Fluctuating cognitive benefits in children attending early bilingual immersive instruction

[en] Abstract Cognitive benefits have been reported in early bilinguals as well as in children attending a Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) school programme. Recent findings, however, show divergent results. These inconsistent findings seem to be attributable, among other factors, to the divergent tasks applied. This study aimed to determine whether a two-year CLIL programme has positive effects by applying the same tasks for which advantages were shown previously and to examine whether potential gains might impact children’s academic performance. Thirty 7-year-old French-speaking pupils who had been enrolled in a CLIL programme since the age of 5 and 30 French-speaking monolinguals following a traditional school programme were compared on different attentional and executive tasks after being matched on potential confounding variables. No attentional and executive differences were observed, but a significant effect was observed in favour of monolinguals on a task assessing mathematical skills. The implications of these results are discussed.

Disciplines :

Theoretical & cognitive psychology

Author, co-author :

Cristina-Anca, Barbu ; University of Liège

Gillet, Sophie ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de Logopédie > Neuropsychologie du langage et des apprentissages

Poncelet, Martine ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de Logopédie > Neuropsychologie du langage et des apprentissages

Language :

English

Title :

Fluctuating cognitive benefits in children attending early bilingual immersive instruction

Publication date :

08 April 2024

Journal title :

Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education

ISSN :

2212-8433

eISSN :

2212-8441

Publisher :

John Benjamins Publishing Company

Peer reviewed :

Editorial Reviewed verified by ORBi

Additional URL :

http://www.jbe-platform.com/deliver/fulltext/10.1075/jicb.22020.cri/jicb.22020.cri.pdf

Available on ORBi :

since 27 April 2024

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