EFFECTIVE BILINGUAL EDUCATION/BARBIERI TWO
WAY BILINGUAL PROGRAM.
For years there had been debates on which program is more effective
for language minority students. Typically, the debate has only focused on
program labels rather than the quality of the program implementation.
In a Two-Way Bilingual Education (TWBE), a balanced group of native
majority language speakers and native minority language speakers are
integrated for instruction. Its goal is to develop high levels of bilingualism
for all students in the program, to develop grade-level appropriate
language proficiency in English and Spanish by the end of fifth grade, and
to develop positive cross-cultural relationships and a respect and
understanding of one’s own culture and for others. The objective is for
educators to instruct students from Kindergarten to 5th grade across
subjects such as literacy, math, science, social studies, ESL, and specials
with various levels of integration.
There are different program designs, but the models that most
commonly used are the 90/10 and 50/50 TWBE approaches. In the 90/10
model, native and non-native speakers of English receive literacy
development in the minority language until third grade when English
literacy is introduced. On the other hand, students in the 50/50 model
receive their literacy instruction simultaneously in both languages. For
instance, the TWBE (Barbieri model in Framingham, MA) has been in
existence for more than ten years. It was first started with kindergarten
and first grade in 1990. After additional planning and development with
more funds, it added one grade level each year. In this particular district,
they also implemented the model with middle and high school students. At
middle schools, students take language arts and social studies in Spanish.
English language arts, math, and science are taken in English standard
curriculum classes. Students continue their Spanish language
development at high school with a TWBE Spanish Language and
Literature class. All other classes are standard curriculum classes where
TWBE students are fully integrated with non-TWBE students.
To be eligible for participation, parents who are interested in the
program attend an orientation. Interested parents will have to sign a
“memorandum of understanding” when they register their child. This
simply stated that they are willing to be committed with the program in a
long-term process. Up until 1999, about 85-90 percent of teachers in the
TWBE program were bilingual and held a bilingual certificate, and more
than half of the teachers had been with the program since the beginning.
This is great in terms of continuity and stability during its developing years.
In addition to that, the program has recruited native Spanish speakers to
provide support services, such as bilingual special educators, bilingual
social workers, bilingual counselors, and abilingual school psychologist.
In the Barbieri TWBE, the program is designed for each grade level for
both Spanish and English speakers and how each language is used for
different subjects. L1 stands for students’ native language, L2 stands for
the second language. Within the teacher’s instruction chart, whenever the
figure shows L1/L2, it simply means that 50% of the subject is taught in L1
and 50% is taught in L2. Shaded areas in the chart illustrate that students
from both language backgrounds are integrated for instruction. Unshaded
areas represent at times that students are grouped by language group of
their own. One of the advantages about the TWBE program is that
teachers and administrators are the ones who will have to make decisions
about which language is used for initial instruction, curriculum content, and
the amount of student integration.
One of the goals of the barbieri TWBE program is that students will
demonstrate academic achievement at grade level in both languages by
the end of fifth grade. In order to see the change, TWBE student scores
are compared to the national norm on the Standford Achievement Test
(SAT) for English and the Aprenda Test for Spanish. The grade level
performance is reflected in a average score of 50 NCE (National Curve
Equivalency scores). Statistics shows that both groups of students
perform well above grade level by fifth grade. This simple means that the
Spanish speakers are able to maintain their native language and the
English speakers develop their Spanish to appropriate levels as measured
by the Aprenda Test.
In conclusion, the Barbieri TWBE approach is dynamic. Its flexibility in
implementation of the model give administrators and teachers ways of
setting up the program according to the students’needs and diversity.
Statistics and past outcomes of student’s performances have shown that
the TWBE might not be the best, but it is one of the leading and effective
tool to be used within our school system.