Summary

The educational assessment of bilingual children in the Western world is highly controversial. The editors and authors of this book are experienced academics and practitioners in this field in the UK. They have taken the creative ideas of Jim Cummins across the Atlantic and have applied them through a novel technique of curriculum related assessment. The book describes the technique in detail and reports on its use in a wide range of settings. The book introduces the context and outlines some of the challenges facing teachers of bilingual children. Five central chapters show how teachers and psychologists have applied Cummins' framework to the analysis of classroom support; to specialist support for children with learning difficulties; to differentiating the curriculum in English and Science in secondary schools; to work with young children in primary schools; and to the assessment of children who have hearing impairment. These accounts demonstrate the flexibility and promise of the technique and also point out its limitations. The final section of the book applies Cummins' ideas to the analysis of language development in bilingual children. In addition, one chapter describes a new resource for assessing their language skills in both their languages.