The study included data from around 3,000 students who participated in a longitudinal study conducted in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, between 2010 and 2014.
The same data had also been used in the previous study, the results of which the researchers had published in 2017. At that time, they had compared two cohorts, one of which had started English lessons in grade one, the other in grade three. In grades five and seven, they had compared both cohorts in terms of English reading and listening comprehension. The new analysis incorporated another set of data collected in 2016 to measure the English performance of the same children in grade nine.
The previous study had found children who had started English lessons earlier in primary school performed worse in reading and listening comprehension in grade seven than children who had not started English lessons until grade three. However, the new analysis showed in grade nine, the early starters in English performed better than the late starters in English.
Additional background variables such as gender, language of origin or cognitive abilities could not account for the difference between the poorer performance in the seventh grade and the late learning gains in the ninth grade.
Transition Between School Types
“We believe the most plausible explanation is that lessons following the transition period in secondary school have been increasingly adapted to the needs of children who start to take English lessons at an early stage,” concludes Nils Jäkel, formerly at RUB, now at the University of Oulu. “This explanation is in line with research that considers the transition between school types to play a key role in the long-term success of English language education across school boundaries.”
With this in mind, it is crucial to optimise the didactic coordination and alignment of English classes at the intersection of school types. In addition, it may be that pupils benefit in the long run from more implicit language lessons in primary school. “We see a high need for research to elaborate factors for successful language education, and we recommend well-coordinated, evidence-based measures in educational policy overall,” say the researchers.
StepUp Note
Research consistently shows the advantages of early learning for many different kinds of skills, including music and sports. This study measures the learning advantage for children who begin to study English in grade 1 instead of grade 3. Importantly, this study also notes the benefits of implicit language lessons (language in context, not just “language lessons”). StepUp exercises, especially in the the PK and K programs, include language in context, with integrated songs, finger plays and action rhymes that emphasize listening and talking. At every program level, some exercises challenge children to “let your ears be your eyes” and to visualize what they would be seeing if they were looking at the screen. Other exercises challenge children to “let your eyes be your ears” as they “visualize” the words of the exercise when the sound is turned off. Visualization is a neural network that is essential for reading comprehension.