Bilingualism

Briefly speaking, bilingualism is the ability to speak two languages.

Babies and children of up to 7 years of age are geniuses at learning languages. Then the ability to learn a language steadily decreases, remaining high, however, in the early childhood education. Never again do we learn foreign languages with such ease.

Language immersion, [from English: immerse], is a method used in bilingual facilities for children. It involves introducing a child into the world of a foreign language, without explanations in the native language.  As a result, children learn a language intuitively, carefully watching their environment and the situations, whose description in a given language they accept in a natural way. The process is similar to learning the mother tongue.

Bilingual teaching, in turn – CLIL, is a modern and innovative way of teaching a foreign language, acquiring an increasingly high recognition among the European Union countries. Its name, CLIL, comes from English and stands for Content and Language Integrated Learning. CLIL refers to teaching particular or all subjects both in the mother tongue and the foreign language, and aiming at achieving proficiency in two languages, both spoken and written: the mother tongue and the foreign language, at an equal level.

The first stage of bilingual education is intensive listening to the English language and the so called ‘silent period’. During their further education children will keep on listening intensely, and then on the next stage they will slowly start speaking; at first saying individual words, and then whole sentence – just as it happens in the case of the mother tongue. That moment is highly person-specific – few children attempt speaking almost from the very beginning (frequently, they start by speaking to themselves, and then to others), whereas a vast majority need a much longer time, yet eventually, the moment always comes. The one condition is permanent, intensive contact with the language, ensured by bilingual education.

English Montessori School covers the bilingualism curriculum by teaching all subjects in English, basing on the immersion method. Apart from the Polish teachers, there are also English native speaker teachers working in the groups. The English speaking teacher runs everyday methodology classes according to a proprietary program, accompanies children in their games, walks, during mealtimes as well as artistic and physical activities. Bilingual approach applied in our preschool makes children experience English in real life situations, rather than learn it, which proves extremely successful when it comes to the knowledge of a foreign language.

We recommend an article on bilingual teaching written by Małgorzata Falkiewicz-Szult, “Immersion in a foreign language. Organisation model to adapt bilingual education at preschool.”