As a Brazilian Portuguese native speaker, I am teaching since the last 3 years Mathematics and Physics in German (I am currently at the level C1/C2) in the city of Berlin. What I have noticed so far: most of the fast learners did not feel the impact of my accent and in few times the lack of native language expressions to explain a certain topic from my side was quickly complemented by these students. They are the minority in all classes I have been teaching. However, the slow learners gave up very quickly and used as an excuse for it the fact of a small lack of my languages skills, even if some of them had already a history of deficiency in their learning processes. I would be interested in quantitative studies that compares the impact of a foreign language teacher teaching in the mother language of children. Is there something remarkable on it to pay attention?
How would you quantify or measure this influence? In many South Asian countries, science is taught in English. Neither the teacher nor the student speaks English at home. The main problem I noticed was that my pronunciation of scientific words was incorrect which I later corrected by consulting dictionaries. Students who had studied science in native or regional languages in schools had lot of trouble when exposed to university level studies in sciences especially in descriptive writing.
I believe it can be difficult at the beginning but one may get used to it. When one is exposed to a new language, they often translate the non-native language to the native one in their mind, understand it and prepare a response, translate back to non-native language and converse it. This could lead to potentially slower comprehension speed compared to when they are used to the language and can listen, think, and respond in the non-native language without the "internal translation".
I would look at language immersion research. Based on test scores the students do as well or better than their monolingually taught peers. There is occasionally vocabulary that needs to be touched upon in the ELA portion of their classes, but that is minor and easily corrected.
Jair,
I am one who holds the belief and takes the stand for the teaching of students in their formative stages, lessons in their mother or local language. It yields the best benefits in the learning outcomes of students. It increases the appetite of students to the teaching and learning processes in any subject, particularly science. We noticed this in some pilot studies regarding the use of 'Asante Twi', one local language in some elementary and Senior High Schools in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. Shy, dull students were actively involved and showed massive improvement in their academic performances.
However, the teaching of the foreign language can be in session but not as the language in teaching the other subjects. When the interest is built and students are maturing, then the foreign language, if it is desired as an official language of a nation, could be introduced.
Thanks
Dickson Adom
Jair,
Science - Non Mother tongue teachers
The only barrier that may exist is students not being able to understand the teacher because of the language linguistic difference. I have personally witness this and it can be frustrating to students who have difficulties reading and writing. Otherwise, the science classroom is no longer the science teacher lecturing in front of the class but utilizing the 5E Model, with interactive smart board games and experiments, and PhET simulations.
Robin Ruiz
https://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulations/category/new
http://www.wisd.org/users/0001/docs/GVC/5E%20Model.pdf
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