The purpose of this research is to examine the comparability of mathematics and science scores for students from English language backgrounds (ELB) and non-English language backgrounds (NELB). We examine the relationship between English reading proficiency and performance on mathematics and science assessments in Australia, Canada, the United…

This study seeks to examine the success of voluntary immigrants in Grade 6 French immersion with a double comparison to Canadian-born (a) Anglophones and (b) multilingual students (children of voluntary immigrants). The findings, that show the immigrant students to outperform the other two groups in French and English, are explored through a…

Although the development of second language (L2) oral fluency has been widely investigated over the past several decades, there remains a paucity of research examining language instruction specifically aimed at improving this cognitive skill. In this study, the researchers investigate how instructional techniques adapted from drama can positively…

The current study examined how two groups of native speakers--monolingual Canadians and multilingual Singaporeans--differentially perceive foreign accentedness in spontaneous second language (L2) speech. The Singaporean raters, who had exposure to various models of English and also spoke multiple L2s on a daily basis, demonstrated more lenient…

In this paper, I report on the findings of a study that compared the French as a second official language (FSOL) proficiency of three groups of Grade-6 students in English-dominant Canada: Canadian-born monolingual English-speaking students, Canadian-born bilingual students and immigrant bilingual students (IMBs). The goal of the study was to…

This paper presents the results of a study that compared the French as a second official achievement of three groups of students: (1) Canadian-born English speaking (CBE), (2) Canadian-born multilingual (CBM), and (3) immigrant multilinguals (IMM) as determined by multiskills test results. ANOVAs and subsequent post hoc tests revealed that the…

This article reports on the preliminary findings of a two-staged empirical study aimed at gaining insights into the variables salient in the early language and literacy development of young English language learners (ELL). Increasingly, young ELL, whether foreign-born or Canadian-born, arrive at school with little developed English-language…

This study examined relationships between the after-school literacy activities and test performance of students who passed and students who failed the 2003 administration of the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test. It included both students who have been in the Canadian school system for most of their school lives and mostly use English as a…

Using generalizability theory, this study examined both the rating variability and reliability of ESL students' writing in the provincial English examinations in Canada. Three years' data were used in order to complete the analyses and examine the stability of the results. The major research question that guided this study was: Are there any…

This study investigated the effects of second language (L2) proficiency differences in pairs and patterns of interaction on L2 learning, making use of both qualitative and quantitative data. We designed the study in such a way that four different "core" participants interacted with higher and lower proficiency "non-core"…

This study examines the perception of English vowels by native speakers of Italian. In two preliminary experiments, Italian university students who had lived in Canada for 3 months were found to have difficulty discriminating because they often identified both members of each contrast as instances of a single Italian vowel. The participants in two…