Context/Background: An ET2020 priority is to " Improve the quality and efficiency of education and training". We intend, through this innovative project, to improve the teaching of a second national language to produce more bilingual speakers through carefully planned classroom materials and teacher guidelines. Added to this is the expectation that we will also successfully teach children a foreign language. We look to find ways of integrating our national languages across the curriculum whilst teaching a foreign language discreetly. We will, as a direct result look at how we are teaching mulitlimgualism in the "bilinigual-plus-one" method. Objectives: There are many countries in the EU whereby there are multiple languages spoken on a daily basis. Our focus for this project is a bilingual country - otherwise known as a country whereby two languages hold equal status, but that English remains the main spoken language. Where schools are briefed to teach via a dual language system, in some countries this has had limited success. We have chosen three areas of the EU as examples of this limited success. Wales, Spain and Ireland are known to speak English, Spanish and English respectively. However, there are a number of other languages in Spain which hold equal status. We have chosen the area of Galicia for our study. In Wales, the Welsh language holds equal status to English but is not taught in a way which enables learners to be truly bilingual. The same issue occurs in Ireland with Irish being held in equal status but not necessarily producing fluent speakers. If 50% of Europe (and also the world) is bilingual, this is not reflected in our Welsh and Irish schools and to an extent our Galician ones. Participants and Methodology: We expect around 24 teachers and at least one expert language advisor from our 3 regions to take part in the project. We will begin by researching the current methods of dual language teaching before collaborating to produce guidelines on how to fully integrate a simultaneous approach to bilingualism. We will trial these materials and look at impact on the foreign language being taught. Is this now easier with learners having more language tools to call on at all times? Is the learning now more fluid and unquestioned? How much easier is it to hold a meaningful conversation in two languages, rather than translate one to the other first? We will use our baseline assessment to measure impact throughout the project and, especially at the end. Results and Impact Throughout the world, bilingualism is a shifting statistic in any case, with many migrants adopting the national language of their host country. In schools throughout Europe at least one foreign language is also taught, therefore we will looking at how this is integrated - is it taught discreetly? Is a foreign language given much less teaching time than a national language? How are the two national languages taught across the curriculum to give them dual status with the school? The EU priority of promoting life long learners means that we much find successful ways to foster learning techniques that will stay with learner past school age. If they enjoy their dual language learning experience, they will be more likely to continue to use both their national languages and will see the benefit of being bilingual into adulthood. The impact we expect to see as a result of this project is a more integrated and innovative approach to language teaching that blends two national languages into all curriculum areas fluidly whilst shifting space for a foreign language to be taught discreetly, but using some of the linguistic skills and tools we are equipping our learners with on the way to true bilingualism. We expect learners to be able to work in dual languages without referring to the lessons as "language" lessons. Our core subjects will reflect incidental and subject terminology whilst harnessing linguistic skills to think in two languages simultaneously.
The focus of the project was to improve the confidence of teachers to teach bilingually in exciting and innovative way. It was hoped that this, in turn, would inspire young people across Wales, Ireland and Spain, to become more confident in their second national language. It was also the wish of the project to create a more bilingual and diverse curriculum enabling young people to feel more empowered to learn other languages. Fear is a large part of young people's resistance to learning and using multiple languages and this project attempted to reverse that opinion. We wished to give children the confidence to not be afraid to have a go and to be equipped with the confidence to try out other languages without the fear of being incorrect.
The project was initiated by a group of Welsh teachers who wished to explore how to improve the teaching of a second national language in an attempt to produce more confident and bilingual speakers. The focus was specifically bilingual countries in the EU, in other words, countries whereby two languages hold equal status and schools are briefed to teach via a dual language system. In this project the countries chosen were Wales, Ireland and Spain. Spain has a number of areas where a number of different languages are taught bilingually, therefore for this project the focus was on Galicia Spain.