Projekt BiPeer

Facilitating German Reading Skills in Bilingual Primary School Children by Peer-Learning.

From primary school on immigrant children of Turkish origin show lower German reading competency than their native classmates. Peer-learning programs have shown to be an effective method to improve reading competency in primary school age. In such peer-learning programs children read to each other and work together on text based exercises. Particularly effective are those programs, which support reading fluency as well as knowledge of reading strategies and their application. However, to date it is not clear, if language homogenous or heterogenous peer-tandems are superior to support the reading competency of immigrant children. In addition, the often raised claim to involve the heritage languages of immigrant students in German lessons lacks specific proposals for implementation in the classroom. The BiPeer project tries to close these academic voids by exploring the language used during the peer-to-peer-interactions (German vs. Turkish/ German) and the composition of the peer tandems to support German reading competency by using peer learning methods. Tandems will consist either of one monolingual (German) and one bilingual (Turkish/ German) child or of two bilingual (Turkish/ German) children.

Selected Publications

Büttner, G., Warwas, J., & Adl-Amini, K. (2012). Kooperatives Lernen und Peer Tutoring im inklusiven Unterricht. Zeitschrift für Inklusion, 1–2. (Online unter: http://www.inklusion-online.net/index.php/inklusion)

Rauch, D. P. (2014). Effects of biliteracy on third language reading proficiency, the example of Turkish-German bilinguals. Plurilingual Education, 199–218. doi:10.1075/hsld.3.14rau

Rauch, D. P., Jude, N., & Naumann, J. (2011). Metalinguistic awareness mediates effects of full biliteracy on third-language reading proficiency in Turkish–German bilinguals. The International Journal of Bilingualism, 16, 402–418. doi:10.1177/1367006911425819