The Effect of Instruction in L1 on Receptive Acquisition of L2 for Bilingual Children With Language Delay

This investigation compared the rate of receptive acquisition of English prepositions and pronouns for two groups of bilingual first grade children with language delays. Group A received instruction in Spanish prior to instruction in English, and Group B received instruction in English only. The results indicated that the subjects in Group A acquired the English prepositions and pronouns twice as rapidly as the subjects in Group B. These results support the interdependence hypothesis and the practice of language intervention in a child’s native language (L1).