Swedish-language schools want pupils to have knowledge of Swedish
A new proposal aimed at securing the position of Finland's second language,
Swedish, includes a call for a test of language skills for children whose
parents want to place them in a Swedish-language school. The plan was drafted
by the Swedish language board of the Research Institute for the Languages of
Finland.
Professor Marika Tandfelt of the Helsinki-based Swedish School of Economics and
Business Administration says that in the Helsinki region many children who are
enrolled in Swedish-language schools do not speak the language well enough to
keep up with the curriculum. "All the time goes into learning the language - at
a time that they should be learning to read and to count", Tandfelt complains.
Professor Tandfelt, who was the main author of the new plan, says that some
parents even place children who speak no Swedish at all into Swedish-language
schools. For these children the initial stages of school can be unreasonably
difficult.
The problem is worst for certain bilingual families, where the Swedish spoken
by one parent is overshadowed by the Finnish spoken by the other.
"Unfortunately there are families who think that the school will make the
children bilingual. However, a Swedish-language school is by nature an ethnic
school, and not language immersion", she says.
Paradoxically, purely Finnish-language families who send their children to a
Swedish-language school usually do not have such problems; Tandfelt says that
they have usually made sure that the children have learned sufficient Swedish
in a language immersion day care centre, for instance.
A majority of pupils at Finland's Swedish-language schools do come from
bilingual families; only 10% to 30% are from exclusively Swedish-speaking
families.
The committee is not proposing a language test of any kind, but urges head
teachers at Swedish-language schools to ascertain the linguistic skills of
would-be pupils at a meeting with the child and the parents - and if necessary,
to suggest a different alternative.
Such a practice is already in place in some schools. On the other hand, some
Swedish-language schools have gone out of their way to recruit children - as
a way of ensuring their survival.
Finland's Swedish-speaking minority comprises about 5.6% of the population, and
is declining. Also, the number of school pupils is going down in all schools in
Finland.
"We don't care if the language assessment leads to a sharp fall in the number
of pupils. The quality of teaching and the language used in that teaching are
more important", Tandfelt says.
Under present law Finnish parents have the right to choose either a Finnish, or
Swedish-language school if they think that the child gets along in both
languages. However, there are no official standards for determining what
constitutes sufficient knowledge.
One possible solution to the demand for more Swedish-language education for
Finnish-speaking children would be an increase in the availability of
language immersion at the day care and school levels.
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