The widely decontextualised educational language, its abstraction from everyday relations and its exemption from personal-dialogical communication have lead the Canadian researcher Jim Cummins to distinguish between „basic interpersonal communication skills“ (BICS) and „cognitive-academic language proficiency“ (CALP). Against this conceptual backdrop, educational discourse is seen to focus on CALP, a language with higher cognitive requirements, lower contextual transparency and a higher demand for abstraction. It presupposes on behalf of the students a differentiated vocabulary, the ability and coherence to discern and articulate, as well as the competence in dealing with complex linguistic structures. According to Gogolin, Kaiser, Roth et al. 2004, in evaluating the relationship between linguistic competence and educational achievement it is less relevant to focus on the students’ general linguistic resources than on CALP-related, hence educational specific, capabilities and strategies. In their research on Turkish-German and Russian-German students and their linguistic, as well as mathematical competence, a correlation was found between the successful verbalisation of a mathematical problem and the reaching of its correct solution.
A six-year project following a German-Portuguese bilingual class in Hamburg learning in a dual language program provided data related to several aspects of these students’ linguistic acquisition. This paper, however, aims to examine the type of relations which can be derived from the students’ semantic, syntactic and discoursive structure and their achievement at school. Therefore, the students were asked to compose a narrative text having a series of images as prompt. The data were treated both quantitatively and qualitatively with special relevance given to the students’ linguistic resources in a CALP-related perspective.
Table of Contents
1. Preliminary considerations: language and school achievement in Germany
2. The bilingual project in Hamburg: oral cognitive-academic language at the end of the fourth grade
3. The bilingual project in Hamburg: written cognitive academic language at the end of the sixth grade. A comparison
4. Conclusions
Objectives and Research Themes
This paper aims to examine the relationship between the semantic, syntactic, and discoursive structures of students' language and their academic achievement within a dual-language educational program. It specifically focuses on the acquisition of "cognitive-academic language proficiency" (CALP) as a prerequisite for success in the German school system.
- Comparison of linguistic development in bilingual versus monolingual student groups.
- Distinction between colloquial language (BICS) and academic language (CALP).
- Evaluation of narrative text composition as a measure of academic linguistic competence.
- Analysis of the impact of continuous bilingual education on student performance in reading and mathematics.
- Assessment of the importance of the students’ first language within a two-way bilingual model.
Excerpt from the Book
1. Preliminary considerations: language and school achievement in Germany
In 1979 Cummins distinguished between basic interpersonal communicative skills and cognitive academic language proficiency. The intention of such a distinction was towards to clarify the different time periods typically required by immigrant children to acquire conversational fluency in their second language as compared to grade-appropriate academic proficiency. Conversational fluency is often achieved at a functional level within about two years of initial exposure to the second language, whereas at least five years are commonly required to equal native speakers in academic aspects of the second language (Collier, 1987; Klesmer, 1994; Cummins, 1981a). Failure to take account of the BICS/CALP (conversational/academic) distinction has resulted in discriminatory psychological assessment of bilingual students and premature exit from language support programs into mainstream classes (Cummins, 1984).
In all migration countries, the school achievement of immigrant children is an issue which is often brought in relation with their linguistic situation. However, beyond language, many other factors can influence the school performance of such groups, such as, discrimination, conflicts or school selection mechanisms. In Germany, the level of school achievement of immigrant children is strikingly lower than that of monolingual German students. In the school year 2000/01, for example, 20,3% of the students with a migratory background left school without a certificate and 40% attained not more than the graduation at a Hauptschule. Regarding their entrance in the professional world, the amount of apprentices has been continuously decreasing in the last years; from 9,6% in 1996 to 7,1% in 2000 (cf. Neumann, 2003).
Summary of Chapters
1. Preliminary considerations: language and school achievement in Germany: This chapter introduces the distinction between BICS and CALP and discusses the systemic educational challenges faced by immigrant students in the German school system.
2. The bilingual project in Hamburg: oral cognitive-academic language at the end of the fourth grade: This section details a scientific evaluation of a two-way bilingual model, analyzing the relationship between oral linguistic structures and school performance.
3. The bilingual project in Hamburg: written cognitive academic language at the end of the sixth grade. A comparison: This chapter investigates written narrative competencies through the "Tulpenbeet-test," comparing bilingual and monolingual students across different academic levels.
4. Conclusions: The final chapter synthesizes the findings, confirming that school success is closely linked to the mastery of academic linguistic registers rather than general colloquial proficiency.
Keywords
Second language acquisition, CALP, BICS, bilingual education, school achievement, German school system, cognitive-academic language, linguistic repertoire, narrative production, migration, educational attainment, syntactic complexity, academic style, primary education, linguistic competence.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the core focus of this research?
The research examines the relationship between students' academic achievement and their proficiency in cognitive-academic language (CALP), specifically investigating how bilingual education models influence this development.
Which central themes are explored?
The primary themes include the transition from conversational fluency to academic proficiency, the role of institutional factors in immigrant student performance, and the effectiveness of dual-language programs.
What is the main objective of the paper?
The objective is to determine whether success in school is more dependent on a specific academic linguistic register than on general language proficiency, using empirical data from bilingual classes in Hamburg.
Which scientific methods are applied?
The study employs a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods, including factor analysis of linguistic features, narrative text assessment, and comparative analysis of performance across different student groups.
What does the main body cover?
The main body covers the theoretical distinction between BICS and CALP, the methodology and results of the bilingual Hamburg project regarding both oral and written academic language, and empirical performance correlations.
Which keywords characterize this work?
Key terms include BICS/CALP, bilingual education, school achievement, linguistic register, cognitive-academic language, and second language acquisition.
What is the "Tulpenbeet-test"?
It is a specific narrative competence assessment tool using a series of images as a visual prompt to evaluate students' development and usage of written cognitive-academic language.
What conclusion does the author draw regarding bilingual education?
The author concludes that bilingual education is highly beneficial, as it balances socio-economic and cultural differences and fosters a higher degree of linguistic abstraction necessary for school success.
- Quote paper
- Joana Duarte (Author), 2008, Linguistic structure and educational achievement in second language acquisition, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/139167
