Additional language in the PYP is always a great topic to discuss or unpack with the PYP teachers. As you know, I always start my blogs by looking at IB documentation:
Culture 4: The school implements, communicates and regularly reviews a language policy that helps to foster intercultural understanding through communicating in a variety of ways in more than one language (0301-04)
Culture 4.2: The school describes in its language policy the way that the school recognizes multilingualism as a fact, a right and a resource for learning. (0301-04-0200)
- PYP 1: The school ensures that students learn a language in addition to the language of instruction (at least from the age of seven). Multilingual programmes, where students are learning in at least two languages, can but are not required to offer additional languages. (0301-04-0411)
(Standards and practices 2020)
Language learning includes the development of home and family languages, languages of the school, additional languages and literacy.
The student language portrait is a tool that captures a learner’s complex language profile.
Students who are multilingual have an improved capacity to think, talk and reflect on how languages work, which is why PYP students learn at leastone additional language from the age of seven. Through learning additional languages, students become cognitively more flexible, creative and better at problem-solving. Students who see and hear their own languages within the learning environment, and who are encouraged to actively make links to their prior linguistic experiences, connect more quickly to the community and their own learning (Cummins 2000).
All teachers are language teachers as all learning takes place through language.
Translanguaging is the process by which language students actively draw on all their linguistic resources to communicate and make meaning (Garcia, Li Wei 2014)
Learning and Teaching, Language section
As you can see, some keywords are: multilingualism, home and family languages, languages of the school, language of instruction, additional languages, language portrait/profile, and translanguaging.
I receive many questions about the additional language in the PYP, and I had the chance to work in three different schools, in three different countries, and three different contexts. Being multilingual (I speak Arabic, French, and English), helped me a lot in supporting the three schools and I will share with you what we did:
| School 1 in Lebanon | French Section | English section |
| Majority of the teachers and the students are Lebanese Parents decide if they want French or English as the language of instruction from the age of 3 | French language, math, and science are taught in French Arabic language, Social, Islamic, PE, Music, VA are taught in Arabic | English language, math, and science are taught in English Arabic language, Social, Islamic, PE, Music, VA are taught in Arabic |
| All teachers speak Arabic and collaborate in all units of inquiry, same units were taught in French, English and Arabic | ||
| School 2 in UAE | |
| Teachers are international and the majority of the students are from the UAE English is the language of instruction | English language, math, and science are taught in English Arabic language, Social, and Islamic are taught in Arabic PE, Music, and VA are taught in English or Arabic depending on the teacher Both Arabic and English teachers collaborate in all the units of inquiry |
As you can see in scenarios 1 and 2, the collaboration is not hard and, in both schools, if we had students who were not fluent in Arabic, they had separate classes to support them.
You will notice now, that in my 3rd scenario, things will be more complex:
| School 3 in Qatar | |
| Teachers and students are international (around 60 different nationalities) English is the language of instruction Arabic language and Spanish lanugage are taught to all students from the age of 3 | In the KG classes, all students learned 3 languages (English, Spanish, Arabic) and all of the language teachers collaborated to teach the same unit of inquiry. From grade 1 to 5 the students were divided according to their level regarding the Arabic and Spanish classes: fluent in the language or beginners. If they are fluent in the language, Arabic, Spanish or both, they would then be learning the same unit of inquiry done with the homeroom teacher in English. For the beginners, in Arabic or Spanish or in both, they had a stand-alone unit, which I will explain below. |
As we all know, the additional language teachers teach most of the grade levels, so we decided to do the following: have the same central idea for all the grade levels but different products, and to make it simpler, we decided to have only 3 units per year, one for each term, each unit around 30 lessons of 45 min.
| Term 1 Final products | Term 2 Final products | Term 3 Final products | |
| Central idea | People use language to communicate. (Focus on listening and speaking) | Authors write for different purposes. (Focus on reading and writing) | Visual presentation enhances the ability to express ideas and images. (focus on viewing and presenting) |
| Grade 1 | Talk about myself | Write a recipe | Prepare an assembly |
| Grade 2 | Talk about my family | Write a letter to students in different schools to know them | Prepare a short play |
| Grade 3 | Talk about my school | Write a short story | Prepare an advertisement |
| Grade 4 | Talk about my country | Write a short poem | Start a YouTube channel to teach the additional language |
| Grade 5 | Talk about an area of interest | Write a persuasive text | Use Arabic and Spanish in PYP Exhibition |
As you can see each school is unique, and the language policy is very important in shaping the school’s identity, the most important thing is not to force additional language teachers to integrate with the class teachers if they are teaching beginners. And it’s not about the numbers of the planners, it’s about the quality and the amount of time we have.
Let’s not forget, two essential questions, that all teachers should be asking at the beginning of the year to all the students learning additional languages:
- Why do we learn this language? Let them come up with 10 reasons, this is important especially if the additional language is obligatory in some countries.
- How do we learn an additional language?
I’m sure you are all waiting for the new subject guide the IB will publish next year related to additional language in the PYP. In the meantime, let me know how you plan your additional language classes in the PYP.
Wonderful blog emphasizing on importance of additional languages . At our school we follow a similar approach of asking students why they are learning an additional language and how they will learn. The latter part will help students to own the language and make efforts to learn . We do not enforce to integrate .