The Benefits of Dual Immersion

Multiple benefits exist for acquiring a second language during the primary years. Some of the benefits of learning a second language during the elementary years include:
  • Children have the ability to learn and excel in the pronunciation of a foreign language.
  • Participation in early foreign language shows positive results in areas of standardized testing. Children who had studied a foreign language show greater cognitive development.
  • Foreign language study has shown to increase listening skills, memory, and a greater understanding of one’s own language.
  • Children studying foreign language have an improved self concept and sense of achievement in school.
  • Children develop a sense of cultural pluralism, openness and appreciation of other cultures.
"Kids who acquire a second language early in life show increased cognitive abilities over their monolingual peers."
 - American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages

How Dual Language Benefits Native Spanish and Native English Speakers

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Dual language programs have helped close the achievement gaps. The recent move away from traditional bilingual education toward English language immersion was meant to help English Language Learners (ELL) catch up with English speaking peers. Instead, standardized test scores from 2003 to 2010 show a widening achievement gap. Numerous studies demonstrate that ELLs become more fluent in English when they learn to read in their primary language. In 2004, Virginia P. Collier and Wayne P. Thomas from George Mason University published an 18-year longitudinal study of dual language programs in 23 school districts and 15 states. They found that dual language immersion fully closes the achievement gap between ELLs and native speakers of English.

In addition, dual language programs have helped create a more positive school culture.  Collier and Thomas discovered that the effectiveness of dual language education extends beyond academic outcomes. The entire school community benefits when multiple languages and cultural heritages are validated and respected. Friendships bridge class and language barriers. Teachers report higher levels of job satisfaction. Parents from both language groups participate more actively in schools.

Why Immersion?

By Julie Sweitzer, Parent, Park Spanish Immersion School, St. Louis Park, Minnesota
The answer seems so obvious now, but six years ago the concept seemed too radical to consider seriously. Sending my baby off in the care of strangers and trusting them to teach her reading, writing, and arithmetic in English was difficult enough. Surely asking her to learn from people who spoke in a language neither she nor her parents understood was an unnecessary complication. Fortunately we decided to explore language immersion before rejecting it, and in doing so completely changed our minds, and our children's futures.

Now that we are in our fifth year (and second child) of immersion schooling, answering the question Why immersion? has become easy. At an ACIE workshop with other immersion parents, as well as in other conversations, I have learned that we all had similar reasons. Perhaps sharing my top seven reasons (at right) will encourage other parents to fully explore immersion for their children.

So how did we learn these things, and how can you share them with others? I went to an open house, before our school even existed. Copies of many research summaries were provided, and I read them all. I talked to parents in other immersion programs, who reinforced the research by confirming that their children's skill levels were age-appropriate in all subjects. Most importantly, I watched the teachers who would be opening our school demonstrate a lesson in Spanish with a group of English-speaking kindergartners. The kids participated and responded, even with an audience. Those "strangers" to whom I was going to entrust my child were no longer strangers, and were obviously skilled. Suddenly it was clear what our decision would be. My heart followed where my head had led, and as Robert Frost first said in The Road Not Taken, "I took the road less traveled by, and that has made all the difference."
  1. Children of today will need to be bilingual to be successful in the global society and economy of their adulthood. 

  2. Childhood is the best time to develop an appreciation and understanding of diverse cultures, peoples, and perspectives in the world. 

  3. An optimal time to learn languages is prior to age twelve. 

  4. Children learn language by listening and repeating, and don't have any fear of a "foreign" language. 

  5. Academic skills are actually enhanced. 

  6. Children are guaranteed to be challenged.  

  7. Parents will be involved.  

The First Year

Wonder what a kindergartener's first year at an immersion school is like? How does a family adapt and feel about sending their child to a school where they don't speak the language at home? We think every parent who has a child enrolled at the DIAS should listen to this touching story. 
Special thanks to Dual Language Program Advocates for supplying the above information. Sources cited on their website.