Larry Hoyt: Can’t always trust education research, especially in languages
Re “Research provides plenty of tips for teachers” (Page B1, June 10): The Bee article ignores a problem with educational research. It never meets the scientific standard requiring a one-to-one relationship between cause and effect. Education research is based on correlations that never address other factors to explain the effect.
The Mandarin immersion program referred to by The Bee was actually designed to compare this school’s immersion program with a more traditional elective-based program to determine if the program’s high costs could be justified at the expense of other students in that district. Or, perhaps, if there might be a better technology-based foreign-language program that would not result in the segregation of these Asian students from others. Because the students attending this program, many from affluent Mandarin-speaking families, can afford home tutors to help them keep up with other students in other subjects, this study says nothing about immersion programs in general.
Shamefully, some Spanish-immersion programs are designed to separate students from the children who speak the language they are supposed to learn.
Learning world languages is a great idea, but there might be better and cheaper ways to accomplish the goal that avoids segregation and unequal funding.
Larry Hoyt, Turlock
This story was originally published June 17, 2015 at 12:48 PM with the headline "Larry Hoyt: Can’t always trust education research, especially in languages."