fbpx
Maple Bear Global Schools Ltd.

loading please wait...

What is bilingual education?

Posted in Education on Tuesday, August 9th, 2016

Not surprisingly, this is a question I am often asked.

Bilingual education is the use of two different languages in the classroom instruction of academic content.

That means, in our Maple Bear program model, students study subjects like Portuguese or Chinese in either their native language or English, depending on the subject and grade level. They don’t just memorize vocabulary which is one way it differs from ESL training.

There have been concerns that teaching children two languages at once only confuses them. Fortunately, there has been much research—much of it conducted by Canadians—which shows that far from handicapping children, bilingual education can offer benefits from infancy to old age.

So what are the benefits of bilingual education for young learners?

For a start, it’s very good for English-language development, a goal of many of our parents who chose Maple Bear for their children. But young learners have been shown to have:

• better concentration, analytical skills and multi-tasking;
• they learn to read sooner than monolingual students;
• they have an increased sense of self-worth and identity;
• the ability to live abroad and learn other foreign languages later in life;
• exposure to more than one culture leads to a global perspective.

Finally, numerous studies have shown that being bilingual actually makes a person smarter as it has a profound effect on the brain, improving cognitive skills and sharpening memory.

Rodney Briggs
President
Maple Bear

View More Stories...
supporting your childs nutrition
How to Support your Child’s Immune System through Nutrition 
Maple Bear Singapore organised a virtual workshop on 27 August 2022 for some 30 parents of children attending our preschools. Sherlyn Quek, Maple Bear's resident school nutritionist, shared tips on…
Meet Gladys Ng of Maple Bear Singapore
For Gladys Ng, owning two Maple Bear schools in Singapore is a dream come true and the pinnacle of a long, meaningful career in early childhood education. Her passion for…
maple bear ceo arno krug with maple bear singapore kids
Maple Bear Global Schools CEO, Mr Arno Krug, Visits Maple Bear Singapore!
In May 2022, Maple Bear Global Schools CEO, Mr Arno Krug, had a blast immersing in the Maple Bear Singapore experience of fun, games, music and laughter. We lined up…
the bear preschool magazine
The Bear Magazine #1
We are proud to have our Education Ambassador, Mrs Patricia Koh, featured on the front cover of Maple Bear Global School’s first magazine issue. In this first global issue, read…