Maryam Daneshgar
Abstract
Ethnic diversity in Iran results in language variety and it affects education from the first year of school; therefore it is necessary to take heed of this matter and to prevent disturbing bilingual children’s education progress for lack of deficiency in the Persian language. This study has been ...
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Ethnic diversity in Iran results in language variety and it affects education from the first year of school; therefore it is necessary to take heed of this matter and to prevent disturbing bilingual children’s education progress for lack of deficiency in the Persian language. This study has been done to analyze the language skills of bilingual and graduated Persian speakers. Statistical society was the students of twelfth grade and the sample has been chosen with the cluster sample and random multistage method among these cities: Arak, Tabriz, Sari, Sanandaj, Shiraz, Yasouj, and Yazd. The research methodology was based on a survey. Besides descriptive statistics, in the inferential statistics part, the non-parametric tests of Mann-Whitney U and KruskalWallis and the parametric test of t-test and ANOVA were employed. Examining the quantitative and qualitative data proved that the results of evaluating Persian and bilingual graduates were meaningful in reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills and the Persian students functioned in all of the skills better than the bilingual students. These outcomes were exact even with adding gender, major, and comparison between the best score of bilinguals and the weakest score of Persian students. The meaningful differences between all of the skills demonstrated that the efforts made in the formal education years were not efficient enough. Based on language variety in Iran, the recommendation of this paper is a reconsideration of current educational programs, especially with paying attention to preschool and the first-third grades of elementary school.Introduction Persian is the national and official language of Iran and all of the official education at schools are done in Persian language. On the other hand, Iran has ethnic diversity with various dialects in a large population. Therefore, Iranian children don’t have the same language situation by entering school at the age of six and their proficiency in Persian is different. According to the studies, if proper education regarding the dialects and languages of each region does not occur, there will be a learning disability and it will spread to other grades. This topic must be taken seriously to prevent the lack of Persian, which disturbs bilingual children’s educational progress. This research is done to analyze bilingualism's impact on enhancing the reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills of graduated students of the educational system by paying attention to the sort of language (being bilingual or Persian speaker), gender, and major.Literature ReviewNumerous studies in Iran and other countries revealed the better performance of bilinguals and a positive influence of bilingualism on the social and cognitive abilities of children and teenagers (including cf. Povarch and Kurt, 2019; Jumabava, 2021; Asadibalin, 1394; Abtahi and Khodadadian, 1395; Yousefi et al. 1396), in contrast, other studies displayed that being bilingual for Iranian children is usually a disturbing point rather than an advantage. The first exposure to school for students with different mother tongues will usually cause language confusion that will affect their educational process. The discontinuity between the language of school and the mother tongues of students will hinder communication based on personal motivation so it will harm the educational process (Parsaie et al, 1392) also the rate of dropping out of school in the cities with the majority of bilinguals is considerably more than other cities (Daneshgar, 1396).MethodologyThe research methodology was based on a survey. Statistical society was all of the students of twelfth grade and the sample was 595 graduated students of the twelfth grade of high school that was chosen among these cities: Arak, Tabriz, Sari, Sanandaj, Shiraz, Yasouj, and Yazd with the cluster sample and random multistage method (for more information, see Daneshgar, 1398, pp. 56-53). Selecting the sample (shown in Table No. 1) was purposeful and attempted to cover the linguistic variousness of different regions of Iran. Table 1Statistical data of participants Language situationGenderEducational majortotalbilingualPersian speakerboygirlLiberal artsScienceMathematicsnumber232363277318142326127595percent39614753245521100Research tools were: A. web-based, online, and researcher test for reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills (for more information about the construction of the test and evaluation tables, see Daneshgar, 1398, 57-61), B. background questionnaire of students including background information which will lead to giving information about the mother tongue of participants and the usage of their mother tongue among their families compared to Persian.ResultsBased on the sort of language (being bilingual or Persian speaker): among bilingual and monolingual Persian speakers in all reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills is a notable difference and in all of these skills, Persian speakers have more capacities.Based on gender: in all of the skills, girls had more abilities and this difference was meaningful. Moreover, the impact of gender was analyzed between the Persian speakers and the bilinguals. The results demonstrated that the function of Persian speakers (both boys and girls groups) were better in all reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills and they gained better results.Based on educational major: the result of liberal arts, Science, and mathematics in reading and writing skills indicated a significant difference but in listening and speaking skills this difference was not meaningful. The influence of educational majors on Persian speakers and bilinguals was studied. The outcomes proved that the function of Persian speakers in all majors (liberal arts, Science, and mathematics) was better in all reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills and they earned better results.Analyzing the results based on descriptive statistics was notable. The comparison between the best score of bilinguals and the weakest score of Persian students by adding elements of gender and major verified the better function of Persian speakers and the average weakest score of Persian speakers was better than the average of best scores of bilinguals. ConclusionThe results of evaluating the four skills of graduated Persian speakers and bilinguals confirmed better results for Persian speakers with considerable differences and more capabilities. Since these results are for the students of the last grade of schools, the outcomes with significant differences in all the skills proved that the efforts made in formal education were not efficient enough to make children and teenagers skillful in the Persian language. This circumstance will also spread into university and, predictably, the language skills of students at university are the same as their school time situation. The result of education in each country is the consequence of the evaluation of all of the users of that pedagogical system, therefore the cause for this problem is that all of the children don’t have the same language situation but the educational system assumes all of them in the same level and present same educational program for all. This negligence will disturb the educational function of language, proper and deep perceiving and finally, it will result in language lacking in graduation time. Regarding the language diversity of Iran, it is essential to verify this problem in the educational system. Also, it is vital to take heed of the features of the students, especially in the first years of school. In the bargain, it is important to provide educational programs for the teachers of bilingual regions and empower their professional skills, mainly from the first to the third grade of elementary school. It is also crucial to assess sporadic evaluations based on national standards.
