Mother-tongue training in school as a determinant of global language proficiency: A Belgian case study

Abstract

Experimental models of education that incorporate the mother tongue of immigrant children into the structure of their curricula constitute obvious cases-in-point for assessing the validity of bilingual or multilingual education for such children. The present case study of one such model, the so-called ‘Foyer Bicultural Education Project’ of Brussels, is intended to shed some light on the relationship between formal mother-tongue training and the development of global language proficiency in minority-language children. Since this particular case-in-point involves three languages — Italian (the mother tongue), Flemish and French — it is especially interesting with regard to the validity of the so-called ‘interdependence principle’, as formulated by Cummins (1979). The findings presented here confirm Cummins' principle that the development of literacy in the mother tongue is a determinant of global language proficiency in minority-language children.