A pilot study at the University of East London, School
of Education
Dr Raymonde Sneddon
reports...
When I was a primary teacher educator at UEL
in 2004 I co-ordinated a small action research project on dual
language books. 
A group of teachers experimented, explored resources
and shared strategies.
The project has since inspired me to look more deeply into what
exactly happens when children explore a text in two languages.
And so, with the support of Samina Jaffar from
the Redbridge EMA team I started recording children using the books
to learn to read in the language of their home.
The children
Magda and Albana, aged 6, were learning
Albanian. They were able to adapt to the different phonics and
explore the meanings across Albanian and English with their
mothers, who learnt more English in the process.
Myadda, aged 7, was learning Urdu. She was
faced with understanding the principles of a very different script,
but, with help from her mother and an Urdu primer from her
grandmother, she used all her knowledge of how reading works, as
well as her iron determination, to crack the code.
Lek and Durkan, also aged 7, were teaching
each other to read in Turkish: as they switched back and forward
they were fascinated by the very different ways in which English
and Turkish put words together and did their best to explain the
“connectives and stuff” to me.
Sarah, aged 9, was teaching herself to read in
French, the language of her family, and making an exceptionally
good job of it. Perhaps she had a flying start because the
languages were less different from each other and she enjoyed
exploring how and why metaphors changed when translated.
The findings so far
All children improved their motivation to read
and their skills in English while learning their home language.
They started using their family language more in the home. They
became proud of their skills and keen to share them with friends.
Their parents became more closely involved in their schooling.
But the most important finding of all was how
crucial was the role played by the class teachers who provided the
books, gave support and encouragement and celebrated their
success.
Using dual language books
While in this pilot study the books have been
used with children learning to read in the language of their
community, there is huge potential for their use in unlocking all
the skills children have in our multilingual classrooms. We have
children learning English, learning to read languages they can
speak (in varying degrees at home) and children learning completely
new languages. The books, and the associated resources that are
currently being developed by publishers and EMA teams also have
huge potential for supporting children in exploring and learning
new languages in the primary school.
We are hoping to develop this area of study
and are building a research collection of children’s dual language
books at UEL. We launched a website in August to encourage teachers
and researchers to explore their potential and share good
practice.
You can view this at www.uel.ac.uk/education/research/duallanguagebooks
.I would love to hear from you if you have examples or ideas or
resources to share.
Raymonde Sneddon – UEL – February 2008
Contact: r.m.sneddon@uel.ac.uk
You may also be interested in the multilingual
work of two members of the action research group...