Page 29 - Second language development of newly arrived migrant kindergarteners - Frederike Groothoff

Introducing the context 29 of educational facilities were provided for this specific group of pupils raised the following question in educational practices: should schools provide separate schooling for kindergarteners and if so, how? While set in the Dutch context, this study will contribute to the current international discussion (e.g., Dryden-Peterson, 2015; European Union, 2013; Herzog-Punzenberger, 2016; Hindman, Wasik, & Snell, 2016) on the education of newly arrived migrant pupils. In relation to Vermeer’s (2015) question: what is the best option for optimal development of the pupils, the general research question of this dissertation is formulated as follows: To what extent do pedagogical practices contribute to the second language development of newly arrived migrant kindergarteners in the first two-and-a-half years after arrival in the Netherlands? In the initial stages of this project the distinct organizational structure of the schools for newly arrived migrants (being a separate language school or a mainstream school) was considered to include distinct pedagogical practices as well, but this was adjusted by studying the actual pedagogical practices in the classrooms. In the present study we refer with “pedagogical practices” to many different circumstances in the classroom and these could be practices by the teacher as well as by the peers. To answer this general research question, I used an interdisciplinary approach combining language learning and teaching approaches. Therefore, this dissertation involves a study of the language development of newly arrived migrant pupils and a study of the pedagogical practices surrounding them in class. Both approaches are explained in Chapter 2. 1.6 Outline of this dissertation This dissertation proceeds as follows: After the general introduction to the context in this first chapter, Chapter 2 provides a closer look at the theoretical perspectives of the present study, leading to the formulation of extended research questions in Chapter 3. Chapter 3 will also introduce the population of the study and some methodological considerations. In the next two chapters I study the second language development of the newly arrived migrant kindergarteners focusing on the development of receptive vocabulary (Chapter 4), and on the development of narrative ability (Chapter 5) and I compared the results of the students depending on the organization of the educational setting in which they were schooled, making a distinction between pupils in DL2-schools and Mainstream schools. Subsequently, I studied the school learning environment of newly arrived migrant kindergarteners through a thorough analysis of the pedagogical practices in the classroom: in Chapter 6 the different school types (DL2-schools and Mainstream schools) are