An Empirical Rationale for Foreign Languages in Elementary Schools

Mexican-American kindergarten children (N =106), linguistically identified as Spanish dominant, balanced bilingual, Eng dominant, or very English dominant, were given 4 Piagetian conservation tasks to assess cognitive ability. A randomly selected group of Anglo-American monolinguals (N = 20) were al...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	The Modern language journal (Boulder, Colo.) Colo.), 1981-04, Vol.65 (1), p.36-42
Main Authors:	Ginsburg, Harvey J., Mccoy, Ingeborg H.
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Bilingual education Bilingual students Child growth Children Language Language acquisition Nonnative languages Second language learning White people World language instruction
Online Access:	Get full text
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Summary:	Mexican-American kindergarten children (N =106), linguistically identified as Spanish dominant, balanced bilingual, Eng dominant, or very English dominant, were given 4 Piagetian conservation tasks to assess cognitive ability. A randomly selected group of Anglo-American monolinguals (N = 20) were also tested & the scores of these groups were compared. Balanced bilinguals exhibited a trend demonstrating enhanced cognitive skills relative to the Spanish dominant, very Eng dominant, & Anglo-American monolingual children. However, Eng-dominant Mexican-American children showed vastly superior cognitive skills when compared to the other groups. These children typically came from homes where English was the primary language & Spanish was used as a second lang. This kind of additive linguistic environment may have pronounced positive impact on intellectual development, especially skills involving reversible thought. Results suggest that Mexican-American children who come from Eng-speaking homes cognitively profit from learning Spanish as a second lang. AA
ISSN:	0026-7902 1540-4781