Laura Furcsa

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Eötvös Loránd University, Faculty of Pedagogy and Psychology Doctoral School of Education

School of English and American Studies PhD Programme in Language Pedagogy Programme Director: Péter Medgyes DSc, Professor

Laura Furcsa

Teaching Foreign Languages to Socially Disadvantaged Children

Supervisor: Edit H. Kontra PhD, Associate Professor and Department Chair, Department of English Applied Linguistics,

Eötvös Loránd University

Dissertation Examination Committee:

Chair: Andrea Kárpáti PhD, DSc, Professor

Internal Opponent: Katalin N. Kollár PhD, habil., Associate Professor External Opponent: Zoltán Poór PhD, CSc, Associate Professor Secretary: Dorottya Holló PhD, habil., Associate Professor Members: László Pethı PhD, habil., College Professor

Endre Barkó PhD, habil., College Professor Sztefka Barócsiné Kirilova PhD

Budapest, 2012

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Acknowledgements

My deepest thanks are due to my supervisor Professor Edit Kontra at Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest for her unwavering support, academic direction and professional critique. I would like to thank all of my tutors in the PhD Programme in PhD Programme in Language Pedagogy at Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest.

Further I thank and commend the interest, inspiration and cooperation of all my colleagues for their discussions, feedback and encouragement at Szent István University, Faculty of Applied and Professional Arts (Jászberény).

Although the respondents must remain anonymous for ethical reasons, this dissertation would not have been possible without children’s and teachers’ willingness to the observations and interviews.

Last but not the least, my family has given me strength through their support, without whose help and patience I would not have been able to complete this dissertation.

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Absztrakt

Jelen disszertáció fı célja, hogy azonosítsa a hátrányos helyzető, idegen nyelvet tanuló gyermekek és nyelvtanáraik fıbb problémáit, és egy részletes és átfogó képet nyújtson, mely mind a gyermekek, mind a tanárok szemszögébıl bemutatja a nyelvtanulás folyamatát, és figyelembe veszi az iskolaigazgatók szempontjait is.

Mivel a kutatás a résztvevık értelmezéseinek megvilágítására irányult, ezért a fı kutatási eszköz a mélyinterjú volt, melyet osztálytermi megfigyelésekkel kombináltunk.

A szándékos mintavételt használó kutatás a Jászság kistérség vidéki általános iskoláira fókuszált, melyeknek tanulói között számottevı hátrányos helyzető gyermek található.

Az iskolák kiválasztásánál a szülık iskolai végzettsége és munkanélküli helyzete volt a legfontosabb kritérium. Interjúk készültek a mintába került általános iskolák igazgatóival (N=6) és angol (N=7), illetve német (N=8) nyelvet oktató tanáraival. Tíz fókuszcsoportos interjúban vettek részt az iskolák hátrányos helyzető, 4-8. osztályos tanulói (N=38). Az osztálytermi megfigyelések az interjúkban résztvevık nyelvóráira koncentráltak. Az interjúk átiratát és a megfigyelések terepjegyzeteit az állandó összehasonlítás módszerével (Maykut és Morehouse, 1994) elemeztük.

A kapott eredményeket hat fontosabb kategóriába osztottuk: 1) a hátrányos helyzető gyermekek tulajdonságai, ahogyan a tanárok látják; 2) a nyelvtanárok módszertani megfontolásai; 3) az értékelés gyakorlata; 4) az idegen nyelv iránti hozzáállás és motiváció; 5) a csoportkörnyezet szerepe, és 6) a nyelvtanítás kontextusa.

A kutatás kapott eredményei jelentékenyen hathatnak az idegennyelv tanításának meglévı gyakorlatára, illetve a tanárképzésre általánosan

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Abstract

The goal of the present dissertation is to identify the major problems faced by disadvantaged foreign language learners and their teachers, and to build up a detailed and comprehensive picture of the process of language learning perceived by both the children and their teachers involving also the aspects of the head teachers.

As the interpretations and perspectives of the participants were the aims of the research, the main research tool was in-depth interviewing, which was combined with classroom observations. The research used purposive sampling and focused on rural primary schools attended by a considerable number of disadvantaged children situated in the micro region Jászság. The most important sampling criteria were educational level and unemployment of the parents. The participants for the interviews included the head teachers (N=6), teachers of English (N=7) and teachers of German (N=8) of the primary schools in the sample. Ten focus group interviews were conducted with disadvantaged children (N=38) from Grades 4-8 of the schools. The observations concentrated on the classes taught by the teachers who were interviewed. The interview transcripts and observation field notes were analyzed by the constant comparison method (Maykut and Morehouse, 1994).

The findings of the qualitative data were divided into six major categories: 1) characteristics of disadvantaged children as seen by the teachers, 2) language teachers’

methodological considerations, 3) assessment practices, 4) attitude to foreign language learning and motivation, 5) role of group environment and 6) context of language teaching. The findings of the present research have considerable implications for teacher education in general and classroom practices of foreign language teaching in particular.

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List of Tables and Figures

Table 1 Quantitative and qualitative criteria

Table 2 Educational and unemployment characteristics of the settlements of Jászság

Table 3 Summary of codes of interviewees

Table 4 Development of categories of inquiry in language teacher interviews Table 5 Development of categories of inquiry in head teacher interviews Table 6 Development of categories of inquiry in children interviews

Table 7 Difficulties of disadvantaged children perceived by language teachers Table 8 Qualifications and experience of language teachers

Table 9 Most frequent activities of language classes perceived by children Table 10 Main characteristics of assessment cultures

Figure 1 Aspects of the learning process

Figure 2 Issues of qualitative design related to trustworthiness Figure 3 Overview of research design

Figure 4 Number of registered unemployed in Jászság

Figure 5. Overview of Category 1: Disadvantaged children in language classes Figure 6. Overview of Category 2: Methodological considerations of language

teachers

Figure 7. Overview of Category 3: Assessment practices of teachers of disadvantaged children

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Figure 8. Overview of Category 4: Factors influencing disadvantaged children’s attitude to foreign language learning and motivation

Figure 9. Overview of Category 5: Group environment characteristics Figure 10. Overview of Category 6: Context of language teaching

Figure 11. An emerging model of teaching foreign languages to disadvantaged learners

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List of Appendices

Appendix A Letter of parental consent

Appendix B Interview guide for the interview with the head teachers

Appendix C Interview guide for the interview with the language teachers of socially disadvantaged children

Appendix D Interview guide for the focus group interview for socially disadvantaged children

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Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 The research in context

The problem of disadvantaged children is of major importance in Hungary.

Children regarded as disadvantaged have a home background which is usually characterized by the conjunction of several factors including low income, poverty, undereducation, unemployment, marital and familial instability, father absence, child neglect, racial or ethnic minority differences, poor health, poor housing conditions, delinquency, and reliance on government benefits. Most of the disadvantaged children suffer multiple and overlapping disadvantages. They experience a lot of difficulties in education, have access to schools that provide low-level qualifications, and have a higher risk of dropping-out, which presents a constant challenge to educators. Most of the disadvantaged children come from rural areas and / or from Roma ethnic minorities where unemployment is high and the standard of living is extremely low. The situation is even more serious as their number continues to increase. Unemployment, unfavourable circumstances and undereducation appear to be inherited from generation to generation. The only way out of this vicious circle seems to be access to quality education.

The findings of several international studies on education (Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi, 2000; Leventhal and Brooks-Gunn, 2001; Conley, 2005; Knitzer and Koball, 2007; OECD, 2009; Brese and Mirazchiyski, 2011) have indicated that children’s family background is associated substantially with their school performance.

The connection between the social and economic conditions of a family and the academic achievement of children is referred to as a socioeconomic gradient (OECD,

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2009) as the relationship between socioeconomic background and educational performance appears to be gradual. It is also referred to as the achievement gap (Lacour and Tissington, 2011) because it involves a gap in school performance between children of high and low status.

Hungary is one of the countries in which different background characteristics are reported to influence student performance to a critical extent. Findings of the Programme for International Student Assessment (hereafter: PISA) indicate that family background plays a significant role in determining the achievement of children at school in Hungary (OECD, 2009). More than 20% of the differences in student performance are related to socioeconomic differences, which is more than in most OECD countries.

The PISA studies draw attention to a serious performance gap between children with advantaged and disadvantaged socioeconomic background. Csapó, Molnár and Kinyó (2009) arrived at the same result when using data from other educational studies, adding that the present situation is the result of educational tendencies in the last few decades;

furthermore, such tendencies seem to have become permanent in the last few years.

These findings also suggest that Hungary may have an especially strong system of school selectivity.

Educational attainment correlates with job prospects in Hungary. After the political changes of 1990 and the accession of Hungary to the European Union in 2004, the Hungarian economy has been influenced by direct foreign investment.

Consequently, there have been dramatic changes in the structure of employment as employers have shifted their requirements and wish to employ more workers with higher qualifications and foreign language knowledge (Medgyesi, 2006). There is a close connection between higher levels of education and higher earnings in Hungary, the educational wage differential is considerable (Kézdi, Horváth and Hudomiet, 2004).

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The role of foreign language learning is crucial as it may change the future life chances of people in the labour market and help them to break from the cycle of poverty. Successful language learning may lead to better opportunities in secondary and tertiary education. Students without a good knowledge of at least one foreign language are unable to take the secondary school leaving exam because a foreign language is one of the requirements of the exam. The prerequisite of obtaining a college or university degree is even more challenging as an intermediate level exam is required. Higher education degrees provide individuals with access to better options and more job opportunities in Hungary, which can be further enhanced by a good command of a foreign language.

Teaching foreign languages to disadvantaged children is a neglected area of language pedagogy: although there is an abundant literature concerning disadvantaged children, there appears to be an obvious research gap in this area. Educational studies usually focus on general problems concerning disadvantaged children, for example minority children in schools (Babusik, 2001; Babusik, 2003; Kemény (1996); Havas, Kemény and Liskó, 2002; Nagy, 2002), equality of opportunities in education (Turcsán, 1998), segregation (Kertesi and Kézdi, 2005), school performance of disadvantaged children (Csapó, 2003; Vágó, 2002), alternative schools and programs (Lázár, 2001), or characteristics of efficient schools (Babusik, 2001), while research into learning foreign languages has been disregarded so far. The important role that foreign languages play in the shaping of young people’s futures makes it necessary to investigate the foreign language teaching situation in schools with a substantial number of disadvantaged children.

Public education is the main context where children start to learn a foreign language. The Hungarian National Core Curriculum (2007) requires that children must

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begin learning their first foreign language in grade 4 of primary school. However, the effectiveness of language teaching has often been criticized; the most common problems seem to be the lack of appropriately trained teachers, insufficient levels of intensity, outdated methodology and deficient technical aids (Petneki, 2002). More affluent families hire private teachers, pay for extracurricular language lessons at school, or send their children to language schools. Parents often put pressure on primary schools to implement early start programmes; local authorities can support earlier programmes by manipulating their budgets (Nikolov, 2000). Foreign language knowledge was found to be significantly influenced by family background, especially by parental educational attainment and status as children of more educated parents have much better foreign language knowledge (Andor, 1999).

These trends of foreign language learning in present day Hungary may threaten the availability of equal opportunities in education. As a consequence, for children coming from economically disadvantaged families the only context of instruction, the primary school is essential as the school may well be their only chance to learn foreign languages. The main task for schools of disadvantaged children is to create the conditions for demanding and meaningful learning and intellectual achievement, including the opportunity to learn a foreign language effectively, regardless of minority group, geographic location, socioeconomic status or disability.

It is a direct consequence of the above considerations that I decided to focus my PhD work on the investigation of foreign language learning of disadvantaged children.

First a number of small-scale, preliminary studies were carried out, which will be introduced as part of the review of the literature. The aims of this research and the applied tools were developed on the basis of the findings of three previous research projects (Furcsa, 2005; Furcsa, 2008; Furcsa, Borogdai and Cserhalmi, 2005) conducted

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by the writer. Even though those projects were motivated with different aims, the results gained helped to provide deeper insights into the disadvantaged children. The results of those preliminary investigations all fed into the research presented in the main body of this dissertation and led to the formulation of new research questions that the dissertation will try to answer.

In the following part of the dissertation, after having formulated the purpose of the research and the research questions, Chapter 2 presents the theoretical framework of the research defining key terms and introducing several aspects of disadvantaged situation in education. Chapter 3 outlines the method of research applied to the study.

Chapter 4 reports the findings of the study and Chapter 5 presents conclusions, implications and recommendations for further research.

1.2 Purpose of the research

The aim of the study I conducted for my PhD is to identify the major problems faced by disadvantaged foreign language learners and their teachers, and to build up a detailed and comprehensive picture, as it is perceived from the inside by both the children and their teachers in the Hungarian context. This research will improve our understanding of the multiple levels of disadvantage in education and, on the theoretical level, contribute to the literature on the relation between language disadvantage, native language and foreign language learning.

On the practical level, the pedagogical implications of the present research are important as the findings could be built into the curriculum of primary school teacher training. My experience as a teacher trainer has drawn attention to the importance of the idea that understanding the characteristics of disadvantaged children and becoming

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familiar with efficient teaching techniques can help beginner or even practicing teachers to develop expertise in teaching disadvantaged children.

As mentioned above, it is a well-established fact in educational research, that there is a strong correlation between a child’s socioeconomic status and his or her academic achievement, consequently, later success or failure in life. However, education has a crucial role in mitigating these disadvantages. Studies investigating school influence conclude that “school practices are not neutral in their treatment of students of varying socioeconomic backgrounds, schools tend to produce a widening gap” (Caro, McDonald and Willms, 2009, p.561). The present research was created in the sense to highlight a chance for disadvantaged children to break this circle.

1.3 Research questions

The present study aims to find answers to the following research questions:

1. How do language teachers see the process and nature of teaching foreign languages to socially disadvantaged children?

2. What factors do teachers consider to influence the process and the result of foreign language teaching in a socially disadvantaged class?

3. How do children from socially disadvantaged families relate to foreign language learning in primary schools?

The answers to the research questions will outline a complex view of learning situations of disadvantaged children investigated from both pedagogic and social aspects. In order to present an as complete picture as possible, the language learning process is investigated from the aspects of disadvantaged children and the teachers of a foreign language; moreover, the viewpoints of the head teachers of the schools are also

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Chapter 2: Theoretical framework

A principal aim of this chapter is to introduce the relevant literature regarding the multiple aspects of disadvantage in education and in language learning in present- day Hungary that constitutes the foundation on which my own research is built. The theoretical framework of my research is multi-disciplinary: issues of minority pedagogy, sociolinguistics and applied linguistics are integrated. This complexity exerts both positive and negative effects on this overview. The abundance of sources offers a wide perspective of ideas and trends but makes it difficult to limit the discussion to only the most relevant views. It seems like a challenging task to shape the various ideas into a coherent unit. The review provided in this chapter is conceptual and analytical in as much as it presents concepts and analytical frameworks relevant to the phenomenon under study.

The chapter is organized as follows: first the theoretical background is presented in eight sections. The first section describes the importance of social context in foreign language teaching and critical pedagogy. The second examines the definition of the term ‘disadvantaged’ as used in this study and the decisive factors that contribute to being disadvantaged. Two subsections try to clarify the differences between disadvantaged and such concepts as ‘children with special learning needs’ and

‘endangered children.’ The subsequent sections review six aspects of disadvantaged situation found relevant: 1) the economic and legal aspect, 2) the ethnic aspect, 3) aspects of language disadvantage, 4) linguistic socialization and communicative style, 5) aspects of literacy and 6) motivation. My intention was to create a discourse of current thoughts and practices related to a disadvantaged situation in Hungary in which to contextualize the research project.

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2.1 Sociocultural perspectives on language learning

Initially, trends in language pedagogy which emphasize sociocultural perceptions are described. The context in which foreign language is learnt and taught is receiving substantial attention in research, but it is only recently that the significance of the social context has been placed at the centre of attention. The sociocultural perspectives on language teaching emphasize the context in which the language learners are situated, and the physical and symbolic tools of their interactions (Gebhard, 1999).

This direction of language pedagogy views second language acquisition (SLA) as an institutional phenomenon shaped by cultures and structures embedded in the educational system. Socially oriented approaches see learners as part of a larger social milieu.

Sociocultural theories of language pedagogy have been strongly influenced by the work of Vygotsky (1978). He conceptualized a complex framework of the relationships between learners and the learning environment. This approach uses a micro-social focus as it relates to language acquisition in immediate social contexts of production, interpretation, and interaction (Saville-Troike, 2006). The role of interaction does not only have a facilitating role but it is seen as a causative force: the whole process of language learning is a social process determined by sociocultural settings. It means that relationships among learners themselves and between learners and teacher, which are influenced by the learning environment, are crucial. The main idea from the perspective of the present study is that language learners are not seen as isolated individuals in the classroom and the role of social settings is essential. The children’s social and cultural context of home and school setting influence learning significantly.

Vygotsky (1978) stated that all cognitive activity is basically social, both in its origins and operation (Lantolf and Appel, 1994). According to his views, learning is

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enhanced by collaboration with others including peers and adults: “the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers” (Vygotsky, 1978, p. 86). This is called the zone of proximal development. Children’s cognitive development is based on individual differences and the range of tasks and appropriate support appear to be decisive. Scaffolding is used to provide the support a child needs in order to complete a task.

Another important trend is the critical pedagogy approach. This views language education in relation to issues of social equality and focuses on issues concerning the power relations of participants. It examines how the asymmetrical relationship of teachers and students influences teaching. It is a postmodern view of language pedagogy that sees schools as a scene of struggle between cultural, ideological and social forms (Davies, 2007). The assumptions of critical pedagogy have been applied to language teaching and refer to an attitude which relates the foreign language classroom context to the wider social context and aims at social transformation through education (Akbari, 2008).

Critical pedagogy views foreign language education as a positive force, as stated in Reagan and Osborn’s study:

Critical pedagogy calls for us to re-examine not only the purposes of foreign language instruction, but even more, the hidden (and often not-so-hidden) biases about language, social class, power, and equity that underlie language use.

Second language education, in short, from a critical perspective is not only about the teaching and learning of a second or additional linguistic system, but is also about social and cultural knowledge, and perhaps even more, about helping students to develop critical approaches to examining and understanding such knowledge. (Reagan and Osborn’s study, 2002, p. 30)

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The main point in the critical pedagogy framework is that teachers are required to be socio-politically conscious in the critical pedagogy framework. They should connect pedagogical theory and practice to wider social issues. This role goes beyond the limitations of the classroom as “the role that teachers and administrators might play as transformative intellectuals who develop counterhegemonic pedagogies that not only empower students by giving them the knowledge and social skills they will need to be able to function in the larger society as critical agents, but also educate them for transformative action” (Kumaravadivelu, 2003, p. 14). This extra role for teachers gives them more responsibility in their work and expects them to be more conscientious.

The sociocultural views on language education dealing with social equity have significant implications for the Hungarian situation. The increasing socioeconomic importance of the knowledge of the English language in Hungary is unambiguous.

However, the question of whether English is implicated in the reproduction of social inequalities has to be addressed.

Access to English, or the lack of it, affects the social mobility and life chances of many children (Lin, 1999; Cumming, 1994). The classroom is a key site for the reproduction of social identities and unequal relations of power. All children deserve equal access to demanding, meaningful learning and intellectual achievement, including the opportunity to learn a foreign language, regardless of ethnic group, socioeconomic status or disability. This consideration leads to the question of who can be regarded as disadvantaged in the Hungarian education system.

2.2 Defining ‘disadvantaged’

When discussing the issue of disadvantage in education, it is of major

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order to establish a common understanding of how this term is viewed and interpreted in its complexity. The complexity of this term is demonstrated through the presentation of recent perspectives on the issues of disadvantaged children in the current Hungarian educational context.

The term disadvantaged denotes a very complex phenomenon in education, and is difficult to define not only owing to its complexity, but also because a variety of expressions are used to refer to socially disadvantaged situations:

- at-risk students, students at risk of failure (e.g. Bailey, 2006; Dufva and Vauras, 2002; Franklin, 2000; Hodge, 1998; Stronge, 2007),

- students of low socioeconomic status (e.g. Smyth and Hattam, 2004;

Sung, Padilla, Silva, 2006),

- working class children (e.g. Snow, 2006; Bernstein, 1972),

- (most) vulnerable students (e.g. Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi, 2000).

This term is used in the ‘No child left behind program in the USA (Hayes, 2008; Hudson, 2007).

Fejes and Józsa (2005) accounted for this complexity by emphasising that the confusion of causes (e.g. parents’ educational level, symptoms, attrition), factors resulting from the socioeconomic background (e.g. poverty) and from the educational system (e.g.

segregation) are not used systematically and are not precisely defined, which makes the definition of disadvantaged even more problematic. In other words, prerequisites of disadvantaged situation, decisive factors and reinforcing factors seem to be confused in research studies.

In education studies, socioeconomic status is a frequently used objective indicator (often abbreviated as SES) at every level of educational systems, (Bailey, 2006; Cabrera and La Nasa, 2001; Goldstein and Brooks, 2007; Stronge, 2007) where

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children of low socioeconomic status are associated with a disadvantaged situation.

There is no strong agreement on the conceptual meaning of socioeconomic status and it is usually operationalized through several measures. In this approach, the following indicators usually influence the socioeconomic status of a child: parental employment status, parental educational attainment, especially parental early school leaver status, parental income level and medical card possession (Eivers, Shiel and Shortt, 2004).

The Index of Economic, Social and Cultural Status (ESCS) used in recent PISA studies adds a cultural dimension as well when describing the combination of characteristics of children’s families (OECD, 2009). This new index was constructed using three previously generated indices. The ESCS index is based on three main factors:

1) the occupational status of the father or mother, whichever is higher, 2) the level of education of the father or mother, whichever is higher, 3) the wealth of the home environment as well, measured by household items possessed at home (for instance a desk, a room of their own, educational software, Internet connection).

Moreover, it also asks about the possession of cultural items (e.g. classic literature, books of poetry, and works of art) and entertainment facilities (e.g. television, a DVD player or VCR etc.). The income of the parents is not directly measured in this large- scale educational study.

However, there are some important concerns in Brese and Mirazchiyski (2011) which have to be taken into consideration when trying to operationalize family background. Certain limitations of the PISA research were that the indicator of family income is considered to be sensitive information. In addition, young children cannot give reliable data about it and for this reason the study had a large amount of missing

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data. The category of occupation caused coding difficulties. When examining the effects of home possessions, they found that only a few items (mainly the number of books at home and the number of children’s books at home) were significant, moreover, educational aids and other home possessions showed very low association with achievement.

Disadvantaged situations cannot be defined by precise and unambiguous criteria.

They are connected to unemployment, social deprivation, poor health and nutrition conditions leading to short life expectancy, frequent use of social and mental health services, and numerous occurrences of criminal behaviour (Ginsborg, 2006). There are several factors which interrelate and generate conditions that place children at risk of failing to achieve their intellectual and academic potential. The life-long consequence of disadvantages in childhood is that their ability to function later as productive adults in society may be severely limited. A child’s socio-economic status is mostly determined by the parents’ circumstances (particularly financial income, occupation and education level), which exert a powerful influence on the child’s psychological and educational development. There is considerable agreement among the above described research studies that parental background appears to be of utmost importance in cases of disadvantaged situations. The following part of the theoretical framework seeks to elaborate on the characteristics and characterization of disadvantaged children.

2.2.1 Characterization of disadvantaged children

In this section, a summary of the different factors which were found to be decisive in identifying groups of disadvantaged children is presented. This review is primarily based on the works of Hungarian researchers while a comparison of relevant

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The use of the term ‘disadvantaged situation’ (hátrányos helyzet in Hungarian) became widespread in the 1970s; however, not as a scientific notion, but as part of the official wording of a ministerial order according to Kozma (1975). The 7th Congress of the Hungarian Socialist Party considered children who dropped out of school or had to repeat a class to be in a disadvantaged situation. The emphasis was placed on poor school performance. Since that time, this term has been widely used in pedagogical literature.

Papp (1997) asserts that the most important factor contributing to a disadvantaged situation is low income; more precisely, the income of a disadvantaged family is under the minimum subsistence level. Apart from low income, in Papp’s theory, a disadvantaged situation is caused by the following factors: unhealthy or inadequate housing conditions, the parents’ low educational level, socialization problems caused by the deviant microenvironment, the absence of family or a broken family, and ill or physically disabled parents who are physically unable to meet their children’s needs. This framework might seem to be confusing because of the interdependence of the factors; for example, low income is usually the cause of poor housing conditions, whereas a low level of education or a disability is often the cause of low income.

Liskó (1997) and Turcsán (1998) worked with similar parameters to characterize the group of disadvantaged children: parents’ educational level, standard of living determined by the parents’ employment status, stability of the family, family size, parents’ deviance, and ethnicity. In this framework, the parents’ employment status and ethnicity are additional elements. Roma ethnicity is such a complex issue in terms of a disadvantaged situation that a more detailed description can be found in the next section (Section 2.3). Deviance in sociology refers to actions or behaviours that do not conform

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to formal and informal social rules and expectations (Bridges and Desmond, 2000).

Deviance is usually interpreted in pedagogy (as in this research study) as the violation of formally enacted rules, for example delinquency, alcoholism, drug addiction etc.

Based on these criteria, a scale of disadvantaged situations can be devised, having children with only one feature of being disadvantaged at one end of the scale and children with all the features of being disadvantaged at the other. They are the so called children with multiple disadvantages, often abbreviated as HHH, meaning halmozottan hátrányos helyzető in Hungarian (Turcsán, 1998). Turcsán thinks that current circumstances influence the number of coexisting criteria to reach the level of multiple disadvantages.

A wider analysis of disadvantaged circumstances includes other dimensions, too.

Imre (2002) saw three components of disadvantaged situations:

1) inequalities outside education;

2) inequalities in the system of education;

3) output characteristics.

This analysis clearly distinguishes the input, process and output features. The first dimension (inequalities outside education) includes mainly the factors previously discussed such as i.e. social background, place of living, gender and ethnicity.

Unfortunately, there is no detailed description of the new factors (e.g. gender). The inequalities in the education system refer to the network of institutions, financing, financial status, personal conditions, objective conditions, curriculum and teaching methods. Output characteristics are connected to different variables, which include school performance, number of students who go on to secondary education, and labour market performance. School performance can be measured by comparing the results of

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large-scale monitor studies or PISA tests, but attrition and school year repetition are also taken into account.

N. Kollár (2004) used a two-dimensional model in her consideration of disadvantaged situations, but with a more complex and detailed description. Her dimensions are the following:

1) causes of inequality from the children’s perspective: language skills and language disabilities (see more details in Section 2.4); the parents’ attitude to school; future perspectives; motivation to further education; personality traits, 2) causes of inequality triggered by school: curriculum built from above (the focus is on the knowledge necessary for further studies, and not on practical, everyday knowledge and skills); different objective and personal conditions; the hidden curriculum.

The hidden curriculum is a frequently used term referring to the sociocultural norms, attitudes, values and politics promoted by school experiences (Massialas, 2001).

It is not connected to the curriculum content of the lessons; it is not written and does not have explicit objectives. The focus is on regulations, procedures, school structures, mechanisms and organizations. N. Kollár emphasizes the importance of the hidden curriculum in detail and examines a study by Anyon (1983) as an example.

A study conducted by Anyon (1983) in New Jersey (USA) distinguishes four types of schools: working class, middle class, aﬄuent-professional, and executive elite.

Working class children are taught simple, mechanistic rules without any reasoning. The teacher-student relationship is asymmetric, and passivity is expected of students. The school equipment is locked in the classroom. However, in the school with middle-class children, the aim of education is to recognize regularities and to find the right answer.

The instruction is teacher and textbook-centred. Besides, necessary skills for life are

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taught but without critical thinking or debate. In the affluent-professional schools the spotlight is on creativity in the classroom. In the elite school, the instruction focuses on the development of intellectual skills, conceptual development, independent decision making. Debating is the main tool of instruction when looking at social questions. As a consequence, the hidden curriculum teaches obedience to working-class children, whereas it teaches flexibility, social responsibility and openness to the elite children.

The idea of the hidden curriculum and Anyon’s research has been applied also to the Hungarian context. Research conducted by Szabó (1985) also in the 1980s concludes that the development of a hidden curriculum in schools is influenced by the cultural and social background of both teachers and learners. The hidden curriculum contributes substantially to school selection and the homogeneity of school communities in Hungary. As part of a large-scale research project focusing on the mechanisms of a hidden curriculum, Petı and Nagy (2004) investigated primary schools in the northern region of Hungary from the aspect of inclusive education. Based on the settlement type, the number of teachers and students and the ratio of children with special needs, five categories of schools were created and described. Important from the perspective of a hidden curriculum is the authors’ conclusion that ‘elite’ schools have the largest number of specialists, most of the teachers working in these schools have participated in several in-service training courses, and these schools were found to be the least receptive to the idea of inclusive education.

Conflict theorists suggest that education is socially and politically constructed to exclude many children from lower socioeconomic groups (Murphy, Mufti and Kassem, 2009). One means of doing this is the hidden curriculum which favours those children whose background is more suited to the environment. Working-class schools prepare students for future positions of labourers, whereas professional and executive schools

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prepare students to be intellectuals and professionals. As a result, the school reproduces the larger system of unequal social relations.

In the field of second language education, Auerbach and Burgess wrote an influential article with the title ‘The Hidden Curriculum of Survival ESL’ in 1985. They describe the hidden curriculum in ESL education, which tries to encourage uniformity and Western cultural values in language education. The reality portrayed in the texts prepares students for subservient social roles and reinforces hierarchical relations in the classroom. The hidden curriculum of language teaching here is to train immigrants to be obedient and accept a limited role in the social order.

The work of Fejes and Józsa (2005) adds a new comprehensive aspect to the issue of disadvantaged children. They use three dimensions of inquiry in their research concentrating on the motivation of disadvantaged children:

1) emotional disadvantage;

2) material disadvantage;

3) language disadvantage.

Emotional disadvantage can be characterized by difficulties in the socialization process, lack of intact families, or the parents’ deviance. It refers to the antisocial lifestyle of the family, emotional emptiness, complicated and disordered relations, and the parents’

irresponsibility with their child. As these factors are relatively complicated to measure, the teachers of the children were asked to characterize the children in their class as emotionally disadvantaged in this study. So classification is based on teachers’

judgement (see more details about this research in Section 2.6).

The approach of Várnagy and Várnagy (2000) focused on the symptoms in behaviour. Based on the intensity of integration problems, they set up four categories.

The mildest category refers to children in disadvantaged situations, where the

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personality development of the children is negatively influenced in relation to only one specific skill or ability. In this case, the disadvantaged situation constitutes a barrier to fulfilling the child’s full capacities. The reasons might be poverty, the parents’ low level of education, social mobility and migration, language development and, interestingly, positive deviance (gifted children).

The second category includes children with inadaptive behaviour, referring to abnormalities in behaviour based on conflicts of social relations. The typical symptoms are lack of self-control, emotional emptiness, and excessive sensitivity. The reasons are rooted in family socialization, family education, intercultural tensions, and conflicts in families. The third and fourth categories refer to potentially dangerous situations and include, subcultures, religious sects, drug addiction (see more details on endangered situation in Section 2.2.3). The reasons are to be found in the family; however, the authors also emphasize the role of the media, the influence of sects, and the consequences of alcohol and drug consumption. The fourth category involves antisocial behaviour and adolescent delinquency. The reasons are either psychological, including moral instability and negative psychosocial developmental influences, or social (collective delinquency).

In international terminology, the term vulnerable children is often used, for example in the ‘No child left behind’ programme which confirms that “the central problem of American education is the need to ensure equity and justice for our most vulnerable citizens: the children of the poor” (Hayes, 2008, p. 148). Hudson also defines children who belong to the group of vulnerable students noting that “too long, the poor achievement of our most vulnerable students has been lost in unrepresentative averages.

African-American, Hispanic, special education, limited English proficient, and many

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other students were left behind because schools were not held accountable for their individual progress” (Hudson, 2007, p. 22).

Vulnerability refers to situations where the child is in the chance of being damaged or hurt. Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi (2000, p. 9) used a concise definition when investigating the vulnerable youth in the European Union:

Vulnerability is defined as severely restricted opportunities for secure employment, social and economic advancement and personal fulfilment as the scarce response capacity of certain persons and groups inside society to confront, adapt or cope with specific economic, social, cultural and political changes to which they are permanently exposed. (Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi, 2000, p. 9)

The decisive objective factors are poverty (resulting in poor quality of life) and discrimination (ethnic, cultural, political or gender). These dimensions of vulnerability seem to be similar to the Hungarian characteristics of disadvantaged situation described above.

As far as terminology is concerned, the following section tries to clarify the differences between disadvantaged children and two similar categories: children with special learning needs and endangered children. Both terms are strongly related to disadvantage, however, they refer to different conditions and are used in different contexts. The first is used in the field of special education, while the second is a central category in child protection.

2.2.2 Children with special learning needs

Hungarian state policy supported segregation for children with special learning needs until the early 1990s (OECD, 2009). Several special institutions were established

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classrooms in ordinary schools. More recently, inclusion aims to integrate these children into mainstream child care systems by modifying teaching methods and school environments. Until recently, specialized schools or classes were required for children with disabilities. However, good practice has proven that disabled children do better in inclusive settings rather than in separated educational forms (Wilson, 1998).

Educational strategies that aim at inclusive education and the promotion of equal opportunities for all children are also receiving more attention.

The Hungarian definition of children with special educational needs is regulated by the Act on Public Education, Act No. LXXIX of 1993 Article 121, according to which the status of children with special educational needs is decided on the basis of expert opinion of the rehabilitation committee of experts under the following criteria:

1) with physical, organoleptic, mental or lalopathic disabilities, autistic children; they are multi-disabled in the case of the simultaneous occurrence of several disabilities; those who struggle with the chronic and serious derangement of cognitive functions and the development of behaviour ascribable to organic reasons,

2) struggling with the chronic and serious derangement of cognitive functions and of the development of behaviour not ascribable to organic reasons on the basis of the expert opinion of the rehabilitation committee of experts.

It is clear in the text of the law that disadvantaged children and children with special educational needs are two different categories with different criteria.

In the school year 2007/2008, the definition was slightly changed concerning children with special educational needs in the 14/1994 of SEN Ministerial decree. This modification was followed by a revision of the status of the children involved, and

the need for special education was terminated if the severe and long-lasting recognised disorder of functioning or behavioural development were not

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justified, and if the severe and long-lasting disorder of functioning or behavioural development were recognised, but were not due to organic reasons, and the student participated in corrective teaching-education in a special class, faculty or school, but subsequent assessment indicated that the student in the following academic year can participate in general, that is, integrated education.

(Special Needs Education Country Data, 2010, p. 29)

The consequence of this modification was that the number of children diagnosed with special educational needs stopped increasing, because one of its aims was to decrease the amount of support from the state (Csépe, 2009).

Children with special learning needs are often considered to be disadvantaged in pedagogical projects. For example, a sub-programme of the World – Language programme, named ‘Help the Disadvantaged Project’ (‘Elıre fuss’) and funded by the Tempus Public Foundation (2006), adds this extra dimension when defining disadvantaged children who are entitled to participate in this programme (Medgyes, 2005). In their project description, the following groups can be considered disadvantaged in foreign language learning: students of socially disadvantaged background, especially of Roma ethnicity (according to the decree 11/1994. (VI.8.) MKM order 39/D. (5) a), b) or students with special needs (according to Law on Public Education, Act 121. (1) 29). It means that besides children with multiple disadvantages as defined by the Hungarian Educational Law, children with special needs were also regarded as disadvantaged and could participate in that project.

Another interesting point to consider is the extent to which disadvantaged children can be characterized by special needs in education. Hodge (1998) argued that disadvantaged children often have mild and moderate learning difficulties, for instance short attention spans and a lack of concentration, memory problems, poor generalization

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skills, sensory impairments (auditory or visual discrimination problems), a lack of imaginative thinking, poor eye-hand coordination, dyslexia and dysgraphia.

An important area of special educational needs in language learning is dyslexia.

Dyslexia can be described as a particular problem with reading and spelling that cannot be explained by sensory or neurological damage, low intelligence, poor educational opportunities, or obvious sensory or neurological damage (Goswami, 2001). Recent research indicates that the central deficit is linguistic: children with dyslexia have problems with the accurate specification of phonology when storing lexical representations. Teaching foreign languages to children with dyslexia has been a popular research topic in language pedagogy recently, more details about this topic will be given in Section 2.7.1.

The research in the present dissertation does not have an explicit focus on children with special educational needs. The issues of children with special educational needs do not overlap entirely with the issues of disadvantaged children. However, there are children with special educational needs among the study participants and the factor of dyslexia seems to be particularly important in relation to language learning.

2.2.3 Endangered children

It is important to make a distinction between children in disadvantaged situations and endangered children (veszélyeztetett in Hungarian terminology). Similar terms used in international research studies are the following: ‘particularly vulnerable children’ or

‘children at special risk’ (used by the Council of Europe, Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi, 2000).

Act No. XXXI of 1997 on the Protection of Children and the Administration of

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in Hungary. Section 5 of this Act says that endangerment is a condition which – as a result of certain behaviour, failure, or circumstances – blocks or hinders the child’s physical, intellectual, emotional, and moral development. It is similar to the World Health Organization definition: “ Child abuse or maltreatment constitutes all forms of physical and/or emotional ill-treatment, sexual abuse, neglect or negligent treatment or commercial or other exploitation, resulting in actual or potential harm to the child’s health, survival, development or dignity in the context of a relationship of responsibility, trust or power” (Runyan, Wattam, Ikeda, Hassan and Ramiro, 2002, p.

59). In cases of abuse, neglect or any form of endangerment, the child welfare service is responsible for the child. Depending on several factors, this authority initiates administrative procedures to find the best solution for the child either within the family or the child is placed under protection.

There is a strong connection between disadvantaged situation and endangerment, as stated in Réthy and Vámos (2006). In the case of an endangered child, different forms of deviances, antisocial behaviour or serious moral defects are reported. These conditions make the child’s later integration into society difficult. One of the causes of endangerment is often poverty; however, it is never the only reason. Consequently, an endangered situation is also regarded as disadvantaged; in contrast a purely disadvantaged situation is not necessarily dangerous. That is why children cannot be placed under protection because of financial vulnerability alone.

The label disadvantaged used in this dissertation may be seen as demeaning or stigmatising to the children or the schools, and it may itself cause harm and may be associated with deficit or delinquency (Chavkin, 1993; Franklin, 2000). It must be stressed at this point that this term is used in the present dissertation with the provision that it does not indicate any kind of deficit or delinquency.

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In the following part of the theoretical overview I would like to focus on six aspects of disadvantage in more detail:

1) economic and legal aspects, 2) ethnic aspect,

3) aspects of language disadvantage,

4) linguistic socialization and communicative style, 5) the role of literacy,

6) motivation.

2.2 Economic and legal aspects

When talking about the economic aspects of a disadvantaged situation, the main issue is child poverty. There are two basic factors according to statistics (Éltetı and Havasi, 2006) that influence child poverty to a great extent. One is the family life cycle (Campos, 2007) which means that families with young children have more costs and less income than others since the livelihood of children mostly depends on the labour income of their parents. The other factor draws on the fact that impoverished families with low educational levels and in underdeveloped regions tend to have more children than families with average educational levels. Consequently, demographic factors, labour market situation and the parents’ education are the most decisive factors.

Obviously, these factors are correlated and have an effect on poverty simultaneously. In 2007, 18.9% of children lived in poverty in Hungary. This level of child poverty was close to the OECD average (19.1%), despite the fact that the general poverty rate (12.3%) was lower than the European poverty rate (16.3%) (TARKI, 2010). The poverty threshold defined in this study is 60 % of per capita median income.

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Child poverty in Hungary is strongly influenced by geographical factors and ethnic factors: it is more intense in rural regions (especially in small villages) and among Roma children. Child poverty in the countryside is more than double of what it is in the capital (Gábos and Szívós, 2010). More than half of poor people live in villages, while only one third of the total population lives in villages. Rural income- poverty is mainly caused by low labour- market prospects and deficient infrastructure.

As a result of low infrastructure the access to transport facilities and services (mainly childcare and schooling) in rural areas is often also inappropriate (Darvas and Tausz, 2007).

Hardships which are direct consequences of low economic status are seen in several areas: poor housing (without comfort or security), and consequently bad health conditions and more disabilities, undernourishment, also deficits in cognition and verbal ability, frequent school change because of migration as well as severe behaviour and social problems in school (Leventhal and Brooks-Gunn, 2001; Ferge and Darvas, 2011).

However, research indicates that a family’s financial problems predict strongly the children’s ability and achievement. Behaviour, physical or mental health seem to be less strongly linked to these financial problems (Duncan, Yeaung, Brooks-Gunn and Smith, 1998).

There is no doubt that poverty seems to be one of the most influential risk factors for school failure as “the multiple stressors of poverty limit children’s readiness for and ability to succeed” (Knitzer and Koball, 2007, p. 686). There are two explanations given in research literature for the effects of poverty on school failure (Conley, 2005). The first explanation concentrates on the material deprivation aspect. If a family lacks basic financial resources, the basic necessities of food, living conditions, clothes and health care are given priority while education appears to be neglected as

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schooling involves costs. In addition to the usual expenses of schooling, successful education may cause extra financial costs, for instance extracurricular activities, activities outside the home or providing rich learning environments by buying motivating materials (books, audio or visual materials). Poverty-stricken parents may not have any extra time and/or energy to invest in promoting their children’s development and have limited access to opportunities and resources. However, Marks (2005) warned that although income and wealth of the family relate to students’ school achievement, the effects are weak or moderate, and the parents’ educational level seems to be more strongly related to their children’s achievement.

It should be stressed here that social class and income are different (although in some cases overlapping) categories. Unemployment or divorce may cause serious and long-lasting income poverty. Ranschburg (2001) investigated the effects of the family’s financial situation on the children behaviour problems and found that in contemporary Hungary, the parenting effect and methods do not actually depend on the socioeconomic status of the family. This is because the connections between parents’ educational level, occupation and income have become extremely confused in recent years; therefore income appears to be a more sensitive indicator.

Financial circumstances influence educational success or failure from an early age. There is a strong connection between preschool education and later success in school. Costs of new clothes, food, transport or additional charges may deter parents from sending their children to nursery school. Preschool education plays an important role in intellectual and social development in childhood and influences later school performance (Barnett and Belfield, 2006). Duncan, Ludwig and Magnuson (2007) investigated the effects of intensive, education-focused intervention programmes and concluded that “increased investments in prenatal and infant health and in high-quality

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preschool education programs will improve children's life chances and generate benefits to society that can easily cover the costs of these government programs” (p.143). This is the underlying assumption of recent Hungarian initiatives aimed at expanding access to nursery schools for disadvantaged families (Vojnitsné and Zilahyné, 2008).

In later years, statistics indicate that poverty has a permanent negative effect on school performance: children in low-income families more frequently repeat a grade or drop out of school, and perform poorly on standardized tests (OECD, 2009; Leventhal and Brooks-Gunn, 2001; Furlong, Stadler and Azzopardi, 2000; Lacour and Tissington, 2011). Students with low academic performance resulting in low levels of educational achievement are more likely to be unemployed and poor when adults.

The long term effects of poverty have been investigated by Duncan, Yeaung, Brooks-Gunn and Smith (1998). They concluded that early childhood seems to be the period in which family economic conditions play the most significant role. The depth and the duration of poverty are also important as children who are exposed to prolonged spells of poverty or severe poverty have more serious deficits in cognitive ability and socio-emotional development.

A low level of parental education is a crucial factor of low income as the level of education that has been completed correlates strongly with income. Ferge and Darvas (2011) observed the continued and escalating devaluation of people with low education levels in the contemporary Hungarian labour market. However, employment does not prevent low incomes among parents with low education levels. As far as both parents’

education level is concerned, Lacour and Tissington (2011) argue that the mother’s education level has a more significant effect on children’s school performance than the father’s and, more interestingly, it indicates a stronger effect than income.

Laura Furcsa

Eötvös Loránd University, Faculty of Pedagogy and Psychology Doctoral School of Education

School of English and American Studies PhD Programme in Language Pedagogy Programme Director: Péter Medgyes DSc, Professor

Laura Furcsa

Teaching Foreign Languages to Socially Disadvantaged Children

Supervisor: Edit H. Kontra PhD, Associate Professor and Department Chair, Department of English Applied Linguistics,

Eötvös Loránd University

Budapest, 2012

Acknowledgements

Absztrakt

Abstract

Table of Contents

List of Tables and Figures

List of Appendices

Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 The research in context

1.2 Purpose of the research

1.3 Research questions

Chapter 2: Theoretical framework

2.1 Sociocultural perspectives on language learning

2.2 Defining ‘disadvantaged’

2.2 Economic and legal aspects