Early bilingual immersion school program and cognitive development in French-speaking children: Effect of the second language learned (English vs. Dutch) and exposition duration (2 vs. 5 years)

Abstract

The results of studies targeting cognitive and academic advantages in children frequenting early bilingual immersion school programs (CLIL) have been contradictory. While the impact of the amount of CLIL experience has already been studied, the role of the second language learned has been little studied to account for differences among study findings. The link between executive skills (EF) and scholar abilities (e.g., mathematics) in the CLIL context has also been little investigated. The purpose of the present study was to determine if the impact of CLIL on EF and academic performances varies depending on the immersion language and the duration of CLIL experience. The sample included a total of 230 French-speaking children attending second (141) and fifth (89) grade classes. Within each grade, there were three matched language groups composed of children respectively immersed in English, immersed in Dutch, and non-immersed controls. The children were administered tasks assessing executive functions [alerting, cognitive flexibility, and working memory], as well as arithmetic abilities. In second grade, we detected no difference in EF between the language groups. On the other hand, in fifth grade, the two immersed groups outperformed the non-immersed group on the cognitive flexibility task but did not differ between them. Moreover, only the Dutch immersed group outperformed the control group on the working memory task. Arithmetic performances also differed depending on the language learned; in second grade, Dutch learners performed better than the monolingual group. In fifth grade, Dutch learners outperformed the two other groups. These results suggest that the impact of CLIL on executive skills and arithmetic performances might be modulated by the amount of CLIL experience and the second language learned in immersion.

An emotional advantage of multilingualism

“…In recent years, several meta-analyses on bilingual advantages yielding heterogeneous results with regard to different cognitive functions (e.g., Adesope et al, 2010;Donnelly et al, 2019;Grundy & Timmer, 2017;Gunnerud et al, 2020;Lehtonen et al, 2018;Lowe et al, 2021;Ware et al, 2020) have been added to an ongoing and still vivid debate. Recent studies also contribute to this inconclusive situation: some researchers find a cognitive advantage (Czapka et al, 2020;Grote et al, 2021), while others do not report any advantages of multilingualism (Bellegarda & Macizo, 2021;Jones et al, 2021;Laketa et al, 2021;Liu et al, 2022;Nicoladis et al, 2018;Shokrkon & Nicoladis, 2021) or report differential results depending on the measures and group characteristics (Gillet et al, 2021). Whether a cognitive advantage of multilingualism with respect to "narrow" cognitive functions can be found seems to depend on the specific function under investigation, individual and social conditions of multilingualism, and the setting in and task with which they are measured.…”

The role of technology in language immersion: a systematic literature review

“…Other language immersion variants are total, partial, and two-way immersion [5]. These diverse language immersion variants have widely implemented and brought positive impact to language learners, be it the aspect of linguistic [7] and cognitive [8], [9], language use [10] and proficiency [11], [12], phonological awareness [13], faster language development [14] in a shorter time and better result [2], provides a unique contribution to receptive and expressive language skills [15], multilingual attitude [16], multicultural identity [17], [18], and intercultural competence [19].…”