Bilingually Enriched Learners

“Hmm,” I wondered loudly, making a point to show I was really thinking. “Like maybe bolus or villi?” I answered, smiling.  

“Yeah, but like ones we don’t know,” he replied grinning. 

Practicing Academic Vocabulary and Building Knowledge

The reason esophagus and large intestine came up in our lunch conversation was because of a unit in our English language arts curriculum focused on the driving question, “How does food nourish us?” Students began their study of food by building knowledge about digestion. 

The student who asked me to introduce some big words over lunch is learning multiple languages and was acquiring some seriously scientific language and background knowledge through our texts and writing tasks. These are words that students don’t use daily: esophagus, nutrients, digestive system. By the end of this unit, I wanted every student, including the multilingual students who needed extra support with academic vocabulary, to feel successful in their understanding of the digestive system and in reading complex texts. 

It’s a challenging task for students who may not already know a lot about the digestive system. And it is even more challenging for students learning English and acquiring the vocabulary to accurately describe what happens in the digestion process, a process they cannot actually see.  

Education researcher Susan B. Neuman wrote in her article “Comprehension in Disguise: The Role of Knowledge in Children’s Learning“ that comprehension of a text requires that students bring what they already know, or background knowledge, to what they want to learn.

As a classroom teacher, I wanted to provide a hands-on experience to my students to help solidify the knowledge they were building in class.  

Hands-on Learning through a room transformation

The solution I came up with was to transform the classroom for a day and allow students to experience the inside of the digestive system to deepen their understanding of how it works. I collaborated with my grade-level team to create four stations that students could visit: the mouth, the esophagus, the stomach, and the small intestine. I loved that it provided all learners an opportunity to apply new and more technical vocabulary (esophagus, digest) with words they already knew (mouth, stomach).  

At each station, students learned essential vocabulary, such as system, digest, absorb, and saliva. They would need to know these words for conversations at each station and for their writing. Then, students used specialized topic-specific words—like the word bolus at the esophagus station and villi at the stomach—necessary to complete the different tasks and activities at each station. 

Next, we made models of the key body parts. At the mouth table, students used modeling clay to create food that enters the digestive system. They had a copy of “The Digestive System” by Christine Taylor-Butler and were able to use the text for reference. I encouraged students to refer to the text to explain what happened to the food in the mouth. 

At the esophagus station, for example, students labeled the parts of the digestive system on a diagram. After students created food in the first station, they delivered their food to the esophagus station. Here students took the food and rolled it into a bolus or a ball that would fit down the esophagus (a cardboard tube).  

The third station took students to the stomach, where they experimented with a piece of bread and a plastic bag of vinegar to represent how the stomach breaks down food. The students acted as the stomach muscles to break down the bread. Finally, students used a marble run to create a physical representation of the small intestine. They designed the interlocking pieces and then ran a piece of food, represented by a marble, through the system.  

On the day we transformed the room, I spent my time at the mouth and esophagus stations, helping the modeling clay food travel from one station to the next, engaging in conversations, supporting students with vocabulary when needed, but most important, listening. I discovered students used academic language during deep and meaningful discussions about the workings of each station. 

As you might imagine, this hands-on learning was a lot of fun for the students. But what did it have to do with English?

Rooting it all in literacy

For one, my students had to expertly capture the steps of the digestive system’s process—both in speaking and in writing. All students ended the lesson by talking about their experiences at each station and what they would write in their final piece. All students completed the writing, and all learners were able to participate and feel successful in the experience and in their writing. They also had plenty of time to improve their reading skills at each station.  

And at every step, they added to their base of knowledge. Students were not only more prepared to answer the question “How can food nourish our body?” but also able to explain the steps in a process, which set them up for success later when we studied the way certain foods travel from farms to our dining rooms.  

Room transformations are a great reminder that students can have fun while building essential knowledge. Adding vocabulary practice ensured that the words and the experiences won’t soon be forgotten and are transferable to their writing. 

Remember where we started, out at that picnic table? We ended up making “Lunch With Language” a regular thing, and it’s something I hope to bring back this coming school year. Mixing casual conversation with emerging vocabulary is fun for students, and that should be an important goal in its own right for every school coming out of the pandemic.

Jami Witherell is a second-grade teacher at Newton School, a public elementary school in Greenfield, MA. She is also a Massachusetts Teacher of the Year 2022 semi-finalist and a seasonal associate with Wit & Wisdom, published by Great Minds. In that role, Witherell provides professional development to teachers using the ELA curriculum. Her room transformation was brought to life with the support of DonorsChoose.org and was named one of the top 5 wackiest requests of the 2020–21 school year by the organization.

International Mother Language Day

Language plays an important role in keeping our culture alive. Mother’s tongue is defined as the first language a child is exposed to from the time of birth and this language that is first naturally acquired by humans is called mother tongue. It is associated with the language that a child’s parent use to communicate with them, also called the native tongue. Mother tongue is the language that a person has grown up speaking from his/her early childhood. It is a person’s native language. It is therefore the medium of communication that a person is most familiar with. This familiarity can be used for providing education, though this is not what happens.  Mother tongue education refers to any form of schooling which uses the language or languages that children are most familiar with, in order to help them learn. This is usually the language that children speak at home with their family. The ‘mother tongue’ does not have to be the language spoken by the mother. Children can and often do speak more than one or even two languages at home.

For example, they may speak one language with their mother, another with their father and a third with their grandparents. Other terms used are home language, first language or heritage language. The government of India introduced the National Education Policy. It is the biggest reform in the field of education since the National Education Policy, 1986. The National Education Policy, 2020 tries to bring changes in many areas in education and one of them is the medium of instruction in which education will be provided in primary schools. This policy states that the mother tongue will be the medium of instruction up to class 5 in all schools.  A child understands his mother tongue and hence if he/she is instructed in that language itself, his transition to school education is smooth and easy. Even UNESCO has recommended that classes be taught in the community’s mother tongue during the early years of primary school so that students can fully learn to read and write, and during this time they also are introduced to early mathematical concepts and other academic subjects.

Advantages of mother tongue in education are numerous. Mother tongue makes it easier for children to pick up and learn other languages. It develops a child’s personal, social and cultural identity. Using mother tongue helps a child develop their critical thinking and literacy skills. Children learning in mother tongue enjoy school more and learn faster due to feeling comfortable in their environment. Self-esteem is higher for children learning in mother tongue. Parent child interaction increases as the parent can assist with homework. Research shows that education in the mother tongue is a key factor for inclusion and quality learning, and it also improves learning outcomes and academic performance. This is crucial, especially in primary school to avoid knowledge gaps and increase the speed of learning and comprehension. And most importantly, multilingual education based on the mother tongue empowers all learners to fully take part in society. It fosters mutual understanding and respect for one another and helps preserve the wealth of cultural and traditional heritage that is embedded in every language around the world.

Learning the mother tongue is very important for overall child’s development and being fluent in the mother tongue is another factor for education. The first language that a child learns right from birth plays a crucial role in education for a wide array of reasons and it builds up a child’s social, personal, and cultural identity. Many child physiologists are indicate that having a strong mother tongue foundation for any child leads to a much better understanding of their education as well as a more positive attitude towards their socialization. Mother tongue provides children strong education base and that makes it easier for the child to learn other languages later as well. So children must maintain their first language when they begin schooling because, at the time when children develop their mother tongue, simultaneous development of a host of other essential skills such as critical thinking and literacy skills takes place in them.

Mother tongue is vital in framing the thinking and emotions of people; therefore it causes the comprehensive development of a child. Learning in ones’ own language will help the student express himself/herself better. This will thus make school learning a two ways communication between teacher and students. Understanding the subject matter would boost the confidence of the student and propel him/her to continue with his/her schooling thus lowering the drop-out rate. Educating children in their mother tongue will also build a strong home-school partnership in their learning. Parents will be able to participate in their child’s education and make the experience of learning for the students more wholesome. It will also benefit the primary school teachers as many of them find it difficult to express themselves in English and hence are not able to transfer as much knowledge as they would like to, thus creating a knowledge deficit. Providing primary education in mother tongue will also decentralize the task of textbook making which has been long recommended by Dr Yashpal Sharma. This will bring the content in textbooks closer to children and make them understand the syllabus better. Thus targeting mechanical learning. Education in mother tongue will help the students in getting a better sense of their cultural background and therefore helps him/her progress in life his/her roots intact.

The importance of mother tongue is very important for child education and many experts argue that foreign language education is not always the best. If the child is taught in a language that the child doesn’t understand, then comprehension doesn’t occur and results in rote memorization. Therefore, it is a healthy approach to learning for the child to teach second languages with first languages. This can improve learning, increase student participation and reduce the number of dropouts. Furthermore, children with a strong mother tongue found it easier to pick up a second language and develop their literacy skills.  The research covers many links between a child’s development and their mother tongue and they found that children, who learn two or even more languages, have a deeper understanding of cultural identity is also easily adapted. Language and mother tongue play a huge role in the development of child’s personal, social and cultural identity and child who has a strong mother tongue foundation equips well to learning additional languages, as well deeper understanding of themselves and their place within society, along with an increased sense of wellbeing and this advantage cannot be overstated. The use of mother tongue in the early education of child helps in facilitating learning, it serves as motivation as the child moves from the known, which is the mother tongue to the unknown which is the second language or target language.

Providing primary education in the mother tongue as now mandated in the National Education Policy, 2020, is the step in the right direction and if implemented in true spirit will enhance the learning capabilities of the students and making education a wholesome experience while in the way also resolving the issue of school drop-outs. However, there is still a long way to go before guaranteeing all learners their right to education in their mother language. In most countries, the majority of students are taught in a language other than their mother tongue, which compromises their ability to learn effectively. It is estimated that 40 % of the world’s population does not have access to an education in a language they speak or understand. There are about 7,000 languages spoken around the world today. But linguistic diversity is increasingly threatened as more and more languages disappear at an alarming rate and when a language disappears, it takes with it an entire cultural and intellectual heritage.

(M Ahmad is a regular writer for this newspaper and can be reached at: specialachivers78@gmail.com)

Miles Kelly, a UK publishing house, has published a fun bilingual dictionary for kids.

The lovely, large, hardback book full of colourful pictures and descriptions makes learning Afrikaans and English tons of fun.

Children can explore their world with this fun dictionary and learn the names of various things around them.

Read: Browse local children's stories in all official languages

Each page of the bilingual dictionary is packed with pictures and things to find and talk about. It is full of colourful illustrations, which keep children engaged.

This bilingual dictionary was published in March 2022, and it is sold at R260,00 per copy. Find out more at NB Publishers.

When you move across the Atlantic armed with only one year of self-taught Portuguese and a joie de vivre that’s been chewed up and spit out by two years of a pandemic, things in your day-to-day life can start to feel a little … desperate. One day you’re laughing at your own confusion and the next you’re, I don’t know, sobbing comically in a café bathroom because you ordered a latte and got bread instead.

Let’s face it—regardless of whether or not you’re feeling a little lost in Europe’s westernmost country, big wins are few and far between for any of us these days. In comes Wordle, a simple game with predictable rules, daily wins, a mediated dopamine rush, and a lighter reason to check in with your loved ones. And God was it a hit. Multicolored blocks peppered every corner of Twitter, and suddenly, for the briefest of moments, that hellscape of a website was awash with peace. Finally there was something that everyone could agree was good. And we all know how rare that is.

I searched, and there it was: Termo.

Wordle has taken the internet by storm, but the great thing about the internet is that it’s wider and deeper than the English-speaking world alone. Web developers all over the world have adapted the game to fit their own languages, with versions for everything from Arabic and Thai to Cymraeg and Gitksan.

For language learners, linguistic nerds, and polyglots everywhere, the emergence of multilingual Wordles is a delight. But it’s more than that—it’s useful. Ohioan Betsy Ramsey plays the English and Spanish versions. Alongside the free Spanish classes she takes online, she plays Wordle ES as a kind of supplemental “extra credit,” thinking of it as a chance to reinforce vocabulary and look up unfamiliar words. Clearly, she’s on the right track: Jamie Thomas, assistant professor of linguistics at Santa Monica College and a self-professed fan of word games, describes Wordle as a great “scaffold,” a tool that’s not-so-ideal for vocabulary acquisition but great for practicing words players already know.

Apart from the game aspect, Wordle’s efficacy lies in what it does to your brain. Thomas explains that playing Wordle activates “sight words”—as we predict words in real time, we connect probable letter sequences to the words that we already have in our vocabulary. Guessing more and more letters correctly elicits different combinations of possible five-letter words in each player’s mind, and each of these words is “linked in lexical retrieval.”

If you’ve ever learned a language past childhood, you’ll know that retrieval is a muscle. Flexing makes it stronger over time, and eventually, it gets strong enough to pull out the words you need, when you need them. If you’re not fluent in a language, retrieving words takes more effort—and, therefore, more conscious thought. Merel from the Netherlands, who requested her last name be withheld, is fluent in Dutch and English but is learning Italian and Spanish, and she plays Wordle in all four languages. “I find that I’m more diligent the less familiar I am with the language,” she says. “With Dutch and English I can always think of another word to try, but that isn’t necessarily the best strategy. I have a higher success rate with Italian and Spanish.”

It’s unsurprising that some languages work better than others when it comes to fitting Josh Wardle’s template. The five-letter structure of the original Wordle is an obvious limitation, because different languages have different vowel-consonant patterns. Take English versus Swahili, for example. “There are about seven patterns in English, including CVCC, as in ‘ramp’ and up to CCCVCCC, as in ‘strengths,’ ” Thomas explains, “while in Swahili, most words can be broken down into CV units, as in ‘maji (water),’ all the way up to ‘kujitambulisha (to introduce yourself).’ ”

Of course, more than anything else, there’s the obvious limitation of fluency. This means that at some point, if you’re not fluent in the language, you’re probably going to have to play with words you don’t know. To do this, knowing the linguistic limitations for each language you’re playing with is key. When we deconstruct words, we lean on the knowledge of typical syllable patterns of the given language. If you know what particular letter combinations your language does or doesn’t use, you end up with a pretty good foundation for making educated guesses.

That’s how I play. One of the more recent Termo words was sogro (father-in-law): I opened the game with saúde (health) to knock out some vowels and started my third guess with S and O squarely in the first two positions. I asked myself: What combination of letters and sounds would make a plausible Portuguese word?

Here, Word Reference (which accounts for semantics) and Google Translate (which accounts for conjugations) were my friends. With S and O squarely in the first two positions, I tried different combinations of the last three letters until I got some words. My guesses ended up being solto (loose), sorvo (sip), sofro (suffer), and sobro (cork).

I lost! But even losing is a win. Now I know how to say, o sogro sofre do sobro solto—the father-in-law suffers from the loose cork. (Is the father-in-law an alcoholic? Was it just a bad cork to begin with? Did the wine spoil? We’ll never know, but I sure do know how to say it.)

Learning words you didn’t know before reframes a loss into a success. And the flip side is true, too: You could feel bad about not knowing a certain word in the first place, but that word you pulled out of thin air could end up winning you the game. Low-stakes word games like these create a circumvented kind of confidence. If I win, I’m left saying, Huh. I know this language better than I thought I did.

When you’re learning a language, it’s really all about the little wins. On some days, that win will look like ordering breakfast without your voice shaking. On other days, it looks like having a conversation with an elderly Portuguese woman whose accent you barely understand, but you hold on, and maybe you finally—finally—use that one vocab word you’ve tried so hard to remember. But if nothing else, your daily win can be learning a new word or two with Wordle—and sometimes, that’s enough.