Zydatiß 2000) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Immersion E L I A S Results of Canadian Immersion studies (e. g. Wesche 2002) • the content knowledge is not negatively affected • the development of the first language does not suffer • attainment in second language is much higher than in traditional foreign language teaching • more positive socio psychological attitudes • suited both for strong and weak learners enhancement of language and general cognitive skills without negative effects for content knowledge and first language Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Early L 2 Learning: Rationales E L I A S Preschool children Ø learn a L 2 like they learn their L 1: by observing and listening and while doing things in/with the L 2, Ø learn the L 2 implicitly, as a "by product", Ø are not able to consciously organize the learning process (the brain constructs the language), Ø love to sing along, to play with language, to imitate "The L 2 grammar emerges" ! (Subconscious process) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Comprehensible Input E L I A S "Understanding occurs when input. . . is comprehensible, and input becomes comprehensible when it is supported by concrete experiences, visuals, realia, and nonverbal communication that assist in conveying meaning. " (Lorenz & Met 1989: 37) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Comprehensible Input E L I A S The Teacher needs to contextualize the L 2 Ø non verbally via gestures, facial expressions, body language, pantomime, Ø verbally via "reference language": deictic terms, "ear catchers" like "Oh, look at this!", stress and intonation Ø with media: realia, pictures, films The relation between the language and the situation has to be clearly VISIBLE at all times! Method: "silent movie-technique" (e. g. Burmeister 2006 a, b, c, 2007; Burmeister & Steinlen 2008; Lyster 2007; Snow 1990; Weber & Tardif 1991) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Comprehensible Input E L I A S Media: picture books flash cards crafts fotos objects films etc. (Akerman & Thomas 2009) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

A Rich Learning Environment E L I A S Experiential Learning / Learning via Exploring: Language becomes more meaningful in activities which enable children to explore the content grasp the concepts apply their knowledge and skills Provision of Learning Centers with interesting experiments etc. The children can demonstrate that they have understood the concept (also non verbally)! Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Comprehensible Output E L I A S Negotiation of Meaning The teacher should provide the children with ample opportunity Ø to interact verbally (L 1 and L 2) Ø to express themselves (verbally and non verbally) (e. g. Day & Shapson 1991; Harley 1993; Long 1996, Lyster 2007; Met 1999; Snow 1989; Swain 1985, 1988, 2001) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Language Scaffolds E L I A S The teacher needs to provide scaffolds to support the children‘s learning: Organizational scaffolds, e. g. : Ø daily routines (weather, tidy up time, morning circle) Ø bells, pictures, symbols as signals Language scaffolds Ø formulaic expressions Ø songs, rhymes as signals Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

The L 2 -Native Speaker Teacher E L I A S uses the L 2 only talks constantly (language and actions belong together) does not "simplify" the L 2, but provides lexically and structurally rich input speaks more slowly at times to emphasize an utterance does not translate the L 2 into the L 1 but translates the child‘s L 1 utterance into the L 2 models, expands, paraphrases the children‘s L 2 utterances (Tardif 1994) recasts, that is, she takes up the child‘s utterance and provides a correct model encourages the children to sing along, to use the L 2 but she never "forces" them Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

The Children E L I A S are able to understand what is going on provided the input is comprehensible (i. e. contextualized) are able to identify single words or phrases in the respective context are used to not understand every single word answer in their L 1 during the first year sing along in the L 2 very soon need some time before they creatively produce language 'code mix' (Gib' mir mal die milk. ), make errors and do not bother with corrections Most of the mistakes are examples of systematic learner errors (e. g. he *wented) and show that the children are on the right track. (Wode 1988/1993) Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

The Development of the L 2 English in German Preschools E L I A S The children Ø "understand" what is going on already after a few days Ø use first words / short phrases after approx. three months (apart from songs and rhymes) Ø at the end of the year, they might produce first „own“ sentences Inter and intraindividual variation is high due to different activity preferences and varying L 2 contact time. So far, no differences between girls and boys with regard to language development have been observed. The comprehension of words and of grammatical elements lexicon grow significantly (comprehension preceeds production). Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

The Development of the L 2 English in German Preschools E L I A S Examples Researcher: Show me the mouth! Child: Die Maus is nich da. [The mouse is not there. ] Researcher: Look at the ducks over there! Child: Das ist doch kein Dachs! [That's not a badger!] Child: Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Eric is red, Paul is dead – and Tini is fat! Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Golden Rules for a Successful Early Immersion Experience: Ø Ø Ø Ø E L I A S The parents are enthusiastic about Immersion and believe in the program take interest in what the child tells them about the program take part in preschool activities read to their children in the L 1 on a regular basis (verbally) interact with their children encourage their child to use the L 2, but do not make him/her produce the L 2 for friends etc. work together with the preschool teachers Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Selected References E L I A S Akerman, S. & Thomas, S. (2009). Green Immersion: Magdeburg‘s Bilingual Zoo Kindergarten. Paper presented at EZE, Cologne: Zoological Garden Cologne. Burmeister, P. (2006 a). Immersion und Sprachunterricht im Vergleich. In: M. Pienemann, J. U. Keßler & E. Roos. (eds. ). Englischerwerb in der Grundschule. Ein Lehr und Arbeitsbuch. Paderborn: Schöningh/UTB, 197 216. Burmeister, P. (2006 b). Frühbeginnende Immersion. In: Jung, U. (ed. ) Praktische Handreichung für Fremdsprachenlehrer. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 385 391. Burmeister, P. (2006 c). Bilingualer Unterricht in der Grundschule. In: J. P. Timm (ed. ). Fremdsprachenlernen und Fremdsprachenforschung: Kompetenzen, Standards, Lernformen, Evaluation. Tübingen: Narr, 197 212. Burmeister, P. (2007). Fremdsprachliches Sachfachlernen im Anfangsunterricht. Take off! Zeitschrift für frühes Englischlernen, 1, 2007, 6 9. Burmeister, P. & Steinlen, A. (2008). Sprachstandserhebungen in bilingualen Kindertagesstätten. In: G. Blell & R. Kupetz (eds. ). Fremdsprachenlehren und –lernen. Prozesse und Reformen. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. 129 146. Day, E. M. & Shapson, S. M. (1991). Integrating formal and functional approaches to lan guage teaching in French immersion: an ex perimental study. Language Learning 41 (1), 25 58. Genesee, F. (1987). Learning through two languages: Studies of immersion and bilingual education. Cambridge, MA: Newbury House. Harley, B. (1993). Instructional strategies and SLA in early French immersion. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 15, 245 259. Krashen, S. D. (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon. Long, M. H. (1996). “The role of the linguistic environment in second language acquisition”. In: Ritchie, W. C. & T. K. Bhatia (eds. ), Handbook of second language acquisition. San Diego, CA: Academic Press. 413 468. Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Selected References E L I A S Lorenz, E. , Met, M. (1989). What it means to be an immersion teacher. Rockville, MD: Office of Instruction and Program Development, Montgomery County Public Schools. Lyster, R. (2007). Learning and Teaching Languages through Content. A counterbalanced approach. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Met, M. (1999). Content based instruction: de fining terms, making decisions. NFLC Re ports. Washington, DC, The National For eign Language Center. http: //www. carla. umn. edu/cobaltt/modules/principles/decisions. html; Zugriff vom 6. 1. 2006. Peregoy, S. F. (1991). Environmental scaffolds and learner responses in a two way Spanish immersion kindergarten. The Canadian Modern Language Review, 47, 3, 463 476. Rohde, A. (2005). Lexikalische Prinzipien im Erst und Zweitspracherwerb. Trier: WVT. Snow, M. A. (1989). Negotiation of meaning in the Immersion Classroom. In: E. B. Lorenz & M. Met (Hrsg. ). Negotiation of meaning. Teacher's activity manual. Rockville, Md. : Montgomery County Public Schools. Snow, M. A. (1990). Instructional methodology in immersion foreign language education. In: A. M. Padilla, H. H. Fairchild & C. M. Valadez (Hrsg. ). Foreign language education. Issues and strategies. Newbury Park, Ca. : Sage, 156 171. Stevens, F. (1983). Activities to promote learning and communication in the second language classroom. TESOL Quarterly 17 (2), 259 272. Swain, M. (1985). Communicative competence: Some roles of comprehensible input and comprehensible output in its development. In: S. Gass & C. Madden (Hrsg. ). Input in second language acquisition. New York: Newbury House, 235 253. Swain, M. (1988). Manipulating and com plementing content teaching to maximize second language learning. TESL Canada Journal/Revue TESL Du Canada 6 (1), 68 83. Swain, M. (2001). Integrating language and con tent teaching through collaborative tasks. The Canadian Modern Language Review 58 (1), 44 63. Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

Selected References E L I A S Tardif, C. (1994). Classroom teacher talk in early immersion. The Canadian Modern Language Review 50, 3, 466 481. Weber, S. & Tardif, C. (1991). Assessing L 2 Competency in Early Immersion Classrooms. The Canadian Modern Language Review, 47, 5, 219 234. Wode, H. (1988/1993). Psycholinguistik: Eine Einführung in die Lehr und Lernbarkeit von Sprachen. Ismaning: Hueber. Wode, H. (1995). Lernen in der Fremdsprache: Grundzüge von Immersion und bilingualem Unterricht. Ismaning: Hueber. Wode, H. (2001). Multilingual education in Europe: What can preschools contribute? In S. Björklund (Ed. ), Language as a tool immersion research and practices. Vaasa: Proceedings of the University of Vaasa, Reports, 424 446. Zydatiß, W. (2000). Bilingualer Unterricht in der Grundschule: Entwurf eines Spracherwerbskonzepts für zweisprachige Immersionsprogramme. Ismaning: Hueber. Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies

E L I A S www. elias. bilikita. org The ELIAS project has been funded with support from the European Commission. Disclaimer: This product reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Petra Burmeister, Anja Steinlen Early Immersion: Teaching Principles © Early Language and Intercultural Acquisition Studies