The influence of two languages of instruction on students' levels of cognitive development and achievement in science

Abstract

In 1969 the Ford Foundation in the United States undertook to sponsor the Six-Year Primary Project. This is a curriculum project concerned primarily with the question of the most appropriate language policy for efficient primary education for Yoruba-speaking Nigerian children. The project is involved with languages as means to an end and not as ends in themselves. The end is effective primary education and the means are the teaching or learning of the children's mother tongue and a second language as school subjects and the subsequent utilization of them as media of instruction. The usual educational practice in the former Western State of Nigeria (now comprising Ogun, Ondo, and Oyo States) is to teach both Yoruba and English languages as school subjects and also to use both of them as media of instruction.Among the assumptions of the project are (1) that the current primary education given to children is neither rich nor meaningful enough; ( 2 ) that the provision for well-designed social and cultural studies as well as elementary science throughout will make primary education richer; and (3)that the given of such improved primary education through the medium of the children's own first language (in the present case, Yoruba) while at the same time teaching English as a second language using a few gifted teachers will make the education more meaningful, with greater "surrender value.'' From these assumptions the aims of the project were generated: (I) to develop a primary education curriculum with an adequately strong "surrender value," since primary education is terminal for the majority of Nigerian children; and ( 2 ) to use the Yoruba language as the medium of instruction throughout, in order to demonstrate that primary education, when given in the child's mother tongue rather than in a second or foreign language, is more effective and meaningful.The importance of one's mother tongue in learning and development has been highlighted by Piaget (1973). According to him, language is a "ready-made system that is elaborated by society and that contains for persons that learn it before they contribute to its enrichment, a wealth of cognitive instruments (relations, classification, and so on) at the service of thought." Piaget talks of language in the sense of learning to speak and to internalize the rules of one's mother tongue. According to Piaget, language (in the sense of a mother tongue) is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the construction of logical operations, noting that "these operations go beyond language since neither the lattice of possible combinations nor the INRC transformational rules is as such found in language."

The acquisition and transfer of transitive inference by some nigerian children aged 4 to 7 years

“…It should also be emphasized that the component skills approach and the quantification procedure, both used in the training of subjects in the experimental group, were given in two linguistic media-the subjects' mother tongue (Yoruba) and their second language (English). The Yoruba mother tongue has been found to reinforce and enhance the learning of science concepts among Yoruba speaking Nigerians (Ehindero, 1980;Adejumo & Ehindero, 1980). Hence, when evaluating the results of the present study, the possible influence of this linguistic medium should be considered.…”

Explaining learning gaps in Namibia: The role of language proficiency

“…In reality, English is the mother-tongue of only .56 percent of the Namibian population (Gordon, 2005 Geary et al, 1997;Valverde, 1984;Collier, 1992;Ehindero, 1980;Yip et al, 2003;Clarkson & Galbraith, 1992). Note that the strong correlation expected between RATOTP and ENGLISH is present in our sample with a significance at the .01 level (2-tailed) and that the mean reading score of pupils who never speak English at home (= 29.86) is less than the mean score of pupils speaking sometimes or all the time English at home (= 35.00).…”

The effects of the language of instruction in the science and math achievement of Lebanese students. (c2014)

“…In addition to the language proficiency, the choice of the language of instruction showed an effect on the students' performance in math and science (Strevens, 1991;Za'rour & Nashif, 1977;Gorgorio & Planas, 2001). Several studies addressed the role of receiving instruction in the students' first language in engaging them in the learning process and allowing them to better perform in math and science over students studying in the second language (Bunyi, 1999;Collison, 1975;Ehindero, 1980;Seliji, 2003;Gfeller & Robinson, 1998). Other studies showed positive results as a result of using the second language for instruction in a medium where the proficiency of languages, the first and the second language existed (Bankston & Zhou, 1995;Cummins and Gulutsan, 1974;Hakuta & Diaz, 1985, Lambert, 1990Swain and Lampkin, 1982;.…”