The impact of the introduction of bilingual learning on sixth grade educational achievement levels

Abstract

Bilingualism was implemented in the Community of Madrid (Spain) more than ten years ago, through the incorporation of the English language in the teaching methods of certain schools. Since that time, various research projects have been carried out, with the objective of comparing the academic performance of students in bilingual schools with those in nonbilingual schools. The present paper makes use of primary education data from the Department of Education and Research for the Community of Madrid in an effort to analyze whether or not bilingualism results in the relative improvement of educational outcomes achieved in primary schools in the Region of Madrid, in Spain. More specifically, the data used is from sixth grade classrooms, given that, generally speaking, in this grade all schools give a standardized test which measures academic performance in Math, Science and Technology, Spanish Language Arts and English Language Arts. Our assessment makes use of a multinomial logit model, and includes the most common variables found in the research on the determination of educational outcomes (variables related to whether or not schools are bilingual, which is the main focus of this paper), as well as other less common variables considered to be relevant. These include absenteeism, satisfaction levels among families and students, and the percentage of students in second chance programs. The results show that bilingualism does not lower children performance in the subjects taught in English or in the subjects taught in Spanish. Academic performance in Mathematics, Science and Technology, and Spanish Language Arts is similar with respect to those schools which are not bilingual. However, results in English are significantly higher in bilingual schools when compared to non-bilingual schools.

Bilingual Education and Learning Achievements in Anglophone and Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa

“…Children must be much used to teachers using their language when learning, which smoothens the learning process. Nevertheless, our first hypothesis is not confirmed for mathematics and science, consistent with García-Centeno et al (2020). A plausible explanation is that using local language to explain mathematical and scientific concepts consistently is complex for teachers.…”

School Failure in the Region of Madrid (Spain): An Approximation through Diagnostic Assessment in 2019

“…Bilingual schools have an ambiguous effect, as results in English are much better, which is to be expected, but results in Geography and History-a subject taught in English in schools belonging to the bilingual programme-are worse, while the subjects taught in Spanish in the bilingual programme (Spanish language and Mathematics) are not statistically significant. This is explained by the fact that when Geography and History are taught in English, pupils have more difficulties in acquiring the skills of this subject because it is not taught in their mother tongue, and because the teachers who teach it are not strictly bilingual either, as they are Spanish teachers with a CEFR C1 level [45,46,59,60]. Of the remaining variables, those related to teachers stand out.…”

“…Therefore, this work contributes additional value to the literature, with the use of a new and more complete database of the Madrid Region. Furthermore, the Madrid Region is one of the few regions that have openly offered the anonymised results of these tests to any researchers who have requested them, and therefore several articles have emerged based on the databases of the external census evaluations of the Region of Madrid [45][46][47].…”

Teaching Bilingually: Unlocking the Academic and Cognitive Potential—Teachers’ Insights

“…However, it is nonetheless prudent to examine studies as educational and social outcomes may still be relevant to the outcomes of pupils in English bilingual schools. Garcia-Centena et al (2020) [24] in a quantitative study, compared records of monolingual and bilingual schools in Madrid, Spain. Aiming to analyse the impact of bilingual education on academic outcomes, they also considered other variables, including SES.…”