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Pandemic and Language Resilience in a Francophone Minority Context
Comments Off on Pandemic and Language Resilience in a Francophone Minority ContextFrom an ecological perspective inspired by Bronfenbrenner’s theory of human development, resilience can be defined as a process initiated by systems when they find themselves in the face of adversity (Ungar, 2018). This article examines the resilience of students during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on language resilience in a francophone minority context.
According to Ungar’s model (2018), each human being is a system in and of itself, while also being a constituent of other systems. A student is therefore a system interacting with others – their school, their community(ies), family, etc. It is by interacting with these systems that students construct themselves, build their sense of the world and participate in (re)producing other systems.
Resilience is a process that aims to return the individual system1 to wellness or well-being. The COVID-19 pandemic has placed entire nations in a context of health adversity. We have seen how they have been able to mobilize various internal resources (financial means, knowledge, attitudes, capacities) and external resources (vaccines, knowledge, allies) within a network of international systems.
In the midst of this upheaval, families, parents, children, students, teachers and school administrators mobilized internal and external resources in a process of resilience that began with school closures and the creation of an “ad hoc” virtual school space. We have therefore been able to confirm the extent to which the school is not only a place of learning but also, in terms of supervising children, a concomitant system of family and social systems. Moreover, the role of schools in reducing social inequalities has been confirmed when family systems have taken on more responsibility for the schooling of children. On the one hand, for example, we saw the lower availability of Internet and computer equipment in low-income households or in those located far from the country’s urban centres. On the other hand, families with the necessary internal resources created “school cells” and hired a qualified teacher to ensure their children’s continued schooling, while the school system struggled to meet its teacher staffing needs and other children were doing minimal hours of virtual schooling, with or without adult supervision or support at home. This is reminiscent of the creation of playgroups by some parents to ensure the availability of a French-language space for their preschoolers in an Anglo-dominated setting, as well as the trend noted in research on school choice: only some families actively choose their children’s school. Thus, the mobilization of internal and external resources by a system, in this case a family system, depends largely on the availability, accessibility and relevance of such resources.
In a francophone minority context, it is also important to take into account accessibility to the French language during the pandemic and afterwards. We already know that in the most Anglo-dominated francophone and Acadian communities, the school is the only public space where the French language enjoys a higher official status than English, although the latter enjoys a very high social status in student interactions. This is the case, for example, in Halifax (Liboy and Patouma, 2021), Toronto (Heller, 1994; Heller, 2006) and Ontario more generally (Gérin-Lajoie, 2004), Manitoba (Cormier, 2020) and Vancouver (Levasseur, 2020). The introduction of the Civic Community School concept developed by FNCSF (Fédération nationale des conseils scolaires francophones) in 2011 and the identification of the sociolinguistic role of the education system as a major issue by AEFO (Association des enseignantes et enseignants franco-ontariens) in 2022 confirmed the centrality of the school for community language resilience in an Anglo-dominated context. Within the school, students find spaces for social interaction that are conducive to contextualized language production and reproduction. The closure of schools and community centres therefore placed young people in a context of language adversity.
The pandemic has had a significant impact on the mental health of adolescents (Vaillancourt et al., 2021), particularly because of the social isolation that has significantly reduced peer contact. Even when health measures have been relaxed to allow social distancing, young people in a minority setting may have encountered difficulties in getting together with their francophone friends if these friends were scattered over an area beyond the limits of their neighbourhood. Indeed, although some historical francophone or Acadian communities occupy a well-defined geographic space (the Brayon population of the City of Edmundston, the Acadian population of Pubnico or the Franco-Ontarian population of Hearst, for example), their lives are for the most part intertwined in a municipality with the lives of an English-speaking majority, thus diminishing the opportunities to communicate in French. Under such conditions, a decision becomes necessary with respect to mobilizing internal and external resources that can support language resilience in French.
Data was collected in various provinces: in Ontario and Prince Edward Island in conjunction with communications sent to various groups in the school system; in New Brunswick in connection with the research component of the Canadian Playful Schools Network; and in Nova Scotia as part of a Master’s thesis. The data shows that the closure of schools during the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant effect on the availability and accessibility of external and internal resources relevant to the language resilience of some young French speakers. In our conversations with teachers and parents in Ontario and Prince Edward Island, we heard that some children’s ability and motivation to speak French decreased during the pandemic. Teachers in some elementary school settings noted that a greater number of students who did not attend daycare because of the pandemic entered school with little or no knowledge of the French language. Teachers at one school were interviewed at the annual ACELF conference and estimated that 70 percent of students did not speak French when they arrived at school in September 2022.
Secondary school students had the habit of switching from English to French when in the vicinity of a teacher in the school hallways; after two years of interrupted copresence, however, this automatic reflex seems to have generally disappeared when students returned to the classroom. Teachers have reported that some students simply refuse to speak French in the classroom, even with staff. A Master’s study of three secondary school students in Nova Scotia informs us about the factors that may have contributed to such changes and describes how in-person school acts as a concurrent system supporting students’ language resilience process (Sutherland, 2022).
Three secondary school seniors from schools across Nova Scotia participated in individual online narrative conversations during the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite distinct sociolinguistic profiles, each one testified to the importance of school for their language resilience (Sutherland, 2022). The in-school resources which they mobilized were (1) access to academic French in French courses, (2) legitimization of the local variety of French (Acadjonne) by certain staff members and (3) extracurricular activities. The French language school thus provides these students with three spaces in which various language resources and norms of communication in French can circulate: interaction in academic French, in Acadjonne and in the language of young people. Although Acadjonne was available to two of these students at home, with one of them speaking French closer to the academic standard with her parents, the pandemic greatly reduced their daily access to academic French and interactions with their peers in French.
When their schools were closed, students in French-language schools had access to a reduced number of classes. French classes were maintained, but accessibility to academic French was reduced as the trend shifted from participative education to lecture-style teaching. The individuals Sutherland met noted in particular the relevance of interaction in the French classroom to their access to academic language. Considering that, for two students, this linguistic variety was not legitimate within their family and community settings but was required for their legitimacy as francophones outside these environments, interactions in academic French proved to be a necessary resource for post-secondary language resilience for these students.
In addition, students testified to the importance of a French-language space, as their propensity to use the dominant language with their peers meant that, in the absence of school-organized extracurricular activities, they turned to social media to communicate with their friends. However, they used English mostly, if not exclusively, in the digital socialization space. For these individuals, the school closure during the pandemic entailed the loss of spaces of social interaction relevant to the production and contextualized language reproduction of the various forms of French.
However, unlike a growing number of young people living in a minority setting, those met by Sutherland had access to French-language resources in their families and in their respective communities. They were also among the young people who mobilized extracurricular school activities as a resource for their resilience in general and for their language resilience in particular. In Ontario, parents from a minority background but who use French at home and mobilize French language resources in their interactions with their children noted that their children spoke and read more frequently in French. This seems to have resulted in an improvement in their French vocabulary and a greater ability to move from a situation of translinguistic communication (i.e., the creative mobilization by bi-plurilingual persons of all their linguistic resources to create meaning and communicate a message) to a unilingual situation. Could it be that, by keeping their children away from a socialization space between young people where French is little used (the school hallways, for example), school closures contributed to these students’ linguistic resilience in French?
In a minority context, the surrounding society cannot ensure that students and their families will have sustained access to the language and linguistic resources distributed by the French-language school. Consequently, the French-language school offers great potential as an external resource for students’ language resilience. Under current conditions, it is not able to fully carry out this role in the context of a pandemic or e-learning. Moreover, some anecdotal data suggests that the French-language school contributes negatively to the language resilience of some students. Thus, there is still much to be learned about the interaction between the school and students’ other language ecology systems, and about the contribution of this interaction to short- and long-term language resilience.
References
Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development: Experiments by nature and design. Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
Cormier, G. (2020). School perspectives and definitions of linguistic identity in a minority environment: How do French-language schools respond to the needs of 21st century students faced with the many social, cultural and demographic changes underway? Éducation et francophonie, 48(1), 53-72. doi.org/10.7202/1070100ar
Gérin-Lajoie, D. (2004). La problématique identitaire et l’école de langue française en Ontario. Francophonies d’Amérique, (18), 171–179. doi.org/10.7202/1005360ar
Heller, M. (1994). Crosswords: Language, education, and ethnicity in French Ontario. Mouton de Gruyter.
Heller, M. (2006). Linguistic minorities and modernity: A sociolinguistic ethnography (2nd ed.). Continuum.
Levasseur, C. (2020). Being multilingual and Francophone: identity representations and positioning of francization students in Vancouver. Éducation et francophonie, 48(1), 93-121. doi.org/10.7202/1070102ar
Liboy, M.-G., & Patouma, J. (2021). L’école francophone en milieu minoritaire est-elle apte à intégrer les élèves immigrants et réfugiés récemment arrivés au pays? Canadian Ethnic Studies Journal, 53(2), 23-40.
Sutherland, H. (2022). De l’insécurité linguistique à la résilience linguistique : le rôle de l’école de langue française dans la formation de la résilience linguistique des adolescents. [Master’s thesis, University of Ottawa]. ResearchuO. https://ruor.uottawa.ca/handle/10393/43860
Vaillancourt, T., Beauchamp, M., et al. (2021). Children and schools during COVID-19 and beyond: Engagement and connection through opportunity. Royal Society of Canada. https://rsc-src.ca/sites/default/files/C%26S%20PB_EN.pdf
Ungar, M. (2018). Systemic resilience: Principles and processes for a science of change in contexts of adversity. Ecology and Society, 23(4). doi.org/10.5751/ES-10385-230434
Photo: iStock
First published in Education Canada, April 20231 Gauvin-Lepage and Lefebvre (2010) focus their research on family resilience. In this context, internal resources belong to the family while external resources are located in the systems around them.
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Effects of School Disruptions in the Years 2020 and 2021 on the Learning of Quebec Children
Comments Off on Effects of School Disruptions in the Years 2020 and 2021 on the Learning of Quebec ChildrenCOVID-19 and the measures put in place to limit its spread have affected the quantity and quality of teaching and services offered by schools. These measures include the complete closure of Canadian schools as of mid-March 2020, emergency distance learning and support, the creation of classroom bubbles, and the temporary closure of classes to control outbreaks. According to the Conseil supérieur de l’éducation du Québec (2021), school disruptions could lead to an impoverishment of the knowledge and skills acquired by children, particularly among the most vulnerable. From an economic perspective, learning delays among elementary and secondary school children in Canada could result in losses amounting to nearly $2,500 billion in GDP over 80 years (Hanushek & Woessmann, 2020).
A growing body of data regarding the effects of academic disruptions on learning became available during the years 2021-2023. A pre-recorded systematic review on the topic indicates that outcomes vary according to the social and school context in which the disruptions occurred, and how they were managed. According to this meta-analysis of 42 studies in 15 countries, a substantial overall learning deficit (Cohen’s d = -0.14, 95% confidence interval -0.17 to -0.10) emerged early in the pandemic and persisted over time. Learning deficits are particularly significant among children from underprivileged socioeconomic backgrounds. These deficits are also higher in mathematics than in reading, and in middle-income countries than in high-income countries.
Although the effects of COVID-19 on learning are of concern to the Canadian government, there appears to be little national data available. In Quebec, the Observatory for Children’s Health and Education (OPES), in collaboration with the Ministère de l’Éducation, collected data to measure the reading skills of Quebec children completing Grade 4 of elementary school in 2021. Between March 2020 and May 2022, these children experienced 15 months of school disruptions caused by the health measures that were implemented to counter the spread of COVID-19.
The goal was to compare the learning level of children in 2021 to that of Grade 4 children in 2019 (who had not been exposed to the pandemic). We tested the possibility that learning gaps between cohorts can vary by child gender, reading-risk status and socioeconomic background, and by the number of days classes were closed.
Methodology
In April 2021, all French-language and public school service centres (n=60) in the province were invited to participate in a study to understand the impact of school closures on reading performance in Grade 4. School participation was voluntary.
The analyses included 10,317 students in 2021 and 13,669 students in 2019 from the same schools, for a total of 23,986 students.
Learning was measured using the compulsory French test (language of instruction). This was the same test that was administered prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, i.e., the June 2019 test.
The Grade 4 reading assessment featured two tasks: the literary text task and the ordinary text task. Only one of the two tests was administered in this study: the ordinary text test. This is a 2.5-hour test in which students read an ordinary 1,000-word text and respond to 12 questions with short answers. The tests were corrected centrally, with each copy being corrected twice by employees of the Direction de la sanction des études (DSE) of the Ministère de l’Éducation du Québec.
The child’s gender and the school’s Socio-Economic Environment Index11 (IMSE) were used as independent variables.The number of class closure days during the 2020-2021 school year (fewer than 15 days closed or more than 15 days) was used in the analyses.
Calculation of learning gaps
To estimate learning gaps between 2019 and 2021, we used a linear model that included school fixed effects. The model is as follows:
Yiet=ɑ +β Cohortt2021 + γBoyi + θe + εiet
where Yiet is the score of student i in school e in year t. The term Cohortt2021 is an indicator variable equal to one in 2021 and zero in 2019. School fixed effects are collected by θe. The student’s gender is controlled via Boyi and εiet is the error term. Standard deviations were calculated to account for the strongest correlation in outcomes among children in the same school (cluster analysis). Thus, the coefficient β captures the effects of school disruptions under certain assumptions. The possibility of interactions between IMSE, performance and gender was investigated.
Our results
There was an average 8.4 percentage point decline in reading between June 2019 and June 2021. The size of this gap varied according to the children’s test performance: it was high for the bottom decile of performance (20 pp); medium for the middle deciles (10 pp at the 4th decile); and zero for the top 2 deciles of performance. Boys had slightly more pronounced losses than girls.
School staff and promotion of equal opportunities
We compared reading skills as measured through a ministry test (n=10,880, 9-10-year-old students) with children in the same schools (n=13,669) that had administered the same test in 2019. Results indicated an 8.4% difference in student reading scores between 2019 (pre-pandemic) and 2021 (after 15 months of exposure to the pandemic). Thus, while the average score was 77.7% in 2019, it was 69.3% in 2021. The size of this standard deviation varied depending on how well the children performed on the test. It was high for the bottom decile of performance (20 pp2); medium for the middle deciles (10 pp at the 4th decile); and zero for the top two performance deciles. These results suggest that children who were already strong in reading, i.e., those with scores in the top 20%, had not experienced learning losses 15 months after the onset of the pandemic. On the other hand, children who were weak in reading, i.e., those with scores in the bottom 20%, did experience significant learning losses (15-20 pp). The performance gaps were larger (by 1.3 pp) for boys.
The results suggest that students with academic difficulties are particularly in need of the specialized and structured environment offered by the school to support them in their learning. They highlight the crucial role of teachers and school professionals as advocates for equal opportunity. Moreover, studies of classroom management practices in a context of uncertainty (such as during a pandemic) suggest that less attention is paid to vulnerable groups during times when everyone is experiencing a low sense of safety. As the years 2020-2021 have placed unusual demands on school staff, it is possible to anticipate that the return to greater normality in 2022 will provide the support needed for everyone’s success.
The results of Betthauser et al. (2023) indicate greater losses for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Although our results show that children from disadvantaged schools had lower scores than others in both 2019 and 2021, we did not detect that learning losses were greater for children from disadvantaged schools, but rather for children who had lower reading levels. Note that since the disadvantage index is correlated with performance, it is plausible that the differential results by performance obscured the difference in the disadvantage index.
It is also possible that we did not find an impact from deprivation due to the fact that the index to which we had access was measured at the school level and not at the child/family level. The composition of schools is in fact very heterogeneous in terms of family disadvantage. Thus, even in disadvantaged neighbourhoods, the variable may not capture individual differences in the level of deprivation, whereas the performance variable does. This explanation also applies to the income threshold, which is a school-level variable.
Special considerations and recommended follow-ups
This study has important methodological strengths, including the standardized nature of the test, the large sample size (n=23,986), the diversity and representativeness of the socioeconomic status of participating schools, and the comparison of children in the same schools in 2019 and 2021. The within-school comparison type controls for a large number of confounding variables, including school management, school staff and the children who attend the schools.
The results captured the full direct and indirect effects of pandemic disruption on the acquisition of reading skills, not just the effects of academic disruption. It should be noted that the context in which the tests were taken may have influenced the results: the test in 2021 was not compulsory and was not entered on report cards. Although teachers were instructed to prepare their students for the test by following standard practices, children’s motivation and stress levels may have been different in 2021 than in 2019. The lower level of stress may have had a positive effect on the performance of some children. For others, the fact that grades were not reported on the report card may have decreased motivation.
The results underscore the importance of conducting a long-term review of the learning trajectories of Canadian students following the 2019-2021 academic disruptions. Researchers have shown that a 0.2 standard deviation increase in academic achievement is associated with higher earnings (2.6% over a life course) and better labour market participation (Chetty, Friedman, & Rockoff, 2014a, 2014b). It should be noted that this study shows greater effects for the most vulnerable students, suggesting increased social inequalities in academic performance. Monitoring of standardized test scores over the next several years is necessary to quantify changes in gaps, if any, and to identify strategies to narrow them.
We would like to thank our collaborators: Karine Trudeau, PhD, and William Sauvé.
References
Blainey, K. (2020). The impact of lockdown on children’s education: a nationwide analysis. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.risingstars-uk.com/media/Rising-Stars/Assessment/Whitepapers/RS_Assessment_white_paper_1.pdf
Chetty, R., Friedman, J. N., & Rockoff, J. E. (2014a). Measuring the impacts of teachers I: Evaluating bias in teacher value-added estimates. American Economic Review, 104(9), 2593-2632.
Chetty, R., Friedman, J. N., & Rockoff, J. E. (2014b). Measuring the impacts of teachers II: Teacher value-added and student outcomes in adulthood. American Economic Review, 104(9), 2633-2679.
Engzell, P., Frey, A., & Verhagen, M. D. (2021). Learning loss due to school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(17), e2022376118.
Goldhaber, D., Imberman, S. A., et al. (2022). To what extent does in-person schooling contribute to the spread of Covid-19? Evidence from Michigan and Washington. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 41(1), 318-349.
Haelermans, C., Jacobs, M., et al. (2021). A full year COVID-19 crisis with interrupted learning and two school closures: The effects on learning growth and inequality in primary education. doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/78fje
Hanushek, E. A., & Woessmann, L. (2020). The economic impacts of learning losses. OECD Work document on education, 225, OECD Edition, Paris.
Maldonado, J. E., & De Witte, K. (2022). The effect of school closures on standardized student test outcomes. British Educational Research Journal, 48(1), 49-94.
Milanovic, K. (2022). The residual impact of educational disruption on primary school attainment by spring 2022. 22 RS Assessment, School Dash. https://risingstars-uk.com/media/Rising-Stars/Assessment/Whitepapers/Spring22_RS_Assessment_white_paper.pdf
Quebec, É. (2021). GDUNO. https://prod.education.gouv.qc.ca/gdunojrecherche/rechercheOrganisme.do;jsessionid=3sZe_Q8EMu68DHnFStbDpDDcFQszamaRzuTZLx4hSeKmIfn7AGRh!1100596104!-1697553619?methode=recherche
Quebec, M. d. l. e. d. (2021). Indice de milieu socio-économique (IMSE). www.education.gouv.qc.ca/enseignants/aide-et-soutien/milieux-defavorises/agir-autrement/indice-de-milieu-socio-economique-imse
Photo: iStock
First published in Education Canada, April 20231 The school’s Socio-Economic Environment Index (IMSE): This is an index made up of two variables, the mother’s undereducation and the parents’ inactivity, which emerge as the strongest explanatory family variables of a child’s non-achievement in school. A student’s IMSE is the IMSE of the population unit from which he or she comes, while the school’s IMSE is the average of all students’ IMSEs.
2 Percentage point
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