Strategies for supporting mother tongue of early years and elementary students  

Oleh:

Langit-Dursin, Richel

Jenis: Article from Proceeding
Dalam koleksi: CONEST 12: The Twelfth Conference on English Studies, Jakarta, Unika Atma Jaya, page 7-12.
Topik: early years; elementary students; language policy; mother tongue
Fulltext: 7-12.pdf (86.84KB)

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Perpustakaan PKBB Nomor Panggil: 406 CES 12 Non-tandon: tidak ada Tandon: 1

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Several studies have shown that a strong mother tongue supports the learning of another language. Students who maintain their proficiency in their mother tongue have been found to be learning other languages quickly. Worldwide, schools implementing the International Baccalaureate (IB) programmes are required to support the mother tongue of their students. Students studying in IB schools come from different nationalities and language backgrounds. Languages spoken as mother tongue by students of IB schools include Bahasa Indonesia, Chinese, English, Filipino, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, and Spanish. This qualitative research was conducted to investigate the different strategies used by schools implementing the IB Primary Years Programme (PYP) to support mother tongue development of students. Involved in the study were 23 IB PYP schools in Asia-Pacific. Data collected from the schools were language policies, language profile of students, and school background. The language policies served as the main source of data for the research. The language policies shared by schools offering the IB PYP indicated the strategies that they use in supporting mother tongue development of students in early years and elementary. Interviews with teachers and class visits were also carried out to collect information about the different strategies utilized by schools in supporting the home languages of students. Out of the 23 IB schools, 12 are located in Indonesia; four in China; two in Australia; two in India; one in Bangkok; one in Hong Kong; and another one in the Philippines. Investigating the various ways used by schools implementing IB PYP to support mother tongue development will help create a resource bank of strategies for maintaining heritage languages of students. Results of the study revealed that the schools do not implement an English-only policy and their common strategies are to provide books in the students’ mother tongue, allow students to use their native languages during lessons and school events, and encourage parents to talk and read to their children in their mother tongue. The other approaches applied by schools include putting up classroom displays and signs in students’ first languages, conducting mother tongue classes, and translating school documents and letters in the students’ native languages. Employing teachers who can speak the students’ home languages, placing students in classes with other children who speak the same language as they do, letting students maintain mother tongue diaries, using available resources from the community such as embassies, and observing events celebrating linguistic and cultural diversity are the other ways put into practice by schools to foster mother tongue development.

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