What a mess. I will merely introduce the problem, here. These are big issues.
Everyone who has paid attention to "foreign language" learning has heard of the ACTFL standards. "ACTFL" stands for the American Council on Teaching of Foreign Languages. You can read more about them and their standards at their site.
I have a big problem with these standards. And no, I'm not a professional language teacher. However, I have been a student in America studying a few other languages during my student years - French, Arabic and Turkish. I did French as a foreign-language from elementary age through middle and high school and then fulfilled my college requirement with it. Then I did the equivalent of beginning through advanced studies for Arabic and Turkish (a commitment of 5 years) during grad school. All the while following these ACTFL standards. I am very familiar with the content it outlines, to say the least.
Moreover, I never did Mandarin studies outside of home and Chinese school. So, I can say I have a pretty good experience set to compare things. Compared to what I can do in the other languages, my Mandarin is fantastic. And those who know me who also know Chinese have an understanding of where my real skills are at. But I know what I comprehend and what I largely do not, when presented with anything in any of these languages. English, obviously, no problem. Mandarin is my second-best. French is a very distant third.
But I remember what I could do and comprehend when I was "immersed" and fully engaged at Advanced Level studies for Arabic and Turkish. I could do a lot. Hanging onto it? Much harder. Hanging onto Mandarin? Wow, you have no idea how much I didn't do. And yet, being made to do a lot when I was a kid clearly made a difference.
All of this goes back to the battle for Critical Thinking Skills. We got a lot of "kid-friendly" content while we were kids. And then again, there was a basic slate that clearly gave us a foundation that could support more sophisticated subjects. There were plenty of kids like me who then went on to do Chinese Studies at college to fulfill their requirements (and to clarify, that wasn't me; I did French). Whether they continued was up to them. I think most of them, if they continuously challenged themselves with reading a newspaper throughout adulthood, then they probably have some good basic reading skills still today.
But therein lies the challenge - continuing to use the language and continuing to use your brain to piece together ideas and be able to comprehend increasingly complex and sophisticated ideas. If the brain doesn't get that development in one language or another, then there simply is no development of the critical thinking skills.
I have no doubt that because I got a very sound education at high school and college, that then much of what I can comprehend when I listen to the radio or listen to educated Mandarin-speaking adults converse, it all comes from my brain being able to piece it together and back-track through my foundational training in Mandarin. It's not like I learned how to talk about, say, "trade imbalances" in Chinese when I was a kid. But given the basic vocabulary “贸易失衡” and other basic terms about the economy, I can certainly piece together my own thoughts and comprehend without effort.
(Someone remind me to address this "without effort" thing... I think it is, in fact, critical to the immersion model. And sure, I get that it is why parents are seduced by the "osmosis" idea.)
ACTFL is trying to be realistic. ACTFL is historical. ACTFL is also a professional association, so teachers go through it and adhere to the standards that have been vetted by the research that can be done, in that it creates its own self-fulfilling prophecy. It's kind of like what happens with certain types of industry-based research. I'm not saying ACTFL is evil. But just using this as a metaphor. It's like when the tobacco industry funded its own research, or if the cell-phone industry were to fund its own research. If you only have English-proficient researchers talking to other English-proficient researchers, and you don't have enough activity going the other way, then you're kind of stuck.
ACTFL is, in fact, a lot about the 'A' part of that acronym - the American part. So you have to see these standards in the context of that historical experience. Nothing wrong with that. But it also means that Globalization has passed them by, despite their efforts to try and help more American students catch up and be aligned with that very force.
But this is life. Globalization happens. And it happened in America far faster than ACTFL noticed. I've said before, there are Chinese schools being run by people who know what they are doing (and there are certainly schools being run by people who don't know what they are doing) who are achieving far more than what ACTFL outlines.
The way to do it? Content-based standards and Whole Language. And that is what some immersion programs are supposed to be doing. But this conversation about ACTFL can throw a wrench into describing the goals, what they are, what they look like. And if they follow the foreign-language model to shape the content (thereby following the ACTFL standards too closely), then it destroys what I call the "whole language" experience.
ACTFL doesn't necessarily produce the 3B's. Bilingualism, Bi-literacy and Bi-culturalism. Can it help? Sure. Clearly, Kevin Rudd did something of that sort. But with a caveat - he's Australian. His access to China and Taiwan and all things Chinese and Taiwanese/Chinese is far easier than those of us on the other side of the Pacific. But there are many Americans who have become very good with their skills. They would have to say for themselves, however, if they feel like they've achieved the 3B's. I think these folks are missing a more natural form of bi-culturalism. They tend to over-exoticize or miss the trees for the forest or the forest for the trees. "The Other" is still an "other" (see Edward Said and all his followers on studies of self v. other and "orientalism"), rather than an extension of the "self."
But I don't see why in this day and age, younger American students cannot just follow what we ABC's had to grow up with and beyond, if they want to achieve the 3B's. Many of us ABC's are still struggling with achieving the 3B's. But if we got enough early training, then at least we know what we're working towards.
I know enough to look at ACTFL and say, Hmm, yeah, really? Not so much. Not good enough. I don't need to be a professional, in this case. But I have enough real-world experience in being a student of languages truly foreign to me, as well as English and Mandarin which are not foreign to me, to say that those standards are not enough to function in the real world. The real world demands a far higher level of engagement and competence. Many native Chinese who have ended up elsewhere in the world for their professional skills, have higher skills in English or French or German, etc. High enough to function at a professional level in a language that was "foreign" to them. This is plenty true for many who live in America or Canada. But have you ever met native Chinese who then raised their families in French, German or Spanish speaking countries? I have. I know one German-raised young woman whose Chinese skills far surpass mine. Plus, she is fluent in English and German because those were the languages she had to use for school. It is humbling.
Point-for-point disagreement about ACTFL? That will have to wait for later posts. But I urge parents to do their own digging, their own questioning. Push your peers, teachers, and school administrators to take issue with these types of assertions. And it's not like there are not professionals out there who know I'm saying the truth, here. In fact, I've heard some say exactly this. In California, the State's "World Languages" standards were based on ACTFL. So sometimes, you might hear people talk about how the World Languages Model is not enough. This is what they mean.
Even in private schools, plenty of professionals are trying to adhere to ACTFL as the basis, but not really thinking about it. They just accept that this should be the ladder of progression, that it is tried and true and proven.
Y'know, I did come across research coming out of Canada that shows this not to be true. But for another post... And I doubt American researchers have much bothered with studying Heritage schools. So herein lie the gaps amongst all these claims. They become circular.
But if you ask native speaking Chinese parents and teachers what they did to get their own kids up-to-snuff, then they will tell you. And believe me, I've asked, so that I could help myself. The answer is that some native-speaking Chinese did not get their kids past a certain point. Then they struggled through adolescence. If they were in the right environment - more support from other Chinese families, formal school requirements, camp in Taiwan - then their kids were able to grab onto something and hold onto it. But if not, then if they stopped fighting to keep the peace, the kids became adults with little to show for that "early immersion" at home.
Who was able to raise their kids with good skills? The fighters. The fiesty moms and grandmas who were not going to take "No" for an answer to "Sit down and write 10 characters 10 times!"
You don't need ACTFL to tell you what to do to succeed. Just the stories of some hands-on mommies. Just like it has always been. So here I am - I'm a mom, passing on the wisdom of other moms. I hope it will help you.
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