Dr. Mila Schwartz milasch@bgu.ac.il Sixth Heritage Language Research Institute UCLA, June, 2012

1. ‘First Language First Approach’ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development Dr. Mila Schwartz milasch@bgu.ac.il Sixth Heritage Language Research Institute UCLA, June, 2012

2. Talk outline • Second generation Russian Jewish immigrants in Israel: A socio-cultural background and parents’ acculturation characteristics

3. Talk outline • Language Policy in Israel

4. Talk outline • Project “'First Language First Approach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “

5. Talk outline • Rationalization of the 'First Language First Approach’ • Negotiation between teachers and parents on challenges of the existing language model

6. Talk outline • Assessing the effect of the 'First Language First Approach‘ on children's development in Russian L1 and Hebrew L2 in lexical knowledge domain

7. Second generation Russian Jewish immigrants in Israel: A socio-cultural background and parents’ acculturation characteristics Demographic characteristic • The last wave of Russian Jewish immigration to Israel was massive and intensive. Over 835,000 immigrants, arrived between 1989 and 1999.

8. Second generation Russian Jewish immigrants in Israel: A socio-cultural background and parents’ acculturation characteristics Cultural characteristics • There is strong tendency to appreciate original culture, which encourages Russian Jewish immigrants to maintain their language of origin • Russian Jewish immigrants have succeeded in building their own cultural framework based on Russian culture (mass media, clubs, theaters).

9. Second generation Russian Jewish immigrants in Israel: A socio-cultural background and parents’ acculturation characteristics Political characteristics • Russian Jewish immigrants have changed the face of Israeli politics. • Russian Jewish leaders and public figures created their own political structures at both the national level and the local level (there are over 500 social and political organizations).

10. Second generation Russian Jewish immigrants in Israel: A socio-cultural background and parents’ acculturation characteristics Main acculturation strategy • Integration, combining the maintenance of the original culture and the adaptation to the host culture (Horenczyk & Ben-Shalom, 2006).

11. Language Policy in Israel • In Israel, language is a loaded concept, closely linked to historical, ideological, political, and social issues (Shohamy, 1994; Spolsky & Shohamy, 1999).

12. Language Policy in Israel • In recent years, there has been a more liberal policy towards maintaining immigrants’ languages (Ministry of Education, 2008). • However, heritage languages are not a part of school curricula.

13. Project “'First Language First Approach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “ • An organization of Russian immigrant teachers was established in 1992. • This organization initiated and currently runs over 25 bilingual kindergartens and has activities in 90 schools and cultural institutions throughout the country.

14. Project “'FirstLanguageFirstApproach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “ Bilingual kindergartens: • The bilingual kindergartens are private institutions • They function under the supervision of the Ministry of Education

15. Project “'FirstLanguageFirstApproach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “ Aim of the bilingual kindergartens' language policy: • To achieve a high level of linguistic competence, in the heritage language, (Russian) and the majority language of the host country (Hebrew).

16. Project “'First Language First Approach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “ • Sequential onset of L2 (Hebrew) begins as the basic linguistic structures and lexicon in L1 Russian are acquired.

17. Project “'First Language First Approach‘ in early bilingual education: Towards a better understanding of early sequential bilingual development “ Projects focuses: • Language and cultural policy inthe Russian-Hebrew speaking bilingual kindergartens • Family language and cultural policy • Assessing the effect of the 'First Language First' approach on children's development in Russian L1 and Hebrew L2 • Lexical knowledge development • Grammar development: Inflectional morphology and morpho-syntax • Narrative development: Script schema knowledge • Emergent literacy acquisition

18. Rationalization of the ‘FirstLanguage First Approach‘ • David, the general manager: Our idea of child bilingualism is the following: Russian as a first language has to be supported in order to maintain the child’s identity, individuality, roots…The aim of the kindergarten it to support not only the colloquial Russian which can be learned at home from parents, but to supply children with a “high”, literate variety of the Russian language. A kindergarten is supposed to be not only a care-giver but an educational institution.

19. Rationalization of the ‘FirstLanguage First Approach‘ Need of gradual immersion in L2 • Olga, the principal: First of all, we offer a gradual transition from one language environment to the other. With small children, we communicate mostly in Russian, so they don’t have stress as they start attending kindergarten. Here they can express themselves and also have a feeling that they are understood. We introduce Hebrew gradually. From the age of three on, the input in Hebrew constantly increases…We apply scaffolding and try to prevent stress caused by confrontation with the new language for children “terrified” by Hebrew.

20. Rationalization of the ‘FirstLanguage First Approach‘ Need of gradual immersion in L2 • Olga, the principal: At the beginning, Russian was presented at the every-day level, without being a subject of teaching…The conviction that the Russian language is important increased with the time. We stopped introducing Hebrew as soon as possible. Hebrew exists as the background until the age of three. The main language to be developed is Russian. Children just develop the awareness of the coexistence of two languages...

21. Rationalization of the ‘FirstLanguageFirstApproach‘: A source of successful L2 acquisition • Elena, the principal: Why Hebrew from age three? We thought that the child needs to advance in the home language. At age three, narrative ability appears. Language is established more or less. On the basis of one language as a foundation I can give the second language and the first one will continue to develop…

22. Evidence for transfer of conceptual knowledge from L1 to L2 • Aviva, Hebrew-speaking kindergarten teacher: The children are provided with instruction in Russian first, and then I can teach them more easily. To have a conversation with them when they are three and I can speak with them like they are five. This helps me…I taught them something on Sunday, but [the children] didn’t understand anything. On Monday [the other teacher] explained it again, but in Russian, with the same pictures and the same recording/video, and the same dance. On Tuesday, they already understood me…and made progress with it… and I continued in Hebrew.

23. Negotiation between teachers and parents on challenges of the existing language approach • Faina, David’s mother: We were worried when David (the child) was 4 years old. The year was almost over and our son barely made progress in Hebrew… The principal tried to calm us down. But I calmed down more due to the other parents whose eldest kids had finished this preschool before. They told us that after this preschool their children did very well at school. We were promised that from 4 to 5 we would observe the dramatic change and our children would speak Hebrew fluently. That proved to be true. Now our child knows fancy words in Hebrew and he feels no problem to speak Hebrew.

24. Negotiation between teachers and parents on challenges of the existing language approach • Recent curriculum changes due to parental concern • Earlier input of Hebrew from its 'tasting' in the 2-3-year-old age group during 30 minutes of structural instruction, four times a week

25. Early kindergarten bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 Main Questions • Whether bilingual education with L1 maintenance promotes or impedes children’s language development in the majority language (L2)? • Whether bilingual education is advantageous for minority language (L1) development? 

26. Theoretical Background Early kindergarten bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 • Paradis (2007, 2008) proposed a maturation hypothesis, which assumes that L1 vocabulary may facilitate the conceptual-lexical mappings between L1 and L2. • As a result, older learners who began learning L2 after onset of L1 acquisition (i.e., sequentially to L1) experienced accelerated progress in their vocabulary acquisition in comparison with younger L2 learners who had received the same exposure time.

27. Theoretical Background Early kindergarten bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 • Most focus was on bilingual development in L1 and/or L2 within bilingual school education (for review see Rolstad, Mahoney, & Glass, 2005). • Limited research focused on children at ages 3-4 and 4-5, (Barnett, Yarosz, Thomas, Jung & Blanco, 2007; Winsler, Díaz, Espinosa, & Rodríguez, 1999).

28. Theoretical Background Early preschool bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 • Concerning L2 development, the existing limited research supports bilingual education at ages 3-4 and 4-5 for minority-language children from immigrant backgrounds and point towards its efficiency in L2 development in receptive vocabulary (Barnett et al., 2007; Kan & Kohnert, 2005; Winsler et al., 1999).

29. Theoretical Background Early kindergarten bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 • Concerning development of L1, the results are inconclusive (Barnett et al., 2007; Kan & Kohnert, 2005; Winsler et al., 1999; Wong-Fillmore, 1991).

30. Theoretical Background Early kindergarten bilingual education and vocabulary acquisition in L1 and L2 • L1 and L2 were examined among children from families with poor socioeconomic status and low parental education. • Diversity in research design (e.g., usage of parental self-reports without appropriate experimental and control kindergarten groups, Wong-Fillmore, 1991).

31. Research Design • Longitudinal design - two data collection points • Cross-sectional design - two age groups – 3- 4 and 4-5 ages • Children’s vocabulary in bilingual kindergartens was compared with children’s vocabulary in monolingual kindergartens in L1 and L2.

32. Research Design • Complex approach to conceptualization and measurement of the vocabulary as a multi-component skill by distinguishing between breadth and depth of vocabulary.

33. Research Design • Breadth of vocabulary: How many words we know? • Depth of vocabulary: How well we know these words, or the qualitative aspects of word knowledge?

34. Measures • Breadth of vocabulary (receptive vocabulary) • Depth of vocabulary (paradigmatic and syntagmatic semantic relations)

35. Measures Depth of the vocabulary: Paradigmatic knowledge • Paradigmatic semantic relations are related to the development of high order cognition skills, such as conceptualization, categorization, classification and de-contextualization of word concepts.

36. Depth of the vocabulary: Paradigmatic knowledge Superordinate Plant Part-whole relations Stem, leave Subordinate tulip, rose flower

37. Measures Depth of the vocabulary: Paradigmatic knowledge • Semantic fluency • Word description • Categorical identification

38. Categorical Identification

39. Measures Depth of the vocabulary: Syntagmatic knolwedge Syntagmatic semantic relations reflect vocabulary richness by providing descriptive, associative and metaphoric information about a variety of distinctive object attributes. For example: "a watermelon is sweet and tasty and looks like a ball"

40. Participants: Age 3-4 • 32 children, mean age 37 months • The sample was divided into two groups: • 15 bilinguals from the bilingual Russian-Hebrew speaking kindergartens; • 17 bilinguals from the monolingual L2 Hebrew-speaking kindergartens

41. Participants: Age 4-5 • 35 children, mean age 52 months • The sample was divided into two groups: • 20 bilinguals from the bilingual Russian-Hebrew speaking kindergartens; • 15 bilinguals from the monolingual L2 Hebrew-speaking kindergartens

42. Participants • No differences were found between the groups in the parents' acculturation patterns, parents' education, competence in Hebrew and Russian, and parent-child language practice at home.

43. Results: ages 3-4Russian as L1 • Significant differences were found in all domains of Russian vocabulary between the groups. • The differences were particularly high on paradigmatic knowledge: lack of progress of the children from the monolingual kindergartens.

44. Results: Age 3-4Russian vocabulary profile (L1) in both kindergarten settings – Time 1 and Time 2 (100-point scale, *p < .05, ** p < .01)

45. Results : ages 3-4Hebrew as L2 • The children from the BK shown similar to the children from the MK results on the paradigmatic knowledge. • Both group of children showed significant progress on the syntagmatic semantic relations during the educational year. • The MK group was superior on measure of vocabulary richness.

46. Results: Age 3-4 Hebrew vocabulary profile (L1) in both kindergarten settings – Time 1 and Time 2 (100-point scale, *p < .05, ** p < .01)

47. Peabody 3-4

48. Results: ages 4-5Russian as L1 Paradigmatic Knowledge • BK Russian- 20% development • MK Russian- showed progress of only 5% during educational year Syntagmatic Knowledge • BK Russian – 12% development • MK Russian –4% regression (a tendency for regression)

49. Results: Age 4-5Russian vocabulary profile (L1) in both preschool settings -Time 1 and Time 2 (100-point scale, *p < .05, ** p < .01)

50. Conclusion: ages 4-5Russian as L1 Paradigmatic Knowledge • At home this knowledge is not developed. • It seems that this knowledge develops only in the educational setting.