1 Introduction

In his book Anthropologie structurale [Structural anthropology], Claude Lévi-Strauss (1958) considered that language represented both the perfect cultural component but also that of the intermediary through which all forms of social life establish, transform and perpetuate themselves. In this chapter, we will attempt to synthesize the role that linguistic diversity can play in intercultural approaches in education.

In the first place, we will present the international discussion on multilingualism. Next, we will analyse the importance of the mother-tongue in learning at school. Then, awareness about language and teaching in the heritage language and culture (ELCO) will be discussed. Finally, in the last part of the chapter we will give examples of the teaching potential of bilingual education.

2 Multilingualism and Bilingualism Under Discussion

If multilingualism has often been a focus for discussion, it is because it called into question beliefs concerning the acquisition of language; it called into question the historical monoculturalism of formal education and, finally, it also posed questions about the decline in speakers that certain minority languages are experiencing. We have chosen to begin this chapter by returning briefly to the discussion on bilingualism and the tensions that arise between the development of multilingualism and formal education.

During the 1960s and 1970s, the discussion on multilingualism was very intense because of a number of scientific studies on bilingualism. Doubt was thrown on numerous myths about poor cognitive and linguistic development among bilingual children. Peal and Lambert (1962), for example, showed that the two linguistic systems used by a bilingual child are interdependent components of an enriched form of cognition. Cummins (1979), for his part, formalized the notion of linguistic interdependence by stating that the positive conclusions of scientific literature about bilingual children only made sense if one accepted that proficiency in the first and second languages was interdependent and they mutually reinforced each other. Compared to monolingual children, the bilingual ones seemed to possess more mental agility, a greater capacity to understand concepts and a wider diversity in their mental (Diaz, 1985; Hakuta, 1984) and metalinguistic skills (Perregaux, 1994a). Research also brought to light the fact that the performances of bilingual children were superior to those of monolingual children in some school tests, as long as they could profit from teaching in both of their languages. Beyond the cognitive benefits, various advantages of a “social” type were identified by researchers among bilingual children. One can particularly mention openness to the world and tolerance, which were more common among bilingual people. Table 1 recapitulates these social advantages.

Table 1 The advantages of bilingualism
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The second discussion concerning multilingualism relates the origin of formal education. Throughout its history, the latter has functioned with a single teaching language. The persistence of monolingualism in the school results from two principal factors. First, we may recall that compulsory education was set up during the second half of the nineteenth century to reinforce and consolidate the nation-State. This entity generally decided to impose a single teaching language that was not necessarily the one spoken by a more or less large part of the population. Second, the choice of a single language made it possible to standardize and accelerate access to schooling. Teacher training and the printing of school textbooks in a single language resulted in the school’s rapid expansion. While it was itself monolinguistic, the school authorized the teaching of foreign languages likely to support finding employment and economic expansion. A tension was created therefore because the pupils brought several languages with them into this frequently monolingual school space. Modern migrations have resulted in the arrival in the classroom of linguistic, cultural, ethnic and religious diversity. The kindergartens of Toronto are a good example of this phenomenon confronting the monolingual universe and the children’s linguistic diversity, since 58% of them came from families where English is not the usual language of communication (Cummins, 2001).

Finally, the question of multilingualism is closely linked to that of maintaining minority languages and questions about their status. It should be said that the majority of human societies use several languages (or dialects) in their daily affairs. Their use varies according to the context and the functions attributed to them. Despite a huge diversity on a global scale, a certain number of languages dominate due to the number of speakers. Thus, despite the existence of several thousand languages in the world, it is estimated that the tenFootnote 1 most spoken are the mother-tongues of nearly one-half of the world’s population. The question of these languages’ status can explain why certain of them dominate others. In fact, even if there are 8,000 languages for some 200 countries, very few of them have the status of “official language” and are therefore little used as teaching languages, which can have an impact on the evolution in the number of speakers using that language.

In relation to these discussions, intercultural approaches suggest that the linguistic diversity arriving with the pupils is far from being a problem at the school; it could represent an educational resource, symbolic and instrumental in making schooling more relevant. The difficulty is to convince the educational partners of the relevance of this resource, given that they are themselves mainly the product, the actors and the agents of monolingual education. Intercultural approaches in education also oppose the hierarchization of languages and suggest that all forms of multilingualism could be authorized within the school—as also in society.

3 The Importance of the Mother-Tongue in Learning at School and in Linguistic Interdependence

For many years, research has been confronted with a negative image of mother-tongues within the school. They were believed to prevent the pupils from learning the teaching language properly. The strongest reservations about using the migrants’ or minorities’ languages came from the teachers and the parents. The former, perhaps believing these languages to be competitors, feared that the mother-tongue would weaken the learning of the teaching language, which they considered indispensable both for learning and social mobility. The parents, who were concerned about the success of their child in the teaching language, thought wrongly that the mother-tongue did not have any effect upon the child learning other languages. They could have chosen not to accept (or only modestly) the development of the mother-tongue.

On the subject of these negative points of view, Cummins (2001) explains that the school places itself in a position to block all pupils’ linguistic diversity, which is treated as if it were a problem to be overcome. Today, these words deserve to be more nuanced, since teachers very often have the opinion that the pupils’ languages should be promoted, without ever actually knowing/recognizing that they could have a positive impact on the learning of the teaching language (to be explained in the following pages). The school, as a monolingual institution, therefore offers very little choice to pupils who do not speak the teaching language.

Yet, scientific research adopts a very clear position on using mother-tongues for both the general and educational benefit of bilingual pupils:

Bilingualism has positive effects on children’s linguistic and educational development. When children continue to develop their abilities in two or more languages throughout their primary school years, they gain a deeper understanding of language and how to use it effectively. They have more practice in processing language, especially when they develop literacy in both, and they are able to compare and contrast the ways in which their two languages organize reality (Cummins, 2001, p. 17).

Fifteen years after Cummins wrote these words, the international Education 2030 Agenda endorses once again the importance of the mother-tongue for the first years of schooling and calls on all countries to take the necessary measures to make its use possible. Indeed, among the strategic targets and options of this fundamental text, it is indicated that: “In multilingual contexts [it is necessary to] foster bi- and multilingual education, starting with early learning in the first or home language of children” (UNESCO et al., 2016, p. 38).

These recommendations concerning the use of children’s first language are based on scientific findings, especially on those of Cummins. He explains that “Children who come to school with a solid foundation in their mother tongue develop stronger literacy abilities in the school language” (Cummins, 2001, p. 17). He also stresses the fact that the teaching of a minority language in the school does not hamper the learning in other disciplines that are taught in the teaching language (Cummins, 2001). In fact, the learning of a minority language is not reduced simply to the discovery of a specific vocabulary; on the contrary, through the development of language competences, children “are learning concepts and intellectual skills that are equally relevant to their ability to function in the majority language” (Cummins, 2001, p. 18).

The scientific explanation for the importance of the mother-tongue arises from the theory of linguistic interdependence developed by Cummins. This theory is based on a few key concepts, particularly:

  • Bilingualism is a proper resource for the children, for they can develop linguistic, cognitive and academic proficiency (Cummins, 2000);

  • Instruction using a language other than that used for teaching does not have any negative effects on learning: “bilingual pupils who continue to develop the two languages within the school seem to achieve positive results as much cognitive as academic” (Cummins, 2000, p. 174).

To understand this reinforcement that the two languages can exercise on each other, the theory of linguistic interdependence has often been illustrated by the image of an iceberg (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
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Source Adapted from Cummins (1984)

The model of a dual iceberg (linguistic interdependence) according to Cummins.

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Figure 1 draws attention to the overlap between the different languages mastered by a bilingual person. Obviously, the proficiencies are specific to the use of certain languages (writing when the alphabet is different, the phoneme/grapheme correspondence, the use of the neutral gender in certain languages, etc.). However, the conceptualization of reading, writing and counting/numbering is itself a skill transferable from one language to another. Thus, once pupils continue to progress in their mother-tongue, it reinforces the proficiency available to them in the second language.

Cummins (2000) also developed a threshold hypothesis that even he judged to be a speculative and vague theory. This one suggests that the development of languages must reach a “threshold level” in order for the cognitive or linguistic benefits to be reaped (Cummins, 2000). Cummins (2000) explains that this hypothesis could sometimes be badly interpreted: he described the use that had been made of it in the United States and in New Zealand:

For example, some educators in the United States and in New Zealand have employed the “threshold hypothesis” as a justification to reject the introduction of literacy in English for a considerable period of time. They assumed that the minority language should reach a threshold level before literacy in another language was introduced [in teaching]; they assumed that the transfer of academic knowledge and competences would be automatic (Cummins, 2000, p. 176).

Following these observations concerning the wrongful use of the threshold hypothesis or of linguistic interdependence, Cummins (2000) stated that neither of these two hypotheses foresees a rule about what is the correct language to begin learning to read in a bilingual programme or an appropriate moment to teach reading in the (school’s) dominant language.

In conclusion, it seems essential not to consider “the children’s linguistic and cultural differences as ‘a problem to be overcome’ and, instead, [to open] one’s eyes on the intellectual and cultural resources that the children bring with them, both in the schools and in society” (Cummins, 2001, p. 20).

4 Language Awareness and the Teaching of the Heritage Language and Culture

In this section, we will present two pedagogical approaches promoting languages in the school: language awareness and courses in the heritage language and culture (CLCO).

According to De Pietro and Matthey (2001), language awareness is an educational technique which appeared in the 1980s in the United Kingdom, especially under the impetus of Hawkins’ work (1992). Originally, this method was part of a procedure in favour of integration and the educational success of pupils with migratory origins. It aimed at promoting the learning of foreign languages among all pupils and supported knowledge of the teaching language through the development of metalinguistic proficiency (De Pietro and Matthey, 2001).

Language awareness (Hawkins, 1992, quoted by De Pietro and Matthey, 2001, p. 33) takes the form of activities focusing on “observation, analysis, comparison” (De Pietro and Matthey, 2001, p. 33) of languages. These activities reinforce an interest in language by developing skills likely to support learning. Concretely, it is necessary to think about languages, their similarities and their differences employing audio and written materials. As an example, we present in Table 2 an EOLE activity (éducation et ouverture aux langues—education and openness to languages) employed in Geneva.

Table 2 Presentation of an EOLE activity (summary and key stages)
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De Pietro and Matthey (2001) describe two ways of employing language awareness. The first is cognitive, since these activities include work on languages, their functioning, their composition, etc. On this subject, the theories of language awareness assume (and for this purpose often make reference to the work of Cummins (1984, 2000) mentioned previously) that the pupils’ language skills will be enhanced.

The second potential use is integrative (De Pietro and Matthey, 2001). In fact, language awareness “participates in the development of positive representations about languages and provides in this way a space to develop language learning in a harmonious way” (Lory and Armand, 2016, p. 29). Also, these activities allow the pupils to think about the ranking of languages in society (Lory and Armand, 2016). In this way, these activities provide an opportunity to work on the pupils’ cultural openness and accept the languages of migration (amongst others) by placing them on an equal footing with the languages taught in the school.

To sum up, language awareness gives priority to the global nature of multilingual skills. It develops positive attitudes towards linguistic and cultural diversity by employing the capacities of listening, observing, comparing and thinking about languages. The recognition of and knowledge about other people’s languages is an exercise that provokes a decentred attitude with a strong added-value for education. The use of languages carried out by the pupils in the classroom has a positive effect on their self-esteem and on their motivation to learn languages.

The second pedagogical approach will be presented more briefly, since it has already been mentioned several times in this book (see Chaps. 1, 8 and 9). It is courses in the heritage language and culture (CLCO). These courses, originally intended for migrant pupils, sometimes with a view to their return to their parents’ country of origin, today form part of numerous education systems that recognize the languages and cultural origins of the pupils with migratory origins. These courses also had as their objective the strengthening of the pupils’ linguistic skills (in their first language). They are mostly provided outside regular school hours and are taught by teachers coming from the pupils’ country of origin.

These courses are themselves an appropriate illustration of the implementation of theories on linguistic interdependence and on metacognitive competences. In fact, they aim at the development of literacy competences in the pupil’s heritage language which may be transferable to a second language. Furthermore, these courses have an intercultural aspect since they contribute to the recognition of the pupils’ cultures in the school (even though they might take place outside regular school hours).

Today, numerous challenges remain to be overcome in order for these educational courses to become part of the school’s regular programme:

  1. 1.

    Proposing CLCO to all pupils in the school, independent of their cultural origins; this will encourage intercultural exchanges and will contribute to the appreciation of diversity.

  2. 2.

    To encourage collaboration between the CLCO teachers and the regular school-teachers with the intention, for example, of developing language awareness activities or a common educational project.

  3. 3.

    To situate the CLCOs within the school’s regular timetable in order to accord them more prestige and legitimacy (Radhouane et al., 2017).

Since languages are transmitted with more or less success from one generation of migrants to another, it is appropriate to abandon the expression “original language and culture”. In truth, it is principally the question of origin which is questionable in intercultural approaches. It recalls an externalization and an otherness in relation to societies affected by diversity following migratory movements. The languages spoken by the pupils should above all be considered as a resource by host societies and by their education systems. The expression “heritage languages” is beginning to emerge in the literature and in educational practice as an alternative to the term “languages of origin” (Brinton et al., 2017).

5 Bilingual People and Bilingual Education

In this section, we are going to deal with bilingual peopleFootnote 2 and more precisely features typical of a bilingual person. Then, we will examine briefly how some of their skills develop. Finally, we will present the main models of bilingual education.

Describing a bilingual person, as Abdelilah-Bauer (2015) has done, should not be limited to the idea that it is a matter of possessing two languages and to speak each one of them in the same way as a person who only speaks one. Grosjean (2008) adds that a bilingual person “is not the sum of two monolinguals” (p. 13). On the one hand, even two monolinguals have different levels of proficiency according to their specific needs and their socio-cultural environment. On the other, balanced bilingualism is rare since the opportunities to use one or the other language equally in all situations of daily life are practically non-existent. Ultimately, it should be recalled that bilingualism is not simply the juxtaposition of two linguistic proficiencies; it is a particular state of linguistic proficiency which cannot be evaluated using the monolingual norm’s terminology.

To understand the bilingual individual’s characteristics, it is appropriate to take another look at the numerous erroneous ideas circulating about them (Table 3).

Table 3 Discrediting erroneous ideas about bilingualism
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By crossing cultural, social and linguistic frontiers, bilingual pupils develop variable capacities for resolving problems and tackle learning at school from a transcultural point of view. These learners acquire proficiency at school in the two languages, which becomes a useful resource throughout life. They also learn to appreciate knowledge and the experience of other people’s lives (see Table 4). Dutcher and Tucker (1996) also draw attention to several other facts concerning the acquisition of language proficiency in bilingual people:

Table 4 Different models taking account of linguistic diversity
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  • Pupils develop their writing culture in the mother-tongue more easily;

  • Pupils develop their cognitive competences and master teaching content more easily when they learn in a language with which they are familiar;

  • Academic and cognitive competences, once developed, and the academic learning acquired are easily transferred from one language to another;

  • The time spent in the development of the mother-tongue is a useful investment for subsequent language learning.

Due to the increased interest in bilingualism, in the consideration of pupils’ languages in the school or even in reinforcing the teaching language, different models of bilingual education have been developed. We describe them below.

Transitional bilingual education represents the most common model in the world given the diversity brought to the school by linguistic minorities and migrant pupils. It has been massively introduced in the United States and in the countries of the South containing large linguistic minorities. The transitional bilingual model is a programme in which minority language pupils are taught initially in their mother-tongue for a few years. Their mother-tongue has no intrinsic value but serves uniquely as a transition vehicle enabling the children to better learn the education system’s dominant language. The length of transition may vary between three to five years (Skutnabb-Kangas, 2000). The value accorded to the minority language is therefore of instrumental value during the transition. It is an approach to linguistic diversity seen as a short-term investment and a hindrance to learning in the school. As a result, transitional bilingual education contributes to the ranking of languages and cultures, even if one cannot rule out its positive role in the transition from family milieu to school milieu (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2
figure 2

Diagram of transitional bilingual education. Note The more schooling advances (T = the period of schooling), the less Language 1 is employed; it finishes by disappearing altogether to the benefit of Language 2

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On the contrary, other bilingual education programmes are based on recognizing all the languages spoken by the pupils. One finds, for example, dual immersion programmes whose approach consists of using two teaching languages with an equal share of the school timetable. What is more, it is recommended in these programmes to have almost the same number of pupils in the classroom who speak each of the two languages used. The key to success for these programmes is the fact that the two languages exist side-by-side throughout the school day, each supporting the other. Learning from their peers stimulates the natural acquisition of the language for both groups of children, because it maintains the level of complex cognitive interaction (Akkari, 1998). The literature shows clearly that the pupils’ academic performance is positive for all groups of participants, compared to groups that receive their teaching in just one language. Even more importantly, these performances remain good even for pupils of poor socio-economic status and for migrant children (Brisk, 2006; Lindholm & Aclan, 1991; Thomas & Collier, 1997) (Fig. 3).

Fig. 3
figure 3

Source Adapted from Howard and Christian (2002), Howard et al. (2005)

The model of dual immersion (with Spanish and English as teaching languages).

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On this subject, we should note that few studies are available in Europe on the situation of speakers of a third language in bilingual programmes. In Luxembourg, the structurally bilingual education system is faced with the massive presence of migrant children principally coming from Portugal. Their school results seem to be inferior to their Luxembourger comrades (Lebrun and Beardsmore, 1993).

In the United States, Chuong (1988) has reported the positive results of dual bilingual education programmes into which the speakers of a third language were introduced but their language was not used in the classroom. The first experience concerned some recently arrived Vietnamese children who were placed in an English/Spanish bilingual education programme. Some convincing results were also reported in two studies carried out by Rolstad (1997, 1998), who demonstrated that pupils speaking other languages and enrolled in a Korean/English programme did not suffer in their cognitive development or in their school performance compared to that of the pupils whose language was employed in the programme. Nor did these pupils suffer any particular difficulties at the level of forming their own cultural identity.

If the cognitive gains contributed by bilingualism and bilingual education are hardly contested today in the scientific literature, the same is not true for the evaluation of bilingual education programmes. After decades of studies on this subject, the principal difficulty in drawing clear conclusions from this literature is associated with a methodological question. Thus, it is possible to observe that the majority of evaluations carried out in the United States during the 1990s relied upon questionable methods; studies were lacking control groups or failed to take the children’s socio-economic status into account (Brisk, 2006). Moreover, many specialists propose going beyond the debate on the choice of languages in bilingual education programmes in order to question the educational approach used in the classroom (Cummins, 2000; Garcia, 2011).

To sum up, the development of bilingual education has true potential; nevertheless, it is necessary to consider the sometimes assimilationist, sometimes integrative dimensions that may form part of different development models (Table 4).

6 Towards Multilingual Education for All Pupils

In order to develop bilingual education for all children, and particularly those whose parents are of foreign origin or belong to a linguistic minority, it is useful to conduct work in parallel on three levels: the institutional choice of teaching languages; teacher training; and finally the way languages are viewed and ways of overcoming institutional resistance to multilingualism (Akkari & Coste, 2015).

At the level of institutional change, it seems important to us to emphasize that the societies that recognize cultural diversity and the rights of minorities offer the most fertile ground for the development of bilingual education for everybody. Thus, despite the crises and disagreements surrounding North American multiculturalism, one is obliged to admit that the United States remains a context in which bilingual education is developing with the aid of public funds (Krashen, 1996).

From the same institutional point of view, one relevant change could be the issuing of directives which propose to consider minority languages in the same way as the second foreign language used in the school. One could imagine, for example, in a region like French-speaking Switzerland that the languages of migration were treated in the same way as German or even English.

As far as courses designed to teach children the heritage language of their parents are concerned, it would be wise to grant the educational, organizational and financial responsibility to the host country and not to the country of origin, as is still the case in some national situations. There is also a call to open their enrolment to all pupils in the school, independent of their origin or mother-tongue.

The second level on which we propose to work is that of teacher training. This could be the vehicle of change by favouring the recruitment of bilingual teachers so as to increase their presence in those education systems that contain a large number of heterogenous classes.

Finally, it seems that work should be carried out in order to transform teachers’ images and opinions about languages. Far from limiting the possibilities of migrant children or representing a handicapping cognitive burden, bilingualism and bilingual education give them the possibility of participating actively in the learning process, even when their mother-tongue is not used in the classroom (Baker, 2001). Furthermore, reflection on representations that also affect the status of languages should be encouraged. Some languages are particularly appreciated in the economic world (English, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, etc.) and are therefore strongly promoted in the school, while, on the contrary, other languages spoken by linguistic minorities have a negative association. To give all languages equal merit within the school would require a fundamental change on the part of the educational partners (teachers, heads, parents, educational decision-makers, etc.).

While it is common to appreciate those languages with a high added-value in the work market, it is rare to hear of education systems recognizing languages spoken by certain migrant peoples or linguistic minorities. This results in typical negative classifications: non-English/French/Spanish-speaker:

The pupils who do not speak the teaching language, should they leave some of their languages by the school gate as one would a scooter, or can multilingualism enter into the building? Opinions are divided between those who think that there should be only one language employed in the school and those who search for a way to exploit their potential resources, being able to move from one language to another, by employing their reference languages, their linguistic biography (Perregaux, 2005, p. 37).

Authorizing the presence of all languages in the school would only be possible if there were a change in attitude by the teachers, school managers and the entire society.

From the formal point of view reflected in European linguistic policies, multilingualism finds a primary place in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (Council of Europe, 2001). This document proposes constructive recommendations concerning the teaching/learning of languages:

The plurilingual approach emphasises the fact that as an individual person’s experience of language in its cultural contexts expands, from the language of the home to that of society at large and then to the languages of other peoples (whether learnt at school or college, or by direct experience), he or she does not keep these languages and cultures in strictly separated mental compartments, but rather builds up a communicative competence to which all knowledge and experience of language contributes and in which languages interrelate and interact (p. 4).

The learning of one or several languages can no longer be envisaged in a monolingual concept, that is to say as a collection of distinct, independent linguistic systems, sometimes placed in close proximity for the acquisition, even the “mastery”, of languages. They should no longer be considered in binary relationships, dichotomic face-to-face as in the past, but rather like elements acting together within a complex system reflecting several languages in an individual’s repertory (Ducancel & Simon, 2004; Perregaux, 2004).

To accept multilingualism or to encourage its development is justified for several reasons. One can immediately think of professional situations: to work in a linguistically diverse environment is becoming more frequent and requires multilingual competences. Nevertheless, these matters do not dominate the arguments in favour of multilingualism. They “[guarantee] mobility, [ensure] communication and [allow] access to information and knowledge in several languages” (Brohy & Gajo, 2008, p. 2). Thus, multilingualism can represent a tool for the development of a multicultural society built on the foundations of interaction, sharing and participation, and based on open and easy access to knowledge.

7 Conclusion

Today, bilingualism and multilingualism seem to benefit from a much better reputation than they did in the past. With the support of the studies presented in this chapter, it is interesting to observe that a profound change has taken place with regard to these subjects. Nowadays, from several points of view linguistic diversity is considered as a resource. Firstly, for the pupil: the studies mentioned have drawn attention to the positive rewards of multilingualism for the children’s cognitive skills, as well as on their metalinguistic competences (thinking about languages). Secondly, in the school, linguistic diversity must be considered as a resource. It enhances teaching by its capacity to raise notions about the world through the languages of which it is composed. Approaches, such as language awareness or the language courses on the culture of origin show that possibilities exist for the school to take possession of languages and make use of them as a tool in the service of intercultural openness.

In some ways, one could say that the school, to a certain extent, has seized upon the matter of languages, but principally through the implementation of bilingual education. Through the different models presented, it is essential to remember that bilingual education does not necessarily support the objectives of intercultural openness mentioned previously. If some of these projects recognize numerous languages, others mobilize two of them, frequently chosen on the basis of the family’s purchasing power and its need for bilingual education.

Today, in order that educational institutions may claim to be multilingual or partners in the development of the pupils’ multilingualism, it is necessary to combine the possibilities for bilingual teaching with awareness-raising activities and openness to languages. Two further facets would then be accessible: the first aims at the development of intercultural competences and the second the development of language skills.