Promoting World Languages in Middle School

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Promoting World Languages in Middle School

• (the achievement connection)
• Deborah L. Shultz

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1983Our Nation is a nation at risk!

• What was unimaginable a generation ago has begun
  to occur others are matching and surpassing our
  educational attainments
• The National Commission on Excellence in
  Education compared standards and expectations of
  American schools to those of other advanced
  countries.

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• This report found that the achievement in
  Americas schools was much lower that other
  advanced countries around the globe.
• As a result NCEE made a list of recommendations
  for stronger curricula
• Broaden foreign language programs by increasing
  course requirements and implementing language
  programs in earlier grades.

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1987Center for Education Reform

• A Nation Still at Risk
• Academically, we fall off a cliff somewhere in
  the middle and upper grades. Internationally,
  U.S. youngsters hold their own at the elementary
  level but falter in the middle years and drop far
  behind in high school. We seem to be the only
  country in the world whose children fall farther
  behind the longer they stay in school.

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1998Forgione (U.S. Commissioner of Education)

• Achievement in the United States Progress since
  A Nation at Risk
• Data from the Third International Mathematics and
  Science Study (TIMSS) suggest that the relative
  international standing of the United States
  students declines as they progress through school.

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2001Kirwan (speech)Communitys greatest
opportunity math education and building a
foundation for the future

• In international math tests, our fourth graders
  usually rank above average. However, when they
  reach eighth grade, theyve slipped to about
  average. And by the time they reach twelfth
  grade, they rank near the bottom.

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Methods participants

• Suburban school district (MASD)
• Community of about 16,000
• 5 elementary schools
• 1 middle school
• 1 high school

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84 students in twelfth grade

• 42 world language students
• 15 males
• 27 females
• 15 started a second language in high school
• 27 started in middle school
• 42 random non-foreign language (NFL) students
• 15 males
• 27 females

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Methods procedures

• Collected and compared standardized test scores
  of the 84 students
• Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT)
• Verbal
• Math
• Pennsylvania State Standardized Assessment (PSSA)
• 8th grade and 11th grade
• Reading
• Math

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Results prediction

• Language students would score higher on all
  sections of each of the tests
• language students are, by nature, a better
  student

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Actual Results
S U R P R I S E ! ! !
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Comparison of average PSSA math scores
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Comparison of average PSSA math scores
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Comparison of average PSSA reading scores
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Comparison of average PSSA reading scores
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Comparison of average SAT Scores
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Discussion

• The results of this study verify Forgiones
  findings however, this study found that to be
  true only in the case of students who did not
  take a foreign language.
• Data collected for this study suggest that the
  relative standing of world language students
  increases as they progress through school.

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Ttest significance

Although it looks as if all students performed at
a relatively lower level in eleventh grade than
in eighth grade, there was no statistical
difference in language students scores between
eighth grade and eleventh grade in either
reading or math.

Reading T(74) .04, (p0.10)

Math T(75) .04, (p0.10)

On the other hand, the drop in the average score
of non-foreign language students was
statistically significant in both reading and
math.

Reading T(75) 5.27, (p.0001)

Math T(75) 6.18, (p.0001)

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Possible Reasons Why???????

• Gifted students do not take language in middle
  school they wait until high school, so the
  courses show up on their transcript. If there
  were more gifted students in language classes,
  the middle school scores would be higher.

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Not so.

• In eighth grade, only 3 out of 50 of the gifted
  students are not in a language. This is the most
  in years.

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Why?????

• Course scheduling
• 8th graders have language class in place of
  reading class. All other 8th graders take
  reading.
• Since 8th grade language students dont have
  reading class, they miss out on skills tested on
  the PSSA.

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Not so..

• Students say they do more for the PSSA in English
  class (all 8th graders have English class).
• They do similar class activities in reading and
  English its just that English class also
  includes grammar.and they take practice PSSA
  tests in English class.
• Both 8th grade English teachers agree.

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Course scheduling (cont.)

• Many language students are in advanced math in
  middle school.
• They are above the math level tested on the PSSA
  and have forgotten the basics.

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Not so..

• There are approximately 180 in 8th grade world
  language classes.
• There are only about 60 students in advanced
  math.
• These classes are mixed 6th, 7th, and 8th
  grades.
• Not all 8th graders in these classes are in a
  language.

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Additionally,

• of course, for our students to develop these
  math skills, they need to have good math
  teachers, especially in the early and middle
  grades. Because of the cumulative way that we
  build up math knowledgeif the students get lost
  and fall behind early, they almost never catch
  up (Kirwan, 2001)
• Even if they are in advanced math, they had to
  have mastered basic skills to get that far.

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Why?????

• I dont know why NFL students outperform world
  language students on the 8th grade PSSA. This is
  open for future investigation.
• 11th grade results are more explainable.

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Why?????

• Eleventh grade language students score better on
  reading, perhaps, because in language class, they
  are consistently tested on reading comprehension,
  writing skills and grammarthis is applicable to
  standardized tests.
• NFL students may take electives that have an
  entirely different focus.

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Why?????

• Eleventh grade language students perform better
  on math because they are more likely to be in
  upper level math, which is tested on the 11th
  grade PSSA.

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Why????

• NOTE Colleges require languages. NFL students,
  at this point, are in non-college-prep programs
  and study, perhaps, business math, basic math,
  math for daily life.

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Limitations of this study

• The reader should be cautious to use this study
  to make a general statement about all language
  programs.
• The number of subjects who participated in this
  localized study was relatively small and perhaps
  not representative of the general population.

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Conclusion

• The College Entrance Examination Board reported
  that students who averaged four or more years of
  foreign language study scored higher on the
  verbal section of the SAT than those who had
  studied four or more years in any other subject
  area.
• Many students take the SAT in eleventh grade. In
  order for them to have completed four years of
  language study before taking this exam, students
  would have to begin in middle school.

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Conclusion

• The middle school foreign language program has
  been the focus of relatively little attention.
  The increasing emphasis on early and long
  sequences of foreign languages, combined with the
  impact of the conversion of junior high schools
  to middle schools, requires a new and intensive
  focus on instructional practices in these schools

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Conclusion

• In times like this, Federal statisical agencies,
  such as the National Center for Education
  Statistics, play a critical role.there are large
  differences in how well students do across
  time, across countries, and sometimes across
  groups. It falls typically to researchers to
  untangle these relationships, to separate
  educational inputs from outputs, and to identify
  the processes that contribute most powerfully to
  student performance.

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Conclusion

• If the results of this study can be replicated on
  a larger scale and middle school world language
  programs are shown to improve student achievement
  across the nation, maybe someday students in the
  United States will have a chance to compete in
  the global marketplace.
• If schools in the United States can successfully
  implement middle school language programs and
  boost student achievement throughout their whole
  academic career, our nation will no longer be at
  risk.