A Critical Examination of the Beliefs about Learning a Foreign Language at Primary School

A study like the one reported by Pinto Suggeststhat all children, regardless of
their background, can benefit from working with language as long as this work
has a cognitive component and goes beyond tie Innindlessl' repetition of
phrases they do not understand. However, these spin-offs’ from working with
language should not be confused with learning a foreign language per se. No
claims were made in the above study that such comparative work led, for
example, to increased 'production competence¹ in English.

4.3.5 First Language Literacy Skills and Effective Classroom Foreign
Language Learning

An awareness of language is presumed to be a piecondition for learning to read
and write and the ability to read and write woUd in itself seem important in a
context where teaching and learning time is limited. In most subjects within the
school education system, intake Ofinformationiand the efficiency with which
children learn is very much a question Oftheirreading ability and learning a
foreign language is no exception. Good foundations in first language skills,
including the ability to read and write, would seem important in learning a
foreign language efficiently and successfully in the classroom where teaching
and learning time are limited. Cummins' 'interdependence hypothesis' (1979)
postulates that the extent of children's command of first language literacy skills
and a sound basis in cognitive and Conceptuall dleyelopment in a first language
will affect their progress in a second language. Cummins & Swain (1986)
argued that children should be given the opportunity to develop a sound basis
in their first language as this would give the child:

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