The greatest linguistic diversity is to be found in developing countries, in those very same countries that are still struggling to promote literacy among their populations.

One of the determining factors for successful education policies, is the use of the student’s mother tongue: surveys conducted worldwide by different organisations have shown that teaching a child how to read and write in his or her own mother tongue leads to excellent results, whereas forcing schooling in the national language from the start is a policy that generally leads to failure.

Quoting the 1999 UNICEF report, the World Bank states in its Sourcebook for Poverty Reduction Strategies (2001):

« “Research from around the world has demonstrated that children become literate more easily and learn more quickly when taught for the first two or three years in their mother tongue. Studies also show that children learn a second language more rapidly than their peers who learned to read in an unfamiliar language. ».

Linguists Thomas and Cullier (1997), who carried out broad-based research on this topic, are even more precise in their conclusions: students coming from linguistic minorities who have received a thorough education in their mother tongue during primary school had the best results at high school in standardised national examinations in their national language.

Success in school determines the chances of improving the standard of living of millions of children throughout the world, because the successful elimination of illiteracy is the best asset to avoid their exclusion from globalization. From an economic point of view, it is the main gateway to mastered development. In terms of health, it contributes to giving access to medication and helps prevent the propagation of diseases such as AIDS.

Extract from “Les Langues en Danger”in Mémoires de la Société de Linguistique de Paris,
Claire Moyse-Faurie, 2000, p.101-102

“As summarised in the works of Jeff Siegel (1996) based on data collected on the subject of various linguistic policies in the South Pacific, the benefits of an education in the vernacular are now well known:

– Students are better taught in their mother tongue: one cannot learn how to read and write in a language before knowing that language; therefore, time must be dedicated to understanding and learning the language before working on introducing literacy;

– Even where the final goal of a given educational system is to learn a second language, the time spent on learning the native language is never wasted; the command of literacy can easily be transferred from one language to another, and the learning of a second language is facilitated once reading and writing have been mastered in the first language.

– The advantages linked to the use of vernacular at school are twofold: a small child’s adaptation to school will be easier if the teacher speaks the same language as he does; his cognitive development will also be facilitated if he is capable of using his own language to think and express himself.

– The benefits are social: the fact that a child speaks the same language as his parents at school means that they can follow the education of their child, discuss it, help him or her and get involved in school life;

– The benefits are cultural: education in the vernacular is a guarantee that children will not be marginalised in their lifestyles and drawn away from their culture, through the cultural impact linked to the learning of another language; the use of a native language in the official educational system confers this language a symbolic value, gives it prestige, and a clear role in the country’s development; education in a native language secures the continuity of a language and culture.

– The benefits are financial: it has been observed that fewer students fall back or drop out of bilingual educational systems.

(…)

Many studies have been carried out in Oceania concerning the use of local languages for educational purposes. The latest among them have come to the following conclusions:

– A child needs twelve years to completely master a first language;

– It is easier for older children and teenagers to learn a second language than for younger children;

– Children who have had the opportunity to develop the use of their own mother tongue learn their second language more easily than those who have not done so.”