Education for biliteracy: maximising the linguistic potential of diverse learners in Australia's primary schools.(Report)

Language and literacy in the contemporary primary school

A fundamental and well-recognised pedagogical role of schools and teachers in English-speaking countries is that of supporting students to develop language and literacy skills that facilitate participation in a broad range of powerful textual practices that require academic language proficiency in English (Cummins, 2000; Delpit, 1988; Gee, 2002). Currently, in Australian schools, the notion of language proficiency has become synonymous with mastery of skills related to reading, writing, speaking and listening in English. Literacy in languages other than English (LOTE), while championed in recent policy statements at both the national (Ministerial Council on Education Employment Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA), 2005) and state levels (Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (Victoria), 2008), has rarely been so overshadowed by an emphasis on English literacy in school curriculum and classroom pedagogy. The prioritisation of literacy development in English, and the marginalisation of LOTE and English as a Second Language (ESL) considerations has been experienced not only in Australia (see Lo Bianco, 2002; McKay, 2001), but, to varying degrees, in other English-dominant countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and New Zealand, Skutnabb-Kangas (2000) documenting the rejection of linguistic pluralism in the broader international context.

There are several reasons for this valorisation of English literacy in countries like Australia, despite its rich reserves of multilingual ability and potential within schools and the broader community (see Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2008; Clyne & Kipp, 2002; Department of Education and Training (Victoria), 2006). Curriculum standards and pedagogical frameworks, developed by the various Australian State and Territory Departments of Education and, recently, at the national level (National Curriculum Board, 2008), link English literacy to personal fulfilment, academic success, post-school options and an informed citizenry. The place of English literacy teaching and learning as a major pedagogical priority and the core business of schools has been consolidated by Federal inquiries into literacy teaching in Australian schools (Department of Education Science and Training, 2005a, 2005b); increasingly high stakes assessment regimes, such as the National Assessment Program--Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN), the Achievement Improvement Monitor in Victoria, and the Basic Skills Test in New South Wales; accountability pressures on teachers to assist students to speedily reach English proficiency benchmarks in the early years of schooling; and public perceptions of 'literacy crisis' and 'falling standards', inflamed by writers in the corporate media (for a full critique of these discourses, see Snyder, 2008).

Concurrently, definitions of literacy have expanded in line with young peoples' broadening repertoire of textual practices, mediated and necessitated by rapid technological change. This has led to wide recognition that literacy pedagogy must support the development of the 'multiliterate' individual who can read, view, use, critique and create a diverse range of texts (see Cope & Kalantzis, 2000; Freebody, 2001; New London Group, 1996; Unsworth, 2002; Zammit & Downes, 2002). Despite Lo Bianco's argument that 'a multiliteracies pedagogy cannot but be multilingual' (2000: 105), linguistic pluralism is frequently overlooked in conceptualising the multiliterate individual and, subsequently, in schools' instructional support for students' expanding repertoire of literacy practices.

The study reported here investigated a bilingual school context comprising, in very large numbers, students from immigrant and refugee backgrounds. How the school's commitment to significant hours of instruction in languages other than English was reconciled with the broader educational context that emphasises students' English literacy development underpinned this investigation.

Bilingual and multilingual pathways to proficiency in English

Bilingual education--school or classroom contexts where students learn in two languages for approximately equal amounts of in-school time (Romaine, 1995) or where a non-dominant language is used as the medium of instruction during a substantial part of the school day (Corson, 2001; Cummins & Corson, 1997)--is rare in Australia. In the state of Victoria, where the investigation reported here was conducted, only 15 from a total of more than 1600 government schools offer bilingual education programs in which: