Teaching Dual Language Immersion Programs

In the past few decades, bilingualism has become increasingly important in our own country and around the world. As our classrooms become more cross-cultural, the needs of our students have changed to place a heavier emphasis on teaching English as a second language. With this need come many theories and concepts on how to meet it. The theory behind teaching in two languages simultaneously, or dual language instruction, has become increasingly popular. The Davis Magnet School located in Tucson, Arizona, has implemented a program of teaching English along with Spanish and has served as a major research facility for the last two decades. The Davis Magnet School's Dual Language Immersion programs have been the setting for several doctoral dissertations and countless research papers; through this research, other schools have implemented several of this school's ideas and these concepts are easily tailored to meet the needs of other schools and communities.

The theory behind teaching in dual languages is that students will become more proficient in both languages simultaneously. In order to understand the details, it is necessary to understand the difference between the languages. A majority language is one spoken by the majority of people in the community or country; in this case, English will be the majority the language. A minority language is a language spoken by the minority of people in a community or country; in this case, Spanish will be the minority language (Wikipedia).