Biliterate Adolescents' Writing Skills in a Two-Majority Language Context

This study examined the writing skills of English-French bilingual (EFbil) adolescents with extensive exposure to both languages in a two-majority language context.

Participants were EFbil adolescents (n = 26) and French near-monolinguals (FL1; n = 12) aged 12 to 17 years. All participants wrote image descriptions in French; EFbil also wrote in English. Between-group comparisons were run for complex syntax, errors, and productivity. Within-group comparisons looked at bilinguals across their languages, and oral and written syntax for both groups. Predictors of text quality were explored through multiple regression analyses.

In French, both groups performed similarly on productivity and syntactic measures. Bilinguals made more errors, but both groups had a high error-to-productivity ratio. Bilinguals performed similarly in both languages on all measures, except errors that were higher in French. Comparisons between oral and written modalities followed similar patterns for both groups. French exposure and all syntactic measures as well as time spent reading in French were predictive of French text quality. However, a low error-to-productivity ratio best predicted French text quality.

Results indicate a similar syntactic performance in French for monolinguals and bilinguals given comparable French school exposure. Being schooled in French did not prevent bilinguals from developing equivalent writing skills in their first language, English. As a majority and globalized language, the environment appears to have allowed bilinguals to maintain sufficient exposure to support their English skills. These results also point to a mutually contributing relationship between the ability to write good content quality and to respect the spelling and grammar of the language.