PEI at Burnin’ For Learnin’

Parent:Wise Magazine brings Austin the second annual Burnin’ For Learnin’ this Sunday from 11-4 at Palmer Events Center. The event showcases private schools and other educational resources in the area, along with music and fun kid activities.

If you go, be sure to check out booth #223 – Petite Ecole Internationale. PEI is a French-immersion Montessori preschool on North Loop Boulevard. Both my kids went there and I can’t say enough good things about our experience. I have become a huge fan of the Montessori approach, so much so that when it came time to find a kindergarten, I opted for a Montessori school that goes up through the lower elementary grades. (Not sure what I will do after that but Austin Montessori School is on the list to research.)

The other big reason I loved PEI was the language immersion aspect. I happen to know some French, but I would have sent them there regardless of which language was offered. Learning any second language has an impact on cognitive development:

Children who learn a foreign language beginning in early childhood demonstrate certain cognitive advantages over children who do not. Research conducted in Canada with young children shows that those who are bilingual develop the concept of “object permanence” at an earlier age. Bilingual students learn sooner that an object remains the same, even though the object has a different name in another language. For example, a foot remains a foot and performs the function of a foot, whether it is labeled a foot in English or un pied in French.

 

Additionally, foreign language learning is much more a cognitive problem solving activity than a linguistic activity, overall. Studies have shown repeatedly that foreign language learning increases critical thinking skills, creativity, and flexibility of mind in young children. Students who are learning a foreign language out-score their non-foreign language learning peers in the verbal and, surprisingly to some, the math sections of standardized tests. This relationship between foreign language study and increased mathematical skill development, particularly in the area of problem solving, points once again to the fact that second language learning is more of a cognitive than linguistic activity.

 

A 2007 study in Harwich, Massachusetts, showed that students who studied a foreign language in an articulated sequence outperformed their non-foreign language learning peers on the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) test after two-three years and significantly outperformed them after seven-eight years on all MCAS subtests.

 

Furthermore, there is research (Webb bibliography) that shows that children who study a foreign language, even when this second language study takes time away from the study of mathematics, outperform (on standardized tests of mathematics) students who do not study a foreign language and have more mathematical instruction during the school day. Again, this research upholds the notion that learning a second language is an exercise in cognitive problem solving and that the effects of second language instruction are directly transferable to the area of mathematical skill development.

 

The notion of “earlier is better” in language learning seems to be upheld by the fact that longer sequences of foreign language instruction seem to lead to better academic achievement, overall.

Now that they don’t go to a French-speaking school anymore, both kids take French classes after school. I’ve told them they can quit soccer or dance or gymnastics or any other extracurricular they decide to pick up, but French is the one thing they are not allowed to quit. I tell them (with only the tiniest bit of irony and ignoring the terribly rude person laughing at me inside my head) that one day they will thank me for not letting them give it up.