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Introduction

Bilingualism (multilingualism) refers to the coexistence of more than one language system within an individual, as contrasted to monolingualism. The question of how the two languages interact at the cognitive and behavioral levels has been of long-standing interest to psycholinguists as well as to neurologists, clinicians, and educators. There has been great anticipation that developments in cognitive neuroscience could shed further light on important fundamental questions in the understanding of bilingualism.

Bilingualism as an individual condition is nested within a distribution of broader societal circumstances that cause language contact. There are many different manifestations of this variability. Bilingualism may be the result of growing up in a bilingual community, such as a bilingual neighborhood of an immigrant community in New York. However, that is different from bilingualism that results from growing up in an officially bilingual country such as Canada, where its two official languages are separated by geographical regions. Bilingualism that is accompanied by literacy in both languages is different from bilingualism in which schooling is available in one language (the one that also carries social prestige) but not the other. Although the interest of the cognitive neuroscientist in bilingualism may be in understanding the neural bases of the distribution of the two linguistic systems in the bilingual, the reality is that research subjects and clinical patients invariably come from a sampling from the social distribution. It is thus necessary to begin an understanding of bilingualism from its social bases.

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What Is Bilingualism?

Bilingualism is a product of extensive language contact (i.e., contacts between people who speak different languages). There are many reasons for speakers of different languages to get into contact with one another. Some do so out of their own choosing, whereas others are forced by circumstances. Among the frequently cited factors that contribute to language contact are education, modern technology, economy, religion and culture, political or military acts, and natural disasters. One does not have to move to a different place to be in contact with people speaking a different language. There are plenty of opportunities for language contact in the same country, the same community, the same neighborhood, or even the same family.

However, although language contact is a necessary condition for bilingualism at the societal level, it does not automatically lead to bilingualism at the individual level. For example, Belgium, Canada, Finland, India, Luxembourg, Paraguay, and Singapore, to name but a few countries, are bi- or multilingual, but the degree or extent of bilingualism among the residents of these countries varies significantly. There are large numbers of bilingual or multilingual individuals in Luxembourg, Paraguay, and Singapore, but considerably fewer in the other officially bi- or multilingual countries. Mackey (1962) claims that there are actually fewer bilingual people in bilingual countries than there are in the so-called 'unilingual' ones, because the main concerns of bi- or multilingual states are often the maintenance and use of two or more languages in the same nation, rather than the promotion of bilingualism among their citizens. It is therefore important to distinguish bilingualism as a social or societal phenomenon from bilingualism as an individual phenomenon.

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Abstract

Bilingualism is increasingly becoming the norm in the world. This article addresses several aspects of bilingualism, with a focus on the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying bilingual language comprehension and production. It starts with a brief overview of different types of bilingualism, including when bilinguals acquired their languages (age of acquisition), their competence in each language (proficiency), and how often and how they use their languages. This is followed by a discussion of how bilinguals speak and process multiple languages. The two languages of a bilingual might be active even when only one language is needed. As a consequence, bilinguals recruit several language control mechanisms to ensure that language comprehension and production are achieved in the target language. The amount and type of language control needed depend on various features including the context (e.g., some contexts require the use of a specific language while others allow free language switching) and language proficiency. Several brain regions are involved in bilingual language control, including parts of the fronto-parietal network and subcortical regions. The article finishes with a brief discussion of the question whether bilinguals recruit domain-general control mechanisms when using multiple languages and consequently whether they possess certain cognitive advantages compared to monolinguals. The evidence so far suggests that bilinguals partly recruit domain-general control mechanisms but also apply mechanisms specific to bilingual language control. Furthermore, while early studies suggested strong cognitive advantages for bilinguals, the overall evidence does not show consistent cognitive differences between bilinguals and monolinguals.

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II. Why the Bilingual Brain?

For a long time, the topic of neurological substrates of bilingualism was simply not addressed in the neuropsychological literature, or it was raised only in obscure outlets. As already noted, a comprehensive account of brain-behavior relations can no longer afford to ignore bilingualism, which represents a particularly prevalent and varied form of language experience. The inclusion of bilinguals broadens the scope of research questions, permitting a fuller examination of how language functioning is influenced both by biological parameters (such as the state of brain maturation at birth versus at puberty, with obvious implications for differences in the processing of languages acquired early versus late in life) and by cultural parameters (such as how a language is taught and in what context it is primarily used).

The earliest empirical research on the bilingual brain took the form of case reports of selective language loss or recovery following aphasia in speakers of two or more languages. This literature on polyglot aphasia, as it was called, sparked many questions and subsequent investigations of brain involvement in the language functioning of brain-injured and brain-intact bilinguals using a diverse array of methods. Questions raised in the context of the polyglot aphasia literature (and subsequently tested using normative samples) include the following: What factors influence which language is recovered following brain injury in polyglots? To what extent is language impairment parallel or differential across languages? Does brain damage impair the ability to translate or code- switch between languages? Does it produce novel forms of language mixing? How are the different regions of the left hemisphere organized for language in bilinguals? What is the role of the right hemisphere in bilingual versus monolingual language functioning? How does the modality in which the language is learned or other factors in the context of language acquisition influence the pattern of brain involvement in language functioning?

Although there are now several hundred clinical reports of aphasia in polyglots and bilinguals and more than 160 experimental studies on cerebral lateralization of language in brain-intact bilinguals, generalizations from this literature are fraught with difficulty. A major source of this difficulty is the fact that although theorizing about the bilingual brain has been shaped by prevailing conceptions about language, bilingualism, and the brain, each of these domains has undergone considerable changes in conceptualization. Thus, some of the earlier hypotheses examined in the bilingual neuropsychological literature are untenable because they rely on assumptions about the brain, language, or bilingualism that have not been supported. Similarly, some evidence acknowledged to be relevant to testing existing hypotheses has turned out to be inadequate, whether in the sense of being insufficient or unsystematic or in the sense of not providing a true test of the hypothesis under study. Moreover, some phenomena that have been interpreted predominantly in bilingual-specific, neuroanatomical terms (e.g., translation or switching) may alternatively be interpreted in terms of more general cognitive attentional phenomena. Finally, it has become apparent that despite the size of the existing neuropsychological literature on bilingualism, many questions remain understudied.

In light of the complexity of the literature, this review uses a combination of a sociohistorical and a methodological approach, in which the aim is to situate the questions in terms of the prevailing zeitgeist and methodologies available at different points in the research enterprise.

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Introduction

The human brain not only has evolved to accommodate a single language but also is, in fact, suited to acquire more than one language, such as the case of bilingual and multilingual individuals. As globalization advances, more people become bilingual or multilingual thus establishing bilingualism as the standard rather than the exception ( Grosjean & Li, 2013). A bilingual individual may achieve different levels of proficiency in the two languages, using both languages in different contexts, by learning a new language following educational requirements, immigration, or alternative circumstances. By this definition, a bilingual individual is not only necessarily someone who has acquired both languages from birth, or early in life, but also that one who learns a second language (L2) later in life. The different contexts and circumstances of L2 acquisition have important effects upon the cerebral organization of multiple languages. Moreover, having acquired more than one language, the bilingual or multilingual speaker may eventually encounter potential conflicts between said languages, such as how to speak in one language while avoiding potential intrusions from the other.

As a broad definition, the concept of neural representation of bilingualism refers to functional and structural neuroimaging evidence that provided the cerebral organization of two (or more) languages. These studies focus on not only how two or more languages are anatomically represented in the human brain, according to crucial variables such as proficiency, age of acquisition (AOA), and exposure, but also, ultimately, how individuals acquire, process, and eventually may later lose such languages.

From a historical viewpoint, the landmark study of Pitres (1895) marked the initiation of this field and has enticed the interest of researchers for more than a century. Pitres in 1896 described cases of selective loss and recovery of a given language in bilingual aphasics, thus giving rise to vivid discussions about different potential neural locations for languages. Indeed, prior to the advent of functional neuroimaging, it was widely believed that bilingual language representation was assigned to different brain areas or even different hemispheres (Albert & Obler, 1978). This hypothesis was essentially based on the common observation of bilingual aphasics who recover only one language after stroke, while the other is lost; this led researchers to believe that the brain regions responsible for one language was damaged though the others remained intact. However, functional neuroimaging studies have so far contradicted this assumption (see, for review, Abutalebi, 2008; Indefrey, 2006; Perani & Abutalebi, 2005). Today, it is well established that bilinguals use the same neural substrate, thus identical brain structures for both languages. The neural networks can vary according to variables that influence neural plasticity, among those, the exposure or amount of use to a given language.

In this article, we will provide a brief overview of how two or more languages are organized in the human brain and what mediates their processes.

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35.4 The Neural Correlates of Language Control: A Frontal, Parietal, and Subcortical Network

A number of neuropsychological studies have presented patients showing selective linguistic alterations and/or pathological language switching (Abutalebi, Miozzo, & Cappa, 2000; Fabbro, Skrap, & Aglioti, 2000; Paradis, 2001). These cases suggest the existence of specific brain areas involved in language control. With the complementary aid of neuroimaging techniques, brain areas such as the left caudate, the ACC, the lateral prefrontal cortex, and the left inferior parietal cortex have been proposed to conform the language control network (Abutalebi & Green, 2007). These brain areas were not specifically dedicated to this aim but acquired a specific role in language control as a part of its general function.

The brain lesion most frequently related to pathological language switching in bilinguals is that affecting the left basal ganglia (Abutalebi et al., 2000; Adrover-Roig et al., 2011; Aglioti & Fabbro, 1993). The general role of this area is to integrate information from multiple brain regions to shape motor learning. In the case of bilinguals, this area is required to establish the adequate motor language program including language planning, selection, and switching. A second area involved in language control is the ACC, which participates in the monitoring of different response alternatives during conflict processing (e.g., Botvinick, Braver, Barch, Carter, & Cohen, 2001; Botvinick, Cohen, & Carter, 2004; Braver, Barch, Gray, Molfese, & Snyder, 2001). In the case of bilinguals, the ACC may participate in the control process of L1 or L2, and in error detection and selective attention during language monitoring. Consistent with this role, Fabbro et al. (2000) reported a case of pathological language switching after a lesion in the left ACC. A third area involved in language control is the left lateral prefrontal cortex including the dorsolateral and ventrolateral parts. These parts exert general executive control functions over behavior in response to stimuli. For instance, when bilinguals named pictures or read words aloud in their L2, this area was more activated in highly proficient bilinguals than in monolinguals (Jones et al., 2012). Thus, the left lateral prefrontal cortex participates actively in the language control network by exerting a role in response selection and inhibition and in working memory. The last part of the brain proposed to participate in the network is the left inferior parietal lobe that participates in the maintaining of language representations in working memory.

The language control network described seems to be somehow affected by the language proficiency level in the second language. For example, bilinguals with high proficiency in the two languages (Garbin et al., 2011) engage different brain areas when switching between L1 and L2 as compared with low-proficient bilinguals (Wang et al., 2007). Note also that the language control network seems to be functionally influenced by sociolinguistic aspects other than language proficiency. For example, Perani et al. (2003) examined the role of age acquisition and language exposure/usage in early and highly proficient Catalan-Spanish bilinguals by means of a fluency task performed in the two languages. Authors revealed the lexical retrieval in the language acquired earlier in life was associated with less extensive activation in the brain. Language exposure/usage modulated the brain areas involved in lexical retrieval. In fact, in one of two groups of participants, those who were less exposed to the L2 showed larger activations during L2 lexical retrieval. These results indicated that in addition to language proficiency, also age of language acquisition and language exposure/usage are crucial factors in determining the neural pattern during lexical processing in bilinguals. This conclusion is in accord with recent ERP evidence suggesting that different linguistic experiences (early versus late acquisition of the L2) in bilinguals may affect the way in which the brain recruits language control (Martin et al., 2013).

Taken together, the network described, which consists of the prefrontal cortex, the ACC, the posterior parietal cortex, and the basal ganglia, constitutes an efficient brain network for language selection and control. In the next section, we describe how this network is specifically engaged when bilinguals have to switch between languages, because language switching relies heavily on cognitive control (Monsell, 2003) and how L2 proficiency can influence this activity.

35.4.1 The Neural Correlates of Language Switching

Neuroimaging techniques like positron emission tomography (PET) and fMRI have been used during the past 20 years to measure brain activity. They provide accurate information about time course of brain activity, and especially about brain localization of this activity. Initial studies on bilingualism were more focused on the representation problem, that is, in knowing whether both languages were represented in the same or different parts of the brain ( Kim, Relkin, Lee, & Hirsch, 1997; Perani et al., 2003). Once the great overlapping in the brain activity for L1 and L2 representations was determined, the remaining question was to investigate how language control is exerted in the brain (i.e., how these overlapping brain areas are recruited for language selection, language inhibition, and language switching).

As in the ERP studies, the different fMRI experiments conducted to investigate language switching have been designed to investigate "sustained" and/or "transient" control mechanisms in language control. As previously introduced, both "sustained" and "transient" control processes are important for language control and both processes may be best characterized in a qualitatively different way and subserve different aspects of language control (Christoffels et al., 2007).

"Sustained" activity was studied by Hernandez, Martinez, and Kohnert (2000) and Hernandez, Dapretto, Mazziotta, and Bookheimer (2001) by comparing brain activation in early and highly proficient Spanish-English bilinguals during naming blocks in one language with naming in mixing blocks in either L1 or L2 (fixed order). Mixed compared with blocked naming conditions increased the activation of the left inferior frontal cortex and the bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex for the two languages. These results suggest that switching between languages requires the extra participation of executive control areas. Similar results (bilateral activation of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) were obtained by Wang, Kuhl, Chen, and Dong (2009) in late, low-proficient, Chinese-English bilinguals using a single digit naming task in mixed and blocked conditions. Also, they found an additional activation in the supplementary motor area (SMA) (see Guo et al., 2011 for similar results in low-proficient bilinguals). Interestingly, Wang et al. (2009) revealed some dissociation between the two languages for sustained control. The mixed condition elicited the activation of the left middle frontal gyrus and right precuneus relative to blocked naming in L1 (Chinese). The mixed condition as compared with the blocked naming in L2 (English) instead revealed the activation of a large network of brain areas: the bilateral middle frontal gyri, the cerebellum, the left inferior frontal gyrus, and the SMA. This recruitment of frontal areas for both languages may reflect proactive processes necessary to regulate the activation level of the two languages when the interference is high (i.e., mixed condition) (Braver et al., 2003). In accord with this observation, Ma et al. (2014) have explored sustained control in a group of Chinese-English unbalanced bilinguals, relatively highly proficient in their L2. In detail, authors revealed that switching between languages (mixed condition) as compared with naming in L1 (blocked L1 condition) elicited the activation of two large clusters. The first one included the left inferior frontal gyrus, the SMA bilaterally, the left insula, and the basal ganglia (including caudate and putamen portions). The second big cluster peaked into the left inferior parietal gyrus and extended to the left supramarginal gyrus and the angular gyrus and precuneus. Switching between languages (mixed condition) as compared with naming in L2 (blocked L2 condition) elicited activations mainly in the left inferior frontal gyrus, the bilateral precentral gyrus and SMA, the bilateral inferior parietal gyrus, the bilateral fusiform, the left lingual gyrus, the left inferior temporal gyrus, as well as the hippocampus bilaterally. These results revealed a neural dissociation that suggests that the sustained mechanisms for L1 and L2 involve different levels of control demands. This may be taken to reflect that when competition increases because of the need to alternate the two languages, the level of activation of the L1 needs to be reduced to favor L2 production. According to Ma et al. (2014), this might be achieved through the coupling between the frontal and basal ganglia brain regions.

These evidences suggest that language proficiency may affect the way in which sustained control processes are applied to regulate the availability of words of the two languages during speech production.

In a different study, Abutalebi et al. (2008) studied highly proficient bilinguals (university students of the Translation Department) using a similar procedure with a random presentation of cues to name in the L1 or in the L2. Besides the activation of left Broca's area, it was reported that naming in L1 in the bilingual context (where subjects had to select L1 or L2 nouns following a cue) compared with monolingual contexts (where subjects had to select L1 nouns or L1 verbs following a cue) induced an increased activation in the left prefrontal cortex and specifically engaged the left caudate and the ACC. Strikingly, this pattern of activity was absent for the same L1 nouns when the same subjects were placed in a monolingual context, therefore highlighting the crucial role of these neural structures in language control and particularly in language switching.

As in ERPs, different studies have used the first instantiation of the language switching paradigm designed to study "transient" effects. For example, Wang et al. (2007) applied this paradigm to a group of late Chinese-English bilinguals. The overall switching condition when compared with non-switching condition activated the language control network, including the left and right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the right ACC, and right caudate. When considering directional changes, the authors observed an asymmetry in behavioral switch costs, such as a larger cost present when switching to the L1 than when switching to the L2. The notion that there is competition between languages predicts that increased executive processes are recruited to allow L2 production compared with L1, especially in the case of low-proficient bilinguals. In line with this prediction, Wang et al. (2007) observed that switches from L1 to L2 ("forward switching") activated the left ACC/SMA, whereas the switches from L2 to L1 ("backward switching") did not activate any brain area within the language control network (Figure 35.2).

In a subsequent study, Wang et al. (2009) studied "transient" changes of language in low-proficient bilinguals using a single digit naming task. They replicated behavioral asymmetries of switch costs (larger switch cost to L1 than to L2) and that switching from L1 to L2 ("forward switching") activated the language control network (left SMA, left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, and left inferior parietal lobe), but the results for overall switches and switches from L2 to L1 ("backward switching") did not show activations in areas of the language control network. In a further study using the first instantiation of language switching paradigm, Garbin et al. (2011) studied a group of early and highly proficient bilinguals and found a different pattern of results. Switches from L1 to L2 ("forward switching") activated the left caudate, whereas switches from L2 to L1 ("backward switching") activated the SMA/ACC (Figure 35.3).

At the neural level, different brain areas appear to be engaged during language switching and, interestingly, functional data indicate that the nature of this may alter with L2 proficiency, consistent with a change from controlled to more automatic L2 processing (Abutalebi & Green, 2007).

Abutalebi et al. (2012, 2013) used a different strategy based on the comparison of the process of language switching in bilinguals to a within-language switching task in monolinguals. The first study focused on the ACC and described this brain area as tuned by bilingualism to resolve cognitive and language conflicts (Abutalebi et al., 2012). The second study compared multilinguals with high proficiency in the L2 and poor proficiency in the L3 with monolinguals ⁵ while performing the first instantiation of the language switching paradigm twice (once with L1 and L2, and the other with L1 and L3). In this study, authors were particularly interested in evaluating how language proficiency modulates the brain network of bilingual language control during a language switching task. The crucial finding of this study is that the pre-SMA/ACC participated in language switching regardless of individual proficiency, whereas the left caudate only was active when switching from L1 to the less proficient language (L3). Contrasting with these results, no neural significant differences were found in this study when comparing direction of switches within the multilingual group.

These studies suggest that language proficiency has an important role in determining how brain areas are recruited for language control, both for the "sustained" and "transient" components.

Besides these adaptations of the switching behavioral paradigms, other studies have used perceptive tasks. Crinion et al. (2006) used a classical semantic priming procedure to compare neural activation when the prime and the target belong to the same language or to different languages. Results showed an activation of the left caudate during language switching compared with nonlanguage switching trials across three different groups of highly proficient bilinguals. A different perceptive task was used by Abutalebi et al. (2007) in a sample of early, highly proficient bilinguals with more experience in L2. They used narratives that included unpredictable changes of languages that might be regular or irregular depending on the respect or violation of the constituents of sentence structure. The comparison of switch and nonswitch trials activated more language areas, including the left inferior frontal gyrus and middle temporal gyrus. Switches into L1 (the less exposed language) activated the left caudate and the ACC, whereas switches into L2 did not activate the language control network.

In general terms, the reviewed studies provide an acceptable uniformity of the results highly consistent with brain areas proposed to form the language control network. This uniformity is greater if we attend to the special role played by variables, such as the type of task and proficiency of bilinguals. The studies designed to investigate "sustained" processes in language control showed consistent activations in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the SMA/ACC, whereas those more related to the "transient" process circumscribed the neural basis of language switching to the SMA/ACC. As in other conflict processes, the language conflict seems to require the participation of ACC that may exert the functions of monitoring and resolution. The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex would remain a global cognitive control mechanism of language conflicts. The role of the left caudate seems to be restricted to language in early and highly proficient bilinguals in tasks that involve language production and comprehension (see Ma et al., 2014 for involvement of caudate in late bilinguals more proficient in L2). Even though its specific role is not clear because in some studies it participated in "backward switching" and in others it appeared to be more related to "forward switching," the diverse studies were consistent in showing a role in detection of language switching when both languages were acquired early. Finally, the left inferior parietal lobe is the brain area of the language network less often detected, probably due to the low working memory demands of the used paradigms. The activation of this area has only been found in tasks using the same stimuli (i.e., numbers) and responses. Maybe its role would be more prominent in translation tasks (Price, Green, & Von Studnitz, 1999).

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Bilingualism is defined as a speaker's ability to use two languages for communication. Due to the complexity of its nature, the study of bilingualism relies on several fields within linguistics, anthropology, psychology, neuroscience, and education. The study of bilingualism describes language behaviors of bilingual speakers, social and pragmatic patterns of using two languages, language development, and acquisition and loss, among other issues. Researchers attempt to explain the effect that bilingualism has on human cognition, societal relationships, and education of bilingual children. This article discusses bilingualism and learning from three perspectives: types of bilingualism, bilingual processing, and bilingualism and academic learning.

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Effects of Bilingualism

Does bilingualism have an adverse linguistic and cognitive effect, particularly on children? Earlier research in the United States pointed out that exposing children to more than one language during their childhood leads them to semi-bilingualism and confusion. Crowding their brain with two or more languages, this research suggested, not only leads children to linguistic deficiency, both in competence and performance levels (semi-lingualism, stuttering, etc.), but also to a wide variety of cognitive and psychological impairments such as low intelligence, mental retardation, left-handedness, and even schizophrenia.

Research by Peal and Lambert (1962), however, put to rest such a negative view of bilingualism: their findings and the work of succeeding researchers provide ample evidence that these negative conclusions of earlier research were premature, misguided (biased toward immigrant communities), and unnecessarily pessimistic. Solid on methodological grounds, Peal and Lambert's study revealed a positive view of bilingualism, including the conclusion that bilingual children demonstrate more cognitive flexibility than monolinguals. Contrary to previous studies, bilinguals performed better than monolinguals in both verbal and non-verbal measures. The study, which was conducted in Montreal, was revolutionary in its own right, changing the face of research on bilingualism forever (see Hakuta, 1985: Chap. 2 for details). This study has been replicated in a number of countries confirming the positive effects of bilingualism.

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Bilingualism in Multilingual Societies

Societal bilingualism in Southeast Asia is extremely complex even without considering the multilingual versatility of tribal minorities in the border areas of Thailand, Myanmar, and the three Indochinese states. Only two main types of societal bilingualism are outlined here. According to Tay (1985: 191), societal bilingualism may be classified according to the status of the languages, whether they are major, minor, regional, or international (or languages of wider communication). The two examples are as follows:

(a)

a major language + language of wider communication (e.g., Tagalog-English; Bahasa Indonesia-English; Malay-English; and Thai-English);

(b)

major language + national language + international language (e.g., Javanese/Madurese + Bahasa Indonesia + English; Mandarin + Malay + English).

The choice of an individual bilingual's repertoire in any one situation is governed by a variety of different factors: (1) the geographical area in which a language or dialect predominates, e.g., a bilingual Chinese speaker can expect to use Cantonese rather than Hokkien (two Chinese dialects) in certain towns in Malaysia because a particular town (e.g., Kuala Lumpur or Ipoh) is predominantly Cantonese-speaking; (2) domains, such as family, friendship, business transactions, employment, religion, and education. Domains may be classified along a range of formality or informality. Certain codes are typically used in certain domains; e.g., in Malaysia, Standard Malay is generally used in the more public and formal domains, whereas Bazaar Malay is used in interactions with the non-Malays in the market place. Similarly, the official languages are used in the educational domain in Singapore, but Chinese dialects continue to be used, to a lesser extent now, in family and friendship domains, especially in interactions with the elderly.

A few countries in Southeast Asia describe their education systems as bilingual, but the models of bilingual education in Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and the Philippines differ in many ways. Nonetheless, it is possible to argue that they are all bilingual to the extent that there are clear societal roles for the languages taught at school. Whereas Singapore and Brunei have a declared bilingual policy, the policy of Malaysia is not explicitly stated as being bilingual, although it now is for certain grade levels in schools. English has a special place in each of the four models, with the instruction time allocated to English varying from model to model. Probably, as a result of time provision and the different linguistic environments in the four countries, the outcomes of the different models have been different - Malay-dominant bilingualism for Malaysia and Brunei in the rural sector and English-dominated bilingualism in the urban areas among the non-Malay-ethnic speakers, whereas that of the Philippines may be described as Filipino-dominant bilingualism. Singapore's situation was described by Pakir (1992) as English-dominant bilingualism, although with the success of the Speak Mandarin Campaign in the past 25 years (1979-2004), there is now a greater proportion of Mandarin-dominated bilingualism. These terms for different patterns of bilingualism do not adequately recognize that the language situations in these four countries are diglossic in the sense that each major language serves different social functions.

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Global Distribution of Multilingualism

Bilingualism and multilingualism are a normal and unremarkable necessity of everyday life for the majority of the world's population. Linguists estimate that there are roughly 6800 languages in the world, but only about 200 nation-states. With more than 30 times as many languages as there are countries, bilingualism or multilingualism is present in practically every country in the world, whether it is officially recognized or not ( Romaine, 1995). This means that in a broad sense multilingual educational contexts can be understood to encompass the educational practices of most countries in the world. The varied cultural and linguistic contexts existing in contemporary societies around the globe pose complex challenges for policy makers in many areas. The centrality of language to education means that policies concerning choice of which language(s) to use as the medium of instruction are essential, even if the need is not always overtly acknowledged. In addition, the need for teaching of additional languages as subjects is widely recognized as schools have a critical role to play in providing the bi- and multilingual skills that have become increasingly necessary in the modern world. In this article the terms 'bilingualism' and 'multilingualism' will be used interchangeably to refer to the routine use of two or more languages in a community ( see Bilingualism).

Despite the near-universal presence of more than one language in every country, the global distribution of linguistic diversity is strikingly uneven. Papua New Guinea alone contains 13.2% of the world's languages, but only 0.1% of the world's population and 0.4% of the world's land area. The overall ratio of languages to people is only about 1 to 5000. If this ratio were repeated in the United States, there would be 50 000 languages spoken there (Nettle and Romaine, 2000). Over 70% of all the world's languages are found in just 20 nation-states, among them some of the poorest countries in the world. They include Papua New Guinea (823), Indonesia (726), Nigeria (505), India (387), Mexico (295), Cameroon (279), Australia (235), the Democratic Republic of Congo (218), Brazil (192), United States (175), the Philippines (169), Malaysia (139), Tanzania (135), Vanuatu (109), Russia (100), Vietnam (93), Laos (82), Ivory Coast (77), Ghana (79), and Solomon Islands (69). These data come from the Ethnologue, a database compiled by SIL International.

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# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Bilingualism (multilingualism) refers to the coexistence of more than one language system within an individual, as contrasted to monolingualism. The question of how the two languages interact at the cognitive and behavioral levels has been of long-standing interest to psycholinguists as well as to neurologists, clinicians, and educators.

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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2013 Apr 1.

Abstract

Building on earlier evidence showing a beneficial effect of bilingualism on children's cognitive development, we review recent studies using both behavioral and neuroimaging methods to examine the effects of bilingualism on cognition in adulthood and explore possible mechanisms for these effects. This research shows that bilingualism has a somewhat muted effect in adulthood but a larger role in older age, protecting against cognitive decline, a concept known as "cognitive reserve". We discuss recent evidence that bilingualism is associated with a delay in the onset of symptoms of dementia. Cognitive reserve is a crucial research area in the context of an aging population; the possibility that bilingualism contributes to cognitive reserve is therefore of growing importance as populations become increasingly diverse.

Why bilingualism?

It is generally believed that more than half of the world's population is bilingual [ 1]. In each of the U.S. [ 2] and Canada [ 3], approximately 20% of the population speaks a language at home other than English. These figures are higher in urban areas, rising to about 60% in Los Angeles [ 4] and 50% in Toronto [ 3]. In Europe, bilingualism is even more prevalent: In a recent survey, 56% of the population across all European Union countries reported being functionally bilingual, with some countries recording particularly high rates, such as Luxembourg at 99% [ 5]. Bilinguals, therefore, make up a significant portion of the population. Importantly, accumulating research shows that the development, efficiency, and decline of crucial cognitive abilities are different for bilinguals than for monolinguals. What are these cognitive differences and how does bilingualism lead to these changes?

The context for examining how bilingualism affects cognitive ability is functional neuroplasticity, the study of how experience modifies brain structure and brain function. Such modifications have been found following experiences as diverse as juggling [ 6], video-game playing [ 7], careers in architecture [ 8] taxi-driving [ 9], and musical training [ 10, 11]. Bilingualism is different from all of these: like juggling and playing video games it is intense, and like architecture and driving taxis in London it is sustained, but unlike these experiences, bilinguals are not typically pre-selected for talent or interest. Although bilinguals undoubtedly differ from monolinguals in certain ways, they generally did not choose bilingualism. Rather, the circumstances of their family, place of birth, or immigration history simply required that they learn more than one language.

What is different about bilingual minds?

It has long been assumed that childhood bilingualism affected developing minds but the belief was that the consequences for children were negative: learning two languages would be confusing [ 12]. A study by Peal and Lambert [ 13] cast doubt on this belief by reporting that children in Montreal who were either French-speaking monolinguals or English-French bilinguals performed differently on a battery of tests. The authors had expected to find lower scores in the bilingual group on language tasks but equivalent scores in nonverbal spatial tasks, but instead found that the bilingual children were superior on most tests, especially those requiring symbol manipulation and reorganization. This unexpected difference between monolingual and bilingual children was later explored in studies showing a significant advantage for bilingual children in their ability to solve linguistic problems based on understanding such concepts as the difference between form and meaning, that is, metalinguistic awareness [ 14- 20] and nonverbal problems that required participants to ignore misleading information [ 21, 22].

Research with adult bilinguals built on these studies with children and reported two major trends. First, a large body of evidence now demonstrates that the verbal skills of bilinguals in each language are generally weaker than are those for monolingual speakers of each language. Considering simply receptive vocabulary size, bilingual children [ 23] and adults [ 24] control a smaller vocabulary in the language of the community than do their monolingual counterparts. On picture-naming tasks, bilingual participants are slower [ 25- 28] and less accurate [ 29, 30] than monolinguals. Slower responses for bilinguals are also found for both comprehending [ 31] and producing words [ 32], even when bilinguals respond in their first and dominant language. Finally, verbal fluency tasks are a common neuropsychological measure of brain functioning in which participants are asked to generate as many words as they can in 60 seconds that conform to a phonological or semantic cue. Performance on these tasks reveals systematic deficits for bilingual participants, particularly in semantic fluency conditions [ 33- 37], even if responses can be provided in either language [ 38]. Thus, the simple act of retrieving a common word is more effortful for bilinguals.

In contrast to this pattern, bilinguals at all ages demonstrate better executive control than monolinguals matched in age and other background factors. Executive control is the set of cognitive skills based on limited cognitive resources for such functions as inhibition, switching attention, and working memory [ 39]. Executive control emerges late in development and declines early in aging, and supports such activities as high level thought, multi-tasking, and sustained attention. The neuronal networks responsible for executive control are centered in the frontal lobes, with connections to other brain regions as necessary for specific tasks. In children, executive control is central to academic achievement [ 40], and in turn, academic success is a significant predictor of long term health and well being [ 41]. In a recent meta-analysis, Adesope et al. [ 42] calculated medium to large effect sizes for the executive control advantages in bilingual children and Hilchey and Klein [ 43] summarized the bilingual advantage over a large number of studies with adults. This advantage has been shown to extend into older age and protect against cognitive decline [ 25, 44, 45], a point we return to below.

In this review, we examine the evidence for bilingual advantages in executive control and explore the possible mechanisms and neural correlates that may help to explain them. Our conclusion is that lifelong experience in managing attention to two languages reorganizes specific brain networks, creating a more effective basis for executive control and sustaining better cognitive performance throughout the lifespan.

Language Processing in Bilinguals

Joint activation of languages

A logical possibility for the organization of a bilingual mind is that it consists of two independently-represented language systems that are uniquely accessed in response to the context: A fluent French-English bilingual ordering coffee in a Parisian café has no reason to consider how to form the request in English, and a Cantonese-English bilingual studying psychology in Boston does not need to recast the material through Chinese. Yet, substantial evidence shows that this is not how the bilingual mind is organized. Instead, fluent bilinguals show some measure of activation of both languages and some interaction between them at all times, even in contexts that are entirely driven by only one of the languages.

The evidence for this conclusion comes from psycholinguistic studies using such tasks as cross-language priming (in which a word in one language facilitates retrieval of a semantically related word in the other language) and lexical decision (in which participants decide whether a string of letters is a legal word in one of the languages) that show the influence of the currently unused language for both comprehension and production of speech [ 46- 52]. Further evidence comes from patient studies showing intrusions from the irrelevant language or inappropriate language switches [ 53], and imaging studies indicating involvement of the non-target language while performing a linguistic task in the selected language [ 54- 56]. Using eye-tracking technology, for example, Marian, Spivey, and Hirsch [ 57] reported that English-Russian bilinguals performing a task in English in which they had to look at the named picture from four alternatives were distracted by a picture whose name shared phonology with Russian even though there was no connection to the meaning of the target picture and no contextual cues indicating that Russian was relevant. Similarly, Thierry and Wu [ 58] presented English monolinguals, Chinese-English bilinguals, and Chinese monolinguals with pairs of words in English (translated to Chinese for Chinese monolinguals) and asked participants to decide if the words were semantically related or not. The manipulation was that half of the pairs contained a repeated character in the written Chinese forms, even though that orthographic feature was unrelated to the English meaning. Waveforms derived from analyses of electroencephalography (EEG) are used to indicate the neuronal response to language on a millisecond by millisecond scale. This event-related potential (ERP) signals the effort associated with integrating the meaning of words in a negative waveform about 400 milliseconds after the stimulus, a waveform called the N400. The more similar the words are to each other, the smaller is the amplitude of the N400. In the study by Thierry and Wu, semantic relatedness was associated with significantly smaller N400 amplitude in all groups as expected, but the repeated character also led to smaller N400 for the two Chinese groups. Thus, although irrelevant to the task, participants were accessing the Chinese forms when making judgments about the semantic relation between English words. Subsequent research has refined these results by showing their basis in the phonology rather than the orthography of spoken language [ 59] and extended the phenomenon to the phonological hand forms of American Sign Language [ 60].

This joint activation is the most likely mechanisms for understanding the consequences of bilingualism for both linguistic and nonlinguistic processing. For linguistic processing, joint activation creates an attention problem that does not exist for monolinguals: In addition to selection constraints on such dimensions as register, collocation, and synonymy, the bilingual speaker also has to select the correct language from competing options. Although joint activation creates a risk for language interference and language errors, these rarely occur, indicating that the selection of the target language occurs with great accuracy. However, this need to select at the level of language system makes ordinary linguistic processing more effortful for bilinguals than monolinguals and explains some of the costs in psycholinguistic studies described above. For nonlinguistic processing, the need to resolve competition and direct attention is primarily the responsibility of general cognitive systems, in particular executive functions. The possible influence of linguistic processes on nonlinguistic executive control has enormous consequences for lifespan cognition and is discussed in the next section.

Consequences of joint activation

Cognitive networks in bilinguals

Bilingual performance on conflict tasks

Early evidence that bilingual children solved nonverbal conflict tasks differently from monolingual children was reported in a study by Bialystok and Majumder [ 21]. Eight-year-old children were given a variety of nonverbal problems to solve, some of which contained perceptual distraction (block design from the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC) [ 71] and some which did not (Noelting's Juice Task [ 72, 73]). Bilingual children outperformed monolinguals on the conflict tasks, but children in the two groups were comparable on tasks that did not include distracting perceptual information. This pattern has been confirmed in studies of both children and adults using a flanker task (children: [ 74, 75]), theory of mind task (children: [ 76, 77]; adults: [ 78]), Simon task (children: [ 79]; adults: [ 44]). Other studies with adults have shown better performance by bilinguals in naming the font color in a Stroop task [ 25], smaller costs in task switching [ 80], better ability to maintain task set in an attention task [ 81], and more susceptibility to negative priming, presumably because of greater inhibition [ 82].

Some studies have extended these bilingual advantages into older age. Bialystok, Craik, Klein and Viswanathan [ 44] reported an experiment in which middle-aged and older adults who were either monolingual or bilingual were given a version of the Simon task. Participants were shown either a green or a red square on each trial, and the task was to press an associated response key as rapidly as possible. The keys were located at each side of the presentation screen. In one condition, the squares appeared centrally on the screen, so there was no spatial conflict between the location of stimuli and responses; in this condition there were no reaction-time (RT) differences between language groups. In a second condition, the colored squares appeared laterally on the screen, either directly above the appropriate response key (congruent condition) or on the other side of the screen, above the incorrect response key (incongruent condition). The RT difference between congruent and incongruent response trials (the Simon effect) is a measure of attentional control. Bilinguals produced smaller Simon effects than monolinguals at all ages.

Three other results from this study are noteworthy. First, the decrease in attentional control in older adults was reduced in the bilingual groups, suggesting that bilingualism may be protective against the effects of cognitive aging. Second, whereas a bilingual advantage was expected for incongruent stimuli, it was also found for congruent stimuli. This result has been replicated in subsequent studies [ 43] and is difficult to account for in terms of response conflict or inhibition. Third, prolonged practice reduced both the Simon effect and the size of the bilingual advantage. Apparently all participants can learn to disregard the distracting effects of interfering stimuli given sufficient practice on a task, but it seems that bilinguals can learn this type of inhibition more rapidly. One interesting question in this regard is the extent to which this attenuation of attentional control is specific to the practiced situation, or whether it generalizes to tasks tapping attentional control in a different manner. Our conjecture is that the attenuation effect is context specific.

A complication that has emerged as more results are reported is that the bilingual advantage is not always found in samples of young adults. For example, a study examining performance on the Simon task in 5-year-olds, young, middle-aged and older adults found a bilingual advantage in RT in the 5-year-olds and in the older adults, but not in the young adult group [ 83]. Similarly, a study of the Stroop effect in younger and older adults found a bilingual advantage in both age groups but when the same participants performed the Simon arrow task the bilingual advantage was found only in the older adults [ 25]. Similarly, Salvatierra and Rosselli [ 45] used a simple version of the Simon task and reported a bilingual advantage for older but not younger adults. There is thus some evidence that the bilingual advantage is greatest in children and in older adults, but less constantly present in young adults - perhaps because the young adult group is at the developmentally peak age for cognitive control.

It appears that bilingual advantages for young adults tend to emerge on tasks or conditions that are difficult. For example, Bialystok [ 84] found that bilingual young adults outperformed their monolingual counterparts on the directional arrow Simon task, but only on the condition that included more monitoring and switching than a simpler condition. Similarly, several studies by Costa and colleagues have reported a bilingual advantage in young adults [ 75, 85, 86] but only under some conditions. For example, Costa et al. [ 85] demonstrated that the bilingual advantage on a flanker task held only under high monitoring conditions. In versions where most of the trials were of one type (congruent or incongruent) no bilingual advantage was observed; the advantage was found, however, in a condition involving 25% incongruent and 75% congruent trials, although even there the advantage decreased over blocks of the experiment (cf., [ 44]). Costa et al. [ 85] concluded that the bilingual advantage reflects a more efficient monitoring system for conflict resolution, in that bilinguals may be better at determining when the misleading information can be safely ignored. Finally, Hernández et al. [ 86] used a nonlinguistic version of the Stroop effect and found a trend towards both reduced interference and enhanced facilitation in young adult bilinguals compared with monolinguals (cf., older participants in [ 25]). One interesting aspect of the studies by Costa, Hernández and colleagues is that the monolinguals were Spanish speakers and the bilinguals' two languages were Catalan and Spanish. Most of the participants were undergraduate students and were not immigrants, so the two groups were well equated apart from the language difference. In summary, the evidence for a bilingual advantage in younger adults is more sporadic than in other age groups, although at all ages there are some reports of studies showing no difference between monolinguals and bilinguals performing a conflict task.

Neural correlates of cognitive reorganization

Recently, studies have begun to investigate the neural correlates of bilingual processing examined in the behavioral research. The majority of this research has used fMRI to study bilinguals performing a linguistic task in their two languages. Typically, participants name pictures or generate words in response to a cue signaling the required language and performance is compared for single language and mixed language conditions. Two early studies revealed promising results. The first led to the surprising finding that language switching was accompanied by activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), an area known to be part of the general executive control system [ 28]. Less surprising was a study showing the involvement of Broca's area as well as a left frontal area in a language switching task [ 87]. Subsequent research has corroborated the involvement of these systems and shown that language switching elicits a spatially-distributed activation pattern involving bilateral frontal regions, bilateral precentral areas, bilateral caudate, bilateral (or midline) pre-supplementary areas (pre-SMA), and bilateral temporal regions. This pattern has been found for German-French bilinguals [ 88], Spanish-Catalan bilinguals [ 89], Chinese-English bilinguals [ 65, 90, 91] and Spanish-English bilinguals [ 92]. A few studies [ 65, 88] have also reported activation in anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), but activation in this area is not consistently observed. Abutalebi and colleagues [ 93] extended this finding to show activation of ACC for both language switching and nonverbal switching. Importantly, these studies confirm that frontal systems involved in executive control are recruited by bilinguals to manage attention to language.

Figure 1.

Bilingual influence on brain function and structure. Transparent brains showing the left and right hemispheres. Green voxels depict grey matter regions showing high activation during bilingual language switching in a meta-analysis ( 94). Red-yellow voxels indicate regions of higher white matter integrity in bilingual older adults relative to monolinguals ( 111). Together, the functional and structural data indicate that neural correlates of bilingualism are observed in the frontal lobes, generally responsible for higher cognition such as executive functions.

Taken together, fMRI research on bilingual language switching has implicated distributed cortical activation that converges in the frontal regions. Intriguingly, the brain regions related to bilingual switching are also critical for general attention and cognitive control [ 97, 98]. This overlap in brain regions activated for bilingual switching and cognitive control implies that the same mechanisms may be involved in both activities, and that these shared processes might help to explain the superior performance of bilinguals on nonverbal conflict tasks. In other words, using these cognitive control networks for bilingual language processing may reconfigure them for other purposes, providing part of the explanation for the behavioral differences between monolinguals and bilinguals found in nonverbal conflict tasks. Specifically, the evidence suggests that cognitive control networks may be more broadly based in bilinguals as a result of their dual function. However, fMRI studies on language switching in bilinguals can only show that these networks are included in bilingual language selection. Determining whether or not such reconfiguration occurs can only be evaluated by comparing monolinguals and bilinguals performing nonverbal conflict tasks. The hypothesis is that monolinguals and bilinguals will perform nonverbal control problems using somewhat different networks, specifically, that the network used by bilinguals will be more broadly based.

Only a few studies have contrasted the neural correlates of non-linguistic cognitive control in bilinguals and monolinguals. Garbin and colleagues [ 99] gave a color-shape switching task to Spanish monolingual and Spanish-Catalan bilingual young adults in fMRI. A bivalent stimulus (e.g., a red circle) and a cue (e.g., "color" or "shape") were shown, and participants responded to the indicated dimension. Both RT of switch costs and accuracy favored the bilingual participants but activation patterns were also different for the two groups: monolinguals showed increased activation in the right IFG, whereas bilinguals showed increased activation in left inferior frontal gyrus. More interestingly, higher levels of activation in left IFG and left striatum were associated with smaller switch costs for the bilingual participants, but increased activation in the right IFG was associated with larger switch costs. In light of the lack of switching effect in the behavioral data, it is possible that the bilinguals relied more on the left IFG and striatum in face of the demand to switch between responses associated with a bivalent stimulus. The left IFG was identified in both the qualitative [ 94] and quantitative [ 95] meta-analyses of bilingual language switching. This region is central to speech production [ 100] and has been shown to have higher activation for bilinguals than monolinguals during speech production [ 101, 102]. Thus, left IFG appears to be one of the overlapping brain regions in bilinguals handling both language switching and non-linguistic cognitive control.

A study by Luk and colleagues [ 103] used an adaptation of a flanker task to compare activation in monolingual and bilingual participants. The stimuli consisted of a string of five chevrons, and the task was to indicate the direction of the red one (that could appear in one of three positions) while ignoring the four black ones. In a previous behavioral study with these stimuli, bilinguals performed this task more rapidly than monolinguals [ 104]. The fMRI data were analyzed using a multivariate statistical technique for neuroimaging data (Partial Least Squares; for review, see [ 105]) to identify integrated neural networks. The results showed that monolinguals and bilinguals recruited different neural networks for both congruent and incongruent trials. Another condition that tested 'no-go' responses indicated no difference between groups. Importantly, greater activity in the bilingual network, including areas identified in the meta-analysis [ 95], was related to smaller RT costs for incongruent trials. There are two implications of these results. First, bilingualism alters functional neural network at the response-selection level (congruent and incongruent trials), but not at the motor execution level (response inhibition no-go trials), a pattern consistent with previous results for both adults [ 106] and children [ 79, 107]. Second, bilinguals showed a brain-behavior correlation when suppressing interference from conflicting flankers, replicating a previous study using magnetoencephalography (MEG) [ 108].

Although bilingualism is a language experience, managing attention to two languages imposes demands on the cognitive system that require brain regions not typically used for language processing. From studies of bilingual language switching and non-linguistic cognitive control, and from the meta-analysis cited earlier, it seems likely that the neural locus of cognitive control in bilinguals lies in bilateral frontal regions. In order to facilitate information transfer between the hemispheres, it is also possible that prolonged bilingual experience alters anatomical structures in addition to cortical functional networks. Cortical activity assessed by fMRI is limited to blood-oxygenated-level-dependent (BOLD) signal in the grey matter. However, when investigating domain-general neural changes (cognitive control) in response to domain-specific experience (bilingualism), it is important to use methods that allow not only the identification of functional networks but also their underlying anatomical structures [ 109, 110].

Nature of the bilingual advantage

Why might bilingualism be associated with an advantage in attentional control? The need to manage two jointly activated languages apparently leads to an enhancement of frontal-posterior attentional control mechanisms with the consequence that other types of cognitive control are also enhanced. Inhibitory control was suggested as the relevant mechanism in early studies [ 44, 61] and continues to be endorsed by some researchers [ 51, 115]. One problem with this account, however, is the recurrent finding of a bilingual advantage in congruent trials (for which there is no conflict) as well as incongruent trials [ 44, 75]. Minimally, therefore, inhibition alone is insufficient to explain bilingual processing differences. The inhibition view is also challenged by evidence from preverbal infants who demonstrate early effects of bilingualism but for whom language inhibition is not a plausible explanation ( Box 1).

Box 1: Bilingualism in infancy.

Research with infants being raised in bilingual homes has produced dramatic evidence for very early effects of bilingualism and challenges some standard explanations for the mechanism underlying these effects. It has long been known that children being raised with two languages do not confuse the languages when learning to speak, even though they may borrow from one when speaking the other [ 131]. It is also well known that monolingual infants lose the ability to make phonetic discriminations not present in their language by about 10-months old whereas bilingual infants continue to distinguish between phonetic categories relevant to all languages. Thus, it is not surprising that bilingual infants can differentiate between their two languages essentially from birth [ 132]. What is surprising, however, is the extension of this discrimination to non-acoustic properties of language. Weikum and colleagues [ 133] showed silent video clips to 8-month old infants who were being raised in homes that were either monolingual English or English-French bilingual. Using a habituation paradigm, the speaker switched languages after habituation and the researchers measured whether or not infants regained interest. The results showed renewed attention among the bilingual but not the monolingual infants. To determine whether the bilingual infants had learned about the facial structures that accompany each language or something more general, the same materials were presented to monolingual Spanish (or Catalan) infants and bilingual Spanish-Catalan infants [ 134]. Again, only the bilingual infants noticed the change in language, even though the children in this study had no experience with either language. The authors concluded that bilingualism enhances general perceptual attentiveness through the experience of attending to two sets of visual cues.

This enhanced perceptual attentiveness may help explain the results of a study in which 7-month old monolingual and bilingual infants learned a head-turn response to a cue to obtain a visual reward and then had to replace that with a competing response for the same reward [ 135]. Again, only the bilingual infants could learn the new response. Even before children have productive language ability, the experience of building two distinct representational systems endows them with greater perceptual and attentional resources than their monolingual peers. In light of such evidence for bilingual advantages in the first year of life, explanations for the mechanism responsible for the advantages found later may need to be reconsidered to include a role for such perceptual processes.

An alternative to inhibition is to consider the demands imposed by a mixed set of congruent and incongruent trials: there is always some probability that the next display may be an incongruent trial. Thus, even on congruent trials the display must be evaluated before the participant commits to a response. Congruent responses will typically be faster than incongruent responses, but individuals with superior attentional control processes (e.g., bilinguals) will be able to carry out such evaluative decisions more rapidly and effectively. Therefore, a different account of the bilingual advantage is in terms of conflict monitoring [ 43, 85, 86]. Evidence supporting this view comes from situations in which monitoring demands are low - if the majority of trials are of one type only [ 84, 85], the potentially misleading information (spatial position in the Simon task, flanker items in the flanker paradigm) can be treated as a valid cue, even if the participant must respond in the direction opposite to that indicated by the cue. In such low-monitoring conditions the bilingual advantage is typically not found. More generally, Hernández, Costa, and Humphreys [ 116] argue for a bilingual advantage in the deployment of attention, enabling them to resist "capture" by irrelevant information; such differences in attentional control may be the consequence of superior conflict monitoring. Conflict monitoring and inhibition are not mutually exclusive: Although monitoring is consistent with evidence that pure blocks of congruent trials are performed equivalently by monolinguals and bilinguals [ 106, 117], an inhibition account is still required to explain evidence that pure blocks of incongruent trials are sometimes performed faster by bilinguals, notably by older adults for whom the task is more effortful [ 106].

Another problem with a pure inhibition account is that bilingual advantages are only found with some types of inhibition. The relevant distinction is captured by the contrast between the concepts of response inhibition and interference suppression [ 79, 118]. In response inhibition, a univalent stimulus is associated with a prepotent response that must be overruled, such as say "day" to a picture of night or press "left" when the arrow points right. Bilinguals typically show no advantage in these situations [ 79, 107]. In interference suppression, a bivalent stimulus contains two cues, each associated with a different response, such as the word "red" written in blue ink, so attention must be selectively focused on the relevant cue. Bilinguals typically outperform monolinguals on these tasks [ 25]. The hallmark of univalent response inhibition tasks is that the correct response can be pre-programmed before the cuing stimulus appears (e.g., if sun appears I'll say 'night;' if the arrow points right I'll respond left). On bivalent tasks, in contrast, the nature of the interfering information is not revealed until the display appears; for example, in the Simon task the participant prepares to respond on the left if the stimulus is green, but cannot prepare to deal with possible competing information until the display is shown. Bilinguals are more efficient at dealing with this online interference, in much the same way as the picture of a horse presented to a French/English bilingual would evoke both ' horse' and ' cheval ', one of which must be suppressed. In a sense, the bilingual must constantly maintain the set of 'respond in one language, suppress the other language' whenever the possibility of two languages exists (cf., global inhibition). Further, this set maintenance must coexist with processing the stimuli and responses of the language currently utilized in a fluent and appropriate manner (cf., local inhibition). Thus, language use for bilinguals involves interference suppression, and the online monitoring required in both nonverbal task switching and language selection is similar.

The suggestion that bilinguals are particularly adept at maintaining the appropriate one of two (or more) relevant task goals or attentional sets in working memory has much in common with the notion of selection of wanted stimuli as opposed to inhibition of unwanted ones. The net effect is the same, but by this view the suppression of potentially interfering information is essentially a consequence of active selection of the relevant information, rather than a primary mechanism of direct inhibition. This view is consistent with that proposed by Colzato and colleagues [ 81] who concluded that the bilingual advantage is not due to the constant exercise of inhibition, but that learning to keep two languages separate leads to an improvement in selecting goal-relevant information from goal-irrelevant information.

Box 2: How bilingual?

Bilingualism is not a categorical experience but experimental research designs require it is treated as such - participants are monolingual or bilingual and differences in performance are assessed for members of the two groups. However, individuals can never be perfectly monolingual or bilingual: even the most monolingual people have had some experience with another language, for example as a school subject or a travel necessity, and all bilinguals have preferred languages or preferred contexts for each. These gradations raise three questions about the research results.

The first question is the possibility of a cumulative benefit for multiple languages. If managing two languages enhances cognitive control processes, then does further enhancement accrue from the management of three or more languages, as explicitly proposed by Diamond [ 136]? Research by Chertkow et al. [ 123] on Alzheimer's disease and Kavé et al. [ 127] on normal aging showed better outcomes for multilinguals than for bilinguals, but there may be significant differences between multilinguals and bilinguals that do not exist between bilinguals and monolinguals. As we have suggested, bilinguals are typically not pre-selected for talent or interest but multilinguals may often be individuals with high ability and motivation to learn other languages, factors which may impact as well on cognitive performance.

The second question is the degree of bilingualism required for these benefits to emerge. If bilingualism is protective against some forms of dementia, then middle-aged people will want to know whether it is too late to learn another language, or whether their high-school French will count towards cognitive reserve. A related question concerns the age of acquisition of a second language; is earlier better? The best answer at present is that early age of acquisition, overall fluency, frequency of use, levels of literacy and grammatical accuracy all contribute to the bilingual advantage, with no single factor being decisive [ 137, 138]. Increasing bilingualism leads to increasing modification of cognitive outcomes.

Finally, if the benefits of bilingualism are at least partly explained by the joint activation of two languages, does the similarity of the two languages matter? Does Spanish-English bilingualism require more (or less?) attentional control to maintain separation than say Chinese-English bilingualism? In a study with children who spoke English plus one of French, Spanish, or Chinese, there was no effect of the type of bilingualism, and all bilingual children outperformed monolingual children on tests of executive control [ 139].

Bilingualism and Dementia

The finding that bilingualism enhances cognitive control raises the possibility that lifelong bilingualism protects against age-related cognitive decline, and may even postpone the onset of symptoms of dementia. In this case, bilingualism may be one of the environmental factors that contribute to cognitive reserve or brain reserve [ 120]. Cognitive reserve is the idea that engagement in stimulating physical or mental activity can act to maintain cognitive functioning in healthy aging and postpone the onset of symptoms in those suffering from dementia. These factors include education, occupational status, higher socio-economic class, and the continuing involvement in physical, intellectual and social activities [ 121- 123]. If bilingualism contributes to cognitive reserve, then bilinguals should maintain higher levels of cognitive functioning and cope better with symptoms of dementia than monolinguals who are otherwise equivalent.

To test this idea, Bialystok, Craik, and Freedman [ 124] examined the hospital records of monolingual and bilingual patients who had been diagnosed with various types of dementia. In spite of being equivalent on a variety of cognitive and other factors, the bilinguals experienced onset symptoms and were diagnosed approximately 3 - 4 years later than the monolinguals. Specifically, monolingual patients were diagnosed on average at age 75.4 years, and bilinguals at age 78.6. A replication from a new set of patients all diagnosed with probable Alzheimer's disease (AD) [ 125] confirmed the results.

Three questions about these results are their reliability, validity, and causality. For reliability, several studies have replicated these findings. Chertkow et al. [ 126] reported partial support for the original results and showed that multilinguals were diagnosed with AD later than comparable monolinguals, although a more limited effect was found when monolinguals were compared with bilinguals. A similar positive relationship between multilingualism and high-level cognitive functioning was reported by Kavé et al. [ 127] in a study of elderly Israelis. Gollan et al. [ 128] reported a study with Spanish-English bilinguals who had been diagnosed with probable AD and found that a higher degree of bilingualism was associated with later age of onset and diagnosis, although only in the less-educated patients.

Second, validity requires demonstrating the specific relation between the predictor and outcome variables. Previously, socioeconomic status, cultural differences and immigration status have been suggested as contributors to or even causes of the bilingual advantage. However, in both Toronto studies, educational level and occupational status favored the monolingual group and immigration status was ruled out as a contributing factor.

Third, regarding cause and effect, is it possible the people that people with 'good brains' are both resistant to dementia and also more likely to learn a second language? This is unlikely: most people do not become bilingual because they are bright or have a flair for learning languages, but rather out of necessity. Supporting this interpretation, a recent study showed that in a sample of monolingual and bilingual AD patients matched on age, cognitive level, and other factors, CT scans showed more AD pathology in the brains of the bilinguals, consistent with the idea that they are better able to cope with the disease and can function longer without showing symptoms [ 129].

Conclusion

In the first study reporting the surprising outcome of an advantage in cognitive and linguistic performance by bilingual children, Peal and Lambert [ 13] concluded: "Intellectually [the bilingual child's] experience with two language systems seems to have left him with a mental flexibility, a superiority in concept formation, a more diversified set of mental abilities" (p. 20). Peal and Lambert did not explain what they meant by "mental flexibility" but the description works well to describe the data accumulated in the 50 years since their original study. Bilinguals do sometimes have an advantage in inhibition, but they also have an advantage in selection; bilinguals do sometimes have an advantage in switching, but they also have an advantage in sustaining attention; and bilinguals do sometimes have an advantage in working memory, but they also have an advantage in representation and retrieval. Together, this pattern sounds like "mental flexibility", the ability to adapt to ongoing changes and process information efficiently and adaptively.

It should not be surprising that intense and sustained experience leaves its mark on our minds and brains - the functional connections that come from practice are surely changed by massive experience, and the structural regions that are recruited for specific activities undoubtedly change as well through use. These responses to experience are precisely what we mean by neuroplasticity. Yet, in the case of bilingualism, the assumption has long been that any such effects would be deeply negative: As one influential educational researcher commented in 1926, "This might be considered evidence that the use of a foreign language in the home is one of the chief factors in producing mental retardation as measured by intelligence tests" ([ 130], p. 393). Almost a century later, and in the face of substantial evidence to the contrary, there remains resistance to the idea that bilingualism can enhance aspects of cognitive function. Educational and clinical practitioners routinely advise parents to "simplicify" their children's linguistic environment when there are signs of academic struggle, and language professionals prescribe optimal timetables (and methods) for introducing languages to children to minimize the inevitable confusion. But such views are based on fear and anecdote - the weight of scientific evidence supports the promise of "mental flexibility". There is still much we do not know about the effect of bilingualism on the mind, the neural correlates of those effects, and the causal components of the experience that lead to them. But it is too late to turn back: it is now clear that the bilingual mind has been uniquely shaped by experience.

Box 3: Outstanding questions.

1. Nature of the Bilingual Advantage: What are the limits and boundary conditions for the bilingual advantage and why are bilingual advantages not always found? What is the role of the standard components of executive control - inhibition, shifting, and working memory - in bilingual differences in processing? Do these relations change over the lifespan?

2. Cognitive Reserve: Is the bilingual protection against cognitive decline similar to other types of cognitive reserve in terms of mechanism and neural correlates?

3. Brain Correlates: What changes occur in the frontal lobes? Are there effects on other brain regions? What is the mechanism for these experience-dependent changes in frontal networks?

4. Psychopathology: What are the neural correlates of the protective effects for patients with dementia? Does bilingualism have differential effects on various types of dementia?

Acknowledgement

Preparation of this manuscript was supported by grant R01HD052523 from the US National Institutes of Health and grant A2559 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to EB, grant A8261 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to FIMC, and grant MOP57842 from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to EB and FIMC. We thank Steven Lovasz for his assistance in preparing the manuscript.

Footnotes

Publisher's Disclaimer: This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final citable form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain.

Contributor Information

Ellen Bialystok, York University.

Fergus I.M. Craik, Rotman Research Institute of Baycrest

Gigi Luk, Harvard Graduate School of Education.

References

34. Gollan TH, et al. Semantic and letter fluency in Spanish-English bilinguals. Neuropsychology. 2002;16:562-576. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

120. Stern Y. What is cognitive reserve? Theory and research application of the reserve concept. J. Int. Neuropsychol. Soc. 2002;8:448-460. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

121. Stern Y, et al. Influence of education and occupation on the incidence of Alzheimer's disease. JAMA. 1994;271:1004-1010. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

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The Bilingual Brain: The Neuroscience of Language Learning, Pt. 1

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Content and Language Integrated Learning, or CLIL, is where a subject is taught in the target language rather than the first language of the learners. In CLIL classes, tasks are designed to allow students to focus on and learn to use the new language as they learn the new subject content. Example In…

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About raising multilingual or bilingual children

If you, your partner if you have one, or other people who help you raise your child speak languages other than English, you might want your child to grow up learning these languages. Raising multilingual or bilingual children has many benefits. For example, it can improve communication and bonds in your immediate and extended family.

The best way to help children learn broad vocabularies in languages other than English is to always use those languages with them, especially in the early years.

Raising multilingual or bilingual children: your family's options

The decisions you and your partner, if you have one, make about helping your child learn to use your languages depend on your family situation.

One person-one language
If you and your partner have different languages, the one person-one language model for supporting multilingualism or bilingualism might work for you.

For example, if your language is English and your partner's is Mandarin, you speak English to your child and your partner speaks Mandarin to them.

This model can work with more than one language other than English. For example, if you speak Spanish and your partner speaks Italian, you each speak your own language to your child at home. If you both speak English as well, you might choose to use English with them outside the home. Your child will also learn to use English at school and in the community.

It's ideal if you both understand each other's languages so neither of you feels left out when you speak your language to your child.

Heritage language as home language
If you and your partner both speak the same heritage language, you might want to make this the language that you and your family use in your home.

For example, you might have migrated from Iraq to Australia and speak Arabic to your child at home. Arabic is your heritage language. Your child also goes to school and speaks English with their friends and teachers.

Another example is if you and your partner have hearing impairments and you're raising a hearing child. Your children might learn Auslan at home, and English in the hearing community.

The heritage language model means that your child hears, speaks and uses your heritage language a lot, because everyone in the family is using it.

Your child might be less willing to speak to you in a language other than English as they get older. It's good to keep using the language even if your child increasingly responds in English. Even just hearing the language will benefit your child in the long term.

Raising multilingual or bilingual children: tips

Here are some practical tips for supporting your child's multilingual or bilingual development.
Play and games

Read and tell stories in your heritage language, and encourage your child to join in. Use dress-ups and be creative!

Play games in your heritage language, especially games that focus on language, like 'I spy', bingo, 'Who am I?' and memory.

Sing songs, dance and play music in your heritage language. Children love music, and melody is a great way to help them remember things.

Look for child-friendly word game apps in your heritage language.

Community activities

Look for schools, child care centres, playgroups or multilingual and bilingual programs that support your child's use of their heritage language.

Organise playtime with other children who speak the same heritage language.

Organise visits to or from speakers of your heritage language. If it's possible for you, visiting countries where people speak the language can boost your child's interest in the culture and ability to speak the language.

Go to the library and borrow CDs, DVDs, picture books, age-appropriate fiction and magazines in your heritage language.

Look for cultural activities that you and your child can do together to tap into your family's cultural heritage and identity. For example, Harmony Day in March each year is widely celebrated across Australia.

At home

Talk to your children in your heritage language from birth.

Listen to radio programs in your heritage language, including popular music programs and channels for teenagers.

If you have family and friends who live overseas, you could encourage your children to connect with them using video-chat or online.

Think about what your child is interested in - for example, soccer, music, TV shows, cooking and so on. Try incorporating your heritage language into these interests. For example, you could find your child's favourite recipe or a typical recipe from your community and cook it together using only that language.

Watch movies or sport in your heritage language - for example, through satellite TV or online streaming services. You can sometimes switch the audio or subtitles of English content into other languages.

Help your older or teenage child find safe, interest-based online communities in their heritage language. Just be mindful of pre-teen internet safety and teenage internet safety.

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Raising multilingual and bilingual children: options

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If you, your partner if you have one, or other people who help you raise your child speak languages other than English, you might want your child to grow up learning these languages. Raising multilingual or bilingual children has many benefits. For example, it can improve communication and bonds in your immediate and extended family.

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Pályázóink hírei | Köznevelés

A CLIL egy oktatási módszertan, amely nem a tanítást, hanem a tanulás folyamatát helyezi középpontba, a befogadás hatékonyságára koncentrál.
2018 nyarán a Budapest IX. Kerületi Weöres Sándor Általános Iskola és Gimnázium által elnyert Erasmus+ pályázat keretében Kutassy Anna és Kocsis Judit Angliába utazhattak, hogy módszertani kurzuson vegyenek részt. Az ott szerzett tapasztalatokat most megosztják a hazai olvasóközönséggel is egy az általuk készített részletes, a CLIL oktatási irányzat komplex módszertanába is betekintést engedő összefoglalóval.
2018 nyarán a Budapest IX. Kerületi Weöres Sándor Általános Iskola és Gimnázium által elnyert Erasmus+ pályázat keretében ketten utaztunk Angliába, hogy módszertani kurzuson vegyünk részt. Azt reméltük, hogy a pedagógiai módszertantárunk bővítésével segíthetjük az itthoni oktatás fejlődését. A Cheltenham CLIL Humanites és Science and Maths tanfolyamokon megismerkedhettünk a CLIL (Content and Lanuage Integrated Learning) oktatási irányzat komplex módszertanával, ami egészen új perspektívát teremt a hagyományos oktatási keretekhez képest.

A CLIL nem a tanítást, hanem a tanulás folyamatát helyezi középpontba, a befogadás hatékonyságára koncentrál. Rendszerének minden eleme e hatékonyság növelését szolgálja. A módszer egyik fontos szegmense, hogy bizonyos tantárgyakat valamely idegen nyelven oktat, ezzel is szélesítve a tanulók látókörét és fejlesztve a sok területre kiható nyelvi kompetenciáikat. Sokan e módszer miatt hajlamosak a CLIL-t a kéttannyelvű oktatással azonosítani, pedig ez a módszer messze túlmutat a hagyományos kéttannyelvűségen, és kulcsa sokkal inkább pedagógiájában rejlik. Ezt az is igazolja, hogy a CLIL rendszerével működő iskolák hangsúlyozottan a tantárgyat tanítják a nyelven keresztül, és nem fordítva, valamint az órákon az idegen nyelvet csupán 25 %-ban használják, a diákokat anyanyelvükön való megszólalásra is buzdítják a szintén anyanyelvű tanárok, akik az óráknak csak bizonyos részeit tartják idegen nyelven.

A nyelvtanuláson kívül tehát rengeteg egyéb elemből áll össze ez a pedagógiai rendszer. Meghatározó fogalmai akollegialitás, a diákok közötti kommunikáció, az együttműködés, a kíváncsiság, a nyitott feladatok és az önálló tevékenység.

Érdemes először a megfelelő pedagógiai közeg kialakításának kérdését vizsgálni, hiszen rengeteg intézményben tudna hatékonyabban működni a tantestület néhány egyszerű szabály bevezetésével, amelyek a szoros együttműködésre épülnek. Nagyon hasznosnak találtuk az alábbi ötleteket:

Egyszerű önfejlesztő módszer a pedagógusok számára

Egy konkrét kérdést feltesz a pedagógus saját munkájával kapcsolatban egy számára problémás területre vonatkozóan (érdemes az azonos tantárgyat tanítóknak ugyanazt a kérdést vizsgálni az egységesség kialakítása érdekében)

Pl.: Milyen tevékenységre mennyi idő megy el pontosan az órán?

Egy hónapig vizsgálja az adott kérdést egy csoportban
Az alábbi táblázatban vezeti a tanórán a különböző tevékenységekkel eltöltött időt

A hónap végén egyénileg, vagy közösen értékelik a vizsgált kérdés eredményeit, és azok alapján dolgozzák ki a módszert a változtatásra.

Így a pedagógus biztosíthatja saját fejlődését, ami azért is fontos, mert diákjainkkal szemben alapvető elvárásnak tartjuk a fejlődést, és rendszeresen ellenőrizzük is annak mértékét, míg saját szakmai munkánk ellenőrzésére ritkán van kidolgozott és következetes módszerünk.

Hogyan érdemes értekezni?

Röviden (30-45 perc, inkább 30, maximum 45)

Fókuszáltan - Nem szabad hagyni, hogy a történetmesélés, panaszkodás irányába mozduljanak a megbeszélések, ezeknek inkább a személyes beszélgetésekkor van helyük

Tantárgyra koncentráltan (az értekezlet témája határozza meg, hogy milyen széles körben gyűljenek össze a tantestület tagjai, de a havi értekezleteket általában érdemes az azonos tantárgyat tanítók körében tartani)

1. „Slam" - Minden kolléga megoszt 1 percben a közösséggel egy éppen őt foglalkoztató fontos jelenséget (Ez lehet pozitív vagy negatív is, az a fontos, hogy valamilyen pedagógiai, módszertani kérdéskörhöz kapcsolódjon. Pl.: „Kipróbáltam ezt a feladatot, és nagyon motiválta a gyerekeket, szívesen megosztom azzal, akit érdekel."/ Kérlek, segítsetek, mert van egy alaposan kidolgozott feladatom, de valamiért nem működik jól, mit kellen rajta változtatni?"). Ez azért szükséges, hogy az együtt dolgozó pedagógusok megismerjék egymás problémáit, módszereit, és ne alakuljon ki az „eggbox szindróma", amikor egy intézményen belül egymástól karnyújtásnyira, mégis szeparáltan léteznek a tantestület tagjai. Az egy percben nyilván nem kerül sor a probléma részletes megbeszélésére, de a felvetést a későbbiek során a kollégák meg tudják tárgyalni

2. A pedagógusok megbeszélik az abban a hónapban vizsgált kérdéssel kapcsolatos tapasztalataikat és teendőiket

3. Az értekezlet végén megbeszélik, mi legyen a következő hónap központi kérdése

Ez a fajta közös munka elősegíti a kollegialitás fejlődését, együttműködésre és önreflexióra sarkall. Hosszútávon ez a folyamat egységesebb pedagógiai munkát és következetességet eredményezhet az intézményben.

Természetesen a pedagógusoknak nem csupán a biztos háttérmunkára kell koncentrálniuk. Az egyik legfontosabb feladatunk a motiváció megteremtése, a diákok érdeklődésének fenntartása és az önálló kritikai gondolkodásra való nevelés. A CLIL módszer nagy hangsúlyt fektet a tanulói tevékenységre az órán, hiszen ezáltal történhet meg a diákok valódi bevonódása. Fontos, hogy elkerüljük azokat a helyzeteket, amelyek csupán a tanulók egy szűk, eleve motivált csoportjának biztosítanak sikerélményt, mert így elveszítjük a csoport jelentős százalékának figyelmét (ezt a jelenséget az oktató az „ elesett katonák pedagógiájaként " emlegette).

További hasznos tippeket és esettanulmányokat a moderniskola.hu honlapon megjelent eredeti cikkben olvashatnak.
Utolsó módosítás: 2018.10.25.

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ha… clil - középpontban a tanulás folyamata - hírek - tempus közalapítvány

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Úgy tanul a gyerek, ha... CLIL - középpontban a tanulás folyamata - Hírek - Tempus Közalapítvány

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Tempus Közalapítvány oktatás, képzés területén működő szervezet, célja európai és nemzetközi mobilitási pályázatok koordinálása, szakértői segítségnyújtás. Úgy tanul a gyerek, ha... CLIL - középpontban a tanulás folyamata - Hírek - Tempus Közalapítvány

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BridgeUniverse - TEFL Blog, News, Tips & Resources

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By Dorothy Zemach
July 6, 2021

Bilingual education isn't just for bilingual communities. Thanks to research that shows learning a second language has benefits for just about everyone, schools all over the world are looking for ways to bring these benefits to their students. One growing teaching trend within bilingual education is CLIL methodology. What is CLIL exactly? To take advantage of this integrative approach, teachers and school administrations need a thorough understanding of the theories behind it as well as proper training on how to apply those theories in concrete ways within their institution.
If you're new to teaching, you'll want to get initial training and qualification with a TEFL certificate. You can explore our online TEFL courses to get started!
CLIL stands for Content and Language Integrated Learning. This means studying another subject (for example, science, history, or literature) and learning a language, such as English, at the same time - integrating the two subjects. The definition is broad because the integration can happen in many different ways.

Professor Do Coyle, who together with education researcher and author Dr. David Marsh coined the term CLIL, explains, "[T]here isn't just one model. ... It can be a theme. It can be principles. You can spend a lot of time on this or a short time on this. But the fundamental principle of CLIL is that there is an integration between using language to learn and learning to use language through the development of content." In this article, we'll explore what exactly that means and, in particular, how it's used in English language teaching.

Although the term "CLIL" is modern, the technique is as old as learning itself. Any time someone learned about something else - engineering, art, cooking - while they learned and practiced a foreign language, they were using CLIL, even if they didn't realize it!

The approach became more formalized in the 1960s, in language immersion programs in Canada and with Languages Across the Curriculum (LAC) programs and Foreign Languages Across the Curriculum (FLAC) programs in the UK and the US. Many of these classes involved native English speakers studying a subject in a foreign language and included study-abroad programs.

David Marsh and Do Coyle came up with the term CLIL in the mid-1990s, at a time when governments, schools, and individuals were all starting to realize the importance of knowing more than one language. The movement was especially strong in Europe, and it's growing around the world in response to globalization.

What are the core features of CLIL methodology?

A successful CLIL program depends on the cooperation between language teachers and content teachers. Each is an expert in his or her own field, so they need to share both their respective principles and information.

The content teacher

A content teacher is someone who teaches a subject - for example, music, architecture, or biology. However, using CLIL as an approach is more than just switching to English to teach another subject. Content teachers are not normally experts in language acquisition or pedagogy. Therefore, to teach their subjects, content teachers usually require some amount of training and might also use both their students' native language and English, a technique known as translanguaging. They'll also depend on the support of the language teacher.

The language teacher

The language teacher is primarily responsible for teaching English (or another language), but in CLIL methodology, he or she also supports the content teacher by introducing relevant vocabulary and functional language related to a given subject (history or biology, for example) and by emphasizing critical thinking.

As an example, think of an earth science class. The content teacher explains the water cycle through pictures, demonstrations, English, and if necessary, the students' first language (or L1). In tandem, the English teacher might cover language for explaining sequences and processes (first, next, then, after that), language for cause and effect (because of, due to, results in), and word forms (vapor, evaporate, evaporation).

Coordination of the two

On the institutional level, a successful CLIL program needs a cooperative organizational structure, which means there has to be a way for the content teacher and the language teacher to work with each other, such as a set place and time to meet and coordinate lessons.

This is helped by a supportive school administration that is willing to provide comprehensive CLIL training, appropriate materials, adequate funding, and time.

Finally, the program will depend on willing students and parents who understand the program's methods and goals. Students might need to work in new and unfamiliar ways, so it's important that they and their families trust the teachers and the program.

Although different programs and classes will of course have their own individual goals, broadly speaking, all CLIL programs aim to increase students' subject-area knowledge while at the same time improving their knowledge of and skills in the target language. In addition, students should improve their own ability to learn and come to understand and appreciate a new culture. Finally, students should not lose ground in their native language. They're adding a new language, not replacing the one they already know.

Think of bilingual education - education involving two languages - as a broad field that can encompass different programs and approaches. Some of the other main approaches share some features with CLIL, although they have differences as well. Here are some of the most common approaches that you might hear about and how they are similar to and different from CLIL.

CBI

CBI, which stands for Content-Based Instruction, refers to learning about a subject using the target language. Some people say that CLIL is a type of CBI, although in a true CLIL program, there is a stronger emphasis on the content. In a CBI course, students might use a textbook with a unit about history, then a unit about communication, then a unit about economics, and so on. But the history teacher would not be teaching in English at the same time.

ESP

ESP, which stands for English for Specific Purposes, teaches students the vocabulary and functions they need for certain fields. Often it is job- or career-focused. Example courses include English for Hospitality Workers or English for Air Traffic Controllers.

EMI

EMI, which stands for English as the Medium of Instruction, refers to language immersion courses where all instruction occurs in the target language. This covers everything from language immersion summer camps to international schools that conduct all of their classes in the target language, where students either must demonstrate proficiency in the target language to be admitted or, if their level is low, seek out additional instruction or tutoring. Unlike a CLIL approach, EMI programs discourage the use of students' native language.
Watch a video featuring CLIL expert, Peeter Mehisto, about what this method is - and is not - from Bridge's Content and Language Integrated Learning Specialized Certification Courses:
Students

Just about any type of student can benefit from a CLIL approach. It has been used with all ages and ability levels. However, that doesn't mean that every student will be successful in a CLIL class, any more than every student is successful in any class. But the factors limiting a student's success are not tied to the CLIL approach.

Teachers

CLIL courses can take time and energy to prepare and carry out. A good CLIL teacher is someone who is committed to the approach and is hard-working, dedicated, and passionate about his or her students. In addition, a CLIL teacher should be skilled at communication and flexible because cooperating with the subject-area teacher is essential.

Subjects

While almost any subject can be taught through a CLIL approach, the most suited are ones that involve student cooperation and have a cultural aspect to them. Some examples are the social sciences, the arts, many trades, and some sciences such as biology and chemistry. One study found that math and physics were less suited to a CLIL approach because of their technical nature. A CLIL approach in these classes would probably rely more heavily on L1 use.

Many types of schools and programs can benefit from CLIL. Because CLIL is particularly well-suited to groups of students working together, it's ideal for K-12 classes, universities, and vocational schools - which of course are all places where students learn subjects in addition to language. But CLIL can also be used in sports and clubs, with private students (if the language teacher also has content knowledge), and in online classes.

If CLIL takes extra training and effort on the part of the teacher, why should they adopt this approach? The short answer is because it provides so many benefits to the students.

As students become proficient in two languages, they gain social and cognitive advantages. Studies have shown that bilingual people are, on the whole, more flexible, better problem solvers, and better communicators. In addition, learning a second language can improve a person's memory and even protect against the effects of aging on the brain.

Other benefits include a deeper understanding of the target language, mastery of a subject, improved social and critical thinking skills, and even a stronger, more flexible brain. With all of these advantages to students, why not see if you can incorporate some CLIL principles and practices into your own teaching?

Harness the benefits of this method with Bridge's new CLIL Certification Courses, developed to help teachers and administrators successfully adopt the CLIL approach to bilingual education institute-wide.

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What Is CLIL? The Global Trend in Bilingual Education Explained

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What is CLIL in language learning, and who is this method best suited for? Take a look at the features and benefits of using CLIL in the classroom, and see how this instructional method differs from others.