Exploring content-based language teaching practices to stimulate language use in grades 7 and 8 of Frisian trilingual primary education

This dissertation describes the teaching practices in Frisian trilingual primary education (grades 7 and 8) in which the use of Dutch, Frisian and English is stimulated in content-based language teaching. The teaching practices are compared over time, and the relation between teacher practices and student language development in the three target languages is assessed. Differences between teachers and between measurements are observed, but also the teacher practices between the three target language lessons show variation. We conclude that the use of the students’ entire language repertoire is beneficial for language development. It is found that stronger development of Dutch vocabulary and reading comprehension is related to the use of Dutch in Dutch target language lessons, and in which Frisian is also used in peer-interaction. Stronger Frisian vocabulary development is likely related to the use of Frisian only, by both teachers and students in Frisian target language lessons. However, Frisian reading comprehension development is probably related to the use of Dutch in addition to that of Frisian for the interaction between teacher and pupils, the interaction between pupils and output.Furthermore, stronger Frisian vocabulary development is related to both meaning making strategies, and more frequent application of teaching methods to stimulate language use. Better Dutch vocabulary development may well be related to the stimulation of student contributions in whole-classroom discussion in Dutch. In this research no relations are found between English language development and specific teaching practices. English language development may be mainly related to the use of media at home