A Study On Bilingual Teaching In Kindergartens Of National Minorities

Childhood is a critical period in human development, at which humans experience thefastest development and display the highest plasticity. Good education at childhood has apositive impact on children’s sound physical and mental health, hence the necessity oftaking it into consideration for a good elementary education. Kindergarten bilingualeducation for national minorities constitutes an integral part of the education for them as awhole, serving as a preparing condition for their to fitting into society and overcomingcultural obstacles. And also it provide a substantial guarantee for their education, solidarity,economic prosperity and the preservation of cultures.The thesis gives a survey of the theories and their development in bilingual educationand that in kindergarten. Next, research methods such as questionnaires, observation inclasses and interviews are adopted in our investigations at12bilingual kindergartens ofAkesu of Xinjiang and Shule County of Kashi City. The following issues are respectivelyaddressed, namely teachers’ attitude toward bilingual education in kindergarten, teachers’design in it, the efficiency of it and its faculty building.Our investigations find that1) kindergarten teachers adopt a positive attitude tobilingual education in kindergarten, yet marked differences exist between differentnationalities and schools at different regions.2) Teachers have a clear understanding of theteaching goals of bilingual education in kindergarten. Everyday expressions receive a lot ofattention. One problem lies in its too much attention to children’s proficiency in spokenChinese rather than in listening, which is contrary to the dictates of second languagelearning for children. Special teaching activities are organized in teaching to the exclusionof use of routine life and activities. The majorities of teachers are able to suit their teachingmethods to children of different ages, but with not much use of modern teachinginstruments. Teaching environment on the whole is richly variant at different schools indifferent regions.3) There still exists a considerable gap between the obtained results andthe set goals.4) The rub still lies in faculty building, which manifests itself chiefly in theshortage of qualified teachers for bilingual teaching either for lack of expertise or for lack oflanguage capacity.