An integrated approach to the design of an immersion programme

Abstract

In 1991 the Government of Hong Kong approved an English immersion program on a massive scale for children entering secondary school at age 12: It is targeted at 30% of that group. Called a Bridge Program, it aims to provide a bridge between primary schooling in the medium of Chinese and secondary schooling in English. The program teaches English through content subjects. The long-term target is a young adult population at least 30% of which is genuinely bilingual. Both authors have been engaged in designing and writing this program, and they report from the perspective of syllabus designers and materials writers informed by theory and guided by particular institutional and pedagogical needs. Unique aspects of their work, which may be of value to L2 teachers and researchers elsewhere, are elaborated. The article starts by describing the background to the program and investigating the gap to be bridged. It then takes a critical look at the role of communicative language teaching in content subject teaching. The article then reviews different theoretical assumptions of the Canadian immersion program and the Bridge Program; outlines the linguistic, content, and task components of the Bridge Program design; and documents some of the research problems that developed in this project.