Bilingual Early Education statistics and information
Research has clearly shown that even a cursory introduction to other languages and cultures at an early age is beneficial to a child's social, emotional and cognitive development.
What does research show about the benefits of language learning?
American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Language
The ACTFL is an excellent one-stop-shop for statistics, studies, research findings and other publications and sources regarding the effects of early bilingual and multilingual education for young children.
see:
Preschoolers Study Foreign Tongues
Early Education Week
March 24, 2004
...Interest in foreign-language instruction in preschool is growing, both among parents and early-childhood educators trying to meet the demand. The interest, though, comes at a time when some districts are scaling back on such programs in the elementary grades in order to spend more time on reading and mathematics—the subjects currently tested to comply with the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
"On one hand, we have parents clamoring for this," said Nancy Rhodes, the director of foreign-language instruction at the Center for Applied Linguistics, a Washington-based nonprofit organization that conducts research and provides training and information on language-related issues. "But on the other hand, we have No Child Left Behind emphasizing reading and math. We are feeling that pull."
see:
Learning a Second Language: When & Why
Essentials on education data and research analysis from Edvantia
November 2006
...On examining the research in 2005, education research analyst Janice Stewart found that foreign language study, "especially when introduced in the early elementary school years," is associated with three additional benefits of "increased cognitive skills, higher achievement in other academic areas, and higher standardized test scores." For example:
Cognitive gains: Wilburn Robinson (1992) reviewed 144 research studies conducted over three decades on the relationship between early second language learning and cognitive ability. He concluded that early experience with two language systems seems to leave children with "a mental flexibility, a superiority in concept formation, and a more diversified set of mental abilities."
Achievement in other academic areas: A study by Armstrong and Rogers (1997) examined the relationship between foreign language education and the basic skills of elementary school students. A group of third-grade students given three 30-minute Spanish language lessons per week performed as well as or better than a control group (given no second-language instruction) on academic achievement tests and "showed statistically significant gains in their Metropolitan Achievement Test scores in the areas of math and language after only one semester of study."
Higher standardized test scores. When Thomas Cooper examined data from 23 high schools in the Southeast in 1987, he found that students who took a foreign language in high school scored significantly higher on the verbal scale of the Scholastic Aptitude Test. Those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds who studied a foreign language performed "basically just as well as their more fortunate peers."
Closing arguments. Additional reasons for foreign language study include global economic competition and national security. "While only 44 percent of our high school students are studying any foreign language, learning a second or even a third foreign language is compulsory for students in the European Union, China, Thailand, and many other countries," Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings remarked in January 2006...
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