Bilingual Childcare - Hitches, Hurdles and Hopes
by Victoria Benz
I just finished the book "Bilingual Childcare – Hitches, Hurdles and
Hopes" by Victoria Benz. I must say that I really enjoyed it. It is a
fascinating in-depth study, an ethnographic study, of an early childhood dual
language programme in Australia. The book is full of information, complemented
with people's points of view when the author quotes the parents she met and
interviewed. Victoria Benz has been investigating a German-English childcare
centre in Sydney, Australia. She tells us about what she discovered and
surprised her most. After exploring at the manner, it was established and
implemented, she examines what is happening. She first looked at how the carers
or teachers as they are often called are managing the two languages, German and
English in the everyday routine of the children. Which language is more
predominant and why? She spent time looking at the attitudes of the educators
as well as their ideologies and practices, asking them why they were acting in
such a manner. She discovered a number of facts which are quite surprising and
explain why there is such an asymmetry between these two languages. She then
queried their training and backgrounds as bilingual carers or teachers and
discovered there are a number of discrepancies in the Australian system.
She also took time to survey the
parents who sent their children to the centre she chose to call Fritzkids. Why
did they choose that centre? Is it because of the languages or for any other
reasons? She also looked at their attitudes, ideologies and practices outside
the day care. Their answers are sometime quite surprising and I myself, as a
bilingual language advisor, was quite surprised. The background of the parents
is also reviewed as well as what they intend to do with the German their
children had acquired. What is the value that parents are giving to the
bilingual education and to the languages in this case. There is a kind of
complex relationship between the childcare provider and the clientele which
helps to understand what is really. The external constraints seem to be against
the success of bilingual education and would have an influence on the language
policy at family, institutional and state levels.
Victoria Benz concludes with a look
at the future of bilingual education for young children. The attitude of the
parents, the training of the teachers, the country language policy, the family
language policy, all of these elements will influence the development of any bilingual
childcare.
Although Victoria Benz has been studying on
specific childcare in Australia, I feel that her findings could be applied to
many other bilingual childcares and that anybody wishing to run such a
childcare should be reading this book and see how they can improve what they
are doing, what they are offering, how they are offering it. It gives light on
language ideology vs the practicalities of life. This book would also be of
great interest to teachers who are training and looking at bilingual education.
It is well researched and gives a new perspective on bilingual education in
monolingual society. Dr Isabelle BARTH - Jeux 2 Langues
Bilingual Childcare - Hitches, Hurdles and Hopes
by Victoria Benz
Multilingual Matters, 2018
-->
Commentaires