Why Mother Tongue Language is Important

In an international school such as Southbank, where there is a high mobility of the student population, many speak two or three languages. On the surface, they are confident bilingual or multilingual students.

However, living in a foreign country there is always a danger of not reaching full fluency and literacy in your Mother Tongue and of becoming "semi-lingual". This refers to people who are fairly fluent/literate in two languages, but who do not achieve full fluency/literacy in either.

Achieving full fluency and literacy in a language is not only essential for the development of higher order thinking skills but is also crucial in establishing one's own cultural identity. In the past, there was a misconception that learning two languages at the same time would slow
down the language acquisition process or be of detriment to the cognitive development of a child. However, current research on bilingualism shows the opposite to be correct.

At Southbank we believe in promoting ‘additive bilingualism'. This means maintaining and developing language and literacy skills in the Mother Tongue language in parallel with reaching competence in a Second Language. We have a well-established Mother Tongue Programme with a dedicated team of experienced professional teachers. At present we teach the following languages to native speakers: Arabic, French, Dutch,
German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Malay, Norwegian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish.

We live in a global society where English tends to be the predominant language of communication. Therefore, living in London and continuing a child's education in a different Mother Tongue is particularly challenging. Often, children find it easier to ‘just' use English to communicate with peers and siblings. However, it is up to us educators and parents to preserve the richness of our heritage language and cultural diversity.

To read more about bilingualism and multilingualism you may find the following bibliography useful:
Baker, C. (2000). A parents' and teachers' guide to bilingualism. 2nd Edition. Clevedon, England: Multilingual Matters.
Cummins, J. (2000). Language, power, and pedagogy. Bilingual children in the crossfire. Clevedon, England: Multilingual Matters.
Cummins, J. (1996). Negotiating identities: Education for empowerment in a diverse society. Los Angeles: California Association for Bilingual Education.