The status and future of bilingual education for remote indigenous students in the Northern Territory

Abstract

This article analyses the status and future of bilingual education programs using Indigenous languages and English in remote Northern Territory schools. It explains why this educational approach is so contested at present, resulting in an unresolved situation which can best be regarded as an uneasy compromise on the ground and a stalemate at higher levels of political decision making. If the bilingual education approach was better understood by the current NT Government, there would a strong impetus now to refine and effectively implement a model of schooling that is appropriate for students in remote areas. Instead, current politicians debunk the bilingual approach, thereby robbing schools and literacy plans of any momentum and distracting attention away from the work that needs to be done. Meanwhile, student attendance rates have fallen away to worryingly low levels (Dickson, 2010). The current regime may well resolve the impasse, but in the absence of any meaningful, open negotiation the future looks uncertain. It is too soon to judge the cost of this uncertainty, but it may well result in further alienation and the emergence of non-government alternatives.

Language endangerment: a multidimensional analysis of risk factors

“…Furthermore, in common with many other Anglophone countries, high-stakes educational testing in literacy and numeracy has been introduced, partly justified as a means to reduce Indigenous disadvantage by ensuring competency in English (Allendorf 2017;Macqueen et al 2018;McCarty 2009;Ryan and Whitman 2013;Wyman et al 2010). In Australia, USA, and Canada, where rates of Indigenous language loss have been the most dramatic, the results of nationwide tests for educational attainment, conducted in English, have been used to reduce support for bilingual education (Combs and Nicholas 2012;Devlin 2011;Wyman et al 2010). But development of these policies focused on English competency has seen less emphasis on the effect of formal education on competency in Indigenous languages, nor on appropriate ways to evaluate such an effect (Hinton 2011;Macqueen et al 2018;O'Grady 2018), leading to the 'squandering of the personal, community, and national linguistic and intellectual resources within the mainstream classroom' (Cummins 2005).…”

Early Vocabulary Development of Australian Indigenous Children: Identifying Strengths

“…After reviewing the available literature Hoff [22] recently argued that, given the obvious cultural, social, and economic benefits of bilingualism and the fact that many bilingual children begin school with levels of English proficiency that are an obstacle to academic achievement in standard educational programs, it is important that curricula and teaching practices are improved to meet the needs of children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Furthermore, the findings of earlier research (e.g., [23][24][25]) and more recent Australian [26,27] and international [28][29][30] reviews identify many benefits that well-designed bilingual instruction can deliver and, conversely, the many downsides associated with English only education policies. Indeed it has been argued that there has been too much focus on "deficits" and a failure to see children's ability to speak an Indigenous language as a strength rather than a deficit [31].…”

Bilingual and multilingual education

“…After achieving self-government in 1978 the Northern Territory modified the educational and linguistic aims of the bilingual programs it inherited to stress their exclusively transitional role as a bridge to English-mediated learning, distancing language maintenance from the core purposes of the programs. The 'step' approach it adopted involved instrumental use of vernacular literacy in the early years, accompanied by oral English support and full introduction of English literacy by Year 4, but regular modifications continually shifted the focus to English (Simpson, Caffery & McConvell, 2009;Devlin, 2011;McKay, 2011).…”

“…By 2008, the Northern Territory bilingual education (Two-Way) programs were under full existential threat, this time due to statistical demonstrations of English literacy difficulties among Indigenous learners, and their mistaken attribution to bilingual teaching and claims that English literacy was being sidelined in favour of Indigenous languages (Devlin, 2011;Simpson et al, 2009). In 2007, Australia first national literacy and numeracy tests were conducted with students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9.…”

“…Extensive criticism of NAPLAN, with its benchmarking against linguistic and cultural norms alien to learners speaking either a traditional language or EAL/D have had little discernible impact on policy makers or administrators. Compounding questions of cultural appropriateness was the demonstrated misinterpretation of the 2008 results (see Devlin, 2011), but the political backlash was swift. See also: Gillian Wigglesworth: Assessment in Indigenous Immersion (Vol 7).…”