Bilingual Curriculum

Bilingual curriculum, or a curriculum that is bilingual, refers to subject matter content taught and [Page 81]learned in two languages. Variations in instructional program models and teaching strategies are influenced by an intricate combination of issues including inadequate funding, national identity, teaching philosophies, and diverse political ideologies. In the United States, a bilingual curriculum includes English as one of the languages. Students enrolled in bilingual curricular programs are identified as English learners. One of the goals of a bilingual curriculum is to ensure that all students in public schools learn to speak English. A discussion of the history of bilingual education, current language policies, and instructional program models follow.

Decades of theory, scholarship, and empirical research have informed practices of a curriculum that is bilingual. Various teaching strategies and modes of instruction falling under the definition of bilingual education have evolved over time. Historically, bilingual education was common in the ancient world. A scarcity of written resources created a need for people to be literate in multiple languages in order to share and access limited materials. Today, in most parts of the world, bilingualism and bilingual education are the norm. However, in the United States, bilingual education has a complex history marked by conflicting theories, ideologies, and language policy trends. When European explorers came to the New World, what is now the United States, there were between 250 and 1,000 indigenous languages. Carlos Ovando, a bilingual education scholar, maintains that the cultural and language differences between the indigenous people and the Europeans initially set the stage for linguistic controversy that continues today and is fueled by issues of power, ethnocen-trism, and cultural and national identity.

In 1974, language policies were initially legislated by Lau v. Nichols, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that first addressed the academic language instruction of non-English-speaking children in public schools. Informed by the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education and Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the Supreme Court stated in Lau v. Nichols that equal education for all students could not exist if non-English-speaking children were taught in a language that they could not understand. The Court stated that native language instructional support for non-English-speaking students must be provided to make certain that their learning opportunities were equivalent to

English-speaking students'. As significant as the Lau decision was to bilingual education, the Court did not define the nature or type of instruction needed to support the schooling of non-English-speaking students.

The ambiguity of the Lau decision resulted in other law suits, such as Otero v. Mesa County School District No. 51 (1977), Guadalupe v. Tempe School District No. 3 (1978), and Aspira of New York, Inc. v. Board of Education (1975), that attempted to explicitly recognize native language instruction as an important component in the schooling of English learners. In terms of program models, the variety of instructional approaches stimulates debate regarding which is the most effective in teaching English learners in schools. In addition, bilingual language programs vary considerably in terms of district funding and support, academic and language goals, the percentage of instructional time allotted to the child's native language, and the amount of time devoted to English.

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