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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 146

Thematic Session (Papers belonging to this Thematic Session)

Language at preschool in urban European settings

Authors: Kuiken, Folkert
Submitted by: Kuiken, Folkert (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, The)

For many European children, especially those growing up in an urban context, language at school is not the same as language at home. This may be because children are raised in a mother tongue, which differs from the language used outside home. But even if a child is raised in the language, which is used outside home, there may be large differences between the variety spoken at home and the particular academic language used in a school setting. It is also the case that often the use of another mother tongue at home coincides with a low economic status of the parents. For these reasons many children suffer from a low language proficiency level in the target language when they enter primary school, which prevents them from attaining higher forms of education and consequently to obtain higher qualified jobs.

This thematic session focuses on the challenges children and educators are faced with in the multilingual urban European context at the earliest years of education, that is, at preschool. In this session various questions will be addressed. For instance: most European countries have started investing large amounts of money in preschool programmes for young children, but how effective are these programmes? What are successful ways to prepare children for their entry to primary school, in particular, regarding their (second) language skills, e.g., lexicon, grammar, communicative competence a.s.o.? Are there possibilities for content and language integrated learning at this age? And what is, in all this, the role of parental stimulation, individual differences between pupils, language policy at/concerning preschools, and preschool teachers’ competences?

The session will bring together scholars from various multilingual Western European countries (e.g. Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, and the UK), specialized in academic language and/or in language problems of pupils at preschool in an urban context. As the majority of young children in (Western) Europe grow up in an urban setting nowadays, many of whom suffer from a low proficiency level in the language used at school, the topic is of particular relevance to the conference theme. The session intends to identify these problems and to present solutions and good practices from various European countries that may serve as an example for other countries.

Some key references
Barnett, W. S. (2008). Preschool education and its lasting effects: Research and policy implications. Boulder and Tempe: Education and the Public Interest Center & Education Policy Research Unit.
Dickinson, D. (2011) Teachers' Language Practices and Academic Outcomes of Preschool Children. Science 19: 964-967.
Goodman, A. & Sianesi, B. (2005) Early education and children’s outcomes: How long do the impacts last? Fiscal Studies, 26, 4, 513-548.
Nell, L. & Rath, J. (eds) (2009) Ethnic Amsterdam. Immigrants and urban change in the twentieth century. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
Overview of Pisa 2009 profiles by country/economy. http://stats.oecd.org/PISA2009Profiles