ТЕОРЕТИЧЕСКИЕ И ПРАКТИЧЕСКИЕ ОСНОВЫ ОБУЧЕНИЯ ИНОСТРАННЫМ ЯЗЫКАМ В ДВУЯЗЫЧНОЙ (МНОГОЯЗЫЧНОЙ) СРЕДЕ

The first issue is the influence of bilingualism on intellect. This issue is analyzed from psychological point of view.

The second problem is the influence of the first and second languages on the third language learning (threelingualism problem). Threelingual multicultural situation in different parts of the world demands urgent deep analysis of such a complicated phenomenon as multilingualism, language consciousness.

Lean Hinton, associate professor of linguistics and director of the Survey of California and other Indian languages at U. C. Berkeley, underlines that keeping the language alive is very important nowadays. 

Our supposition was that the effective teaching of the third language (English), besides Russian and Yakut language, which are studied by Yakut learners, is possible on the basis of all round analysis of bilingualism and multilingualism, development of language consciousness, perfecting native language skills. At the same time in the model of teaching of the third language there may be realized a purposeful transition from the initial stage of thought formation and formulation to the highest stage of operational activity- lingua- comparative analysis into consideration of sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic factors.

The aim of our investigation is predetermined by setting up and solving the following theoretical and practical objective: 1) carrying out of a complex interdisciplinary analysis of multilingualism; 2) realization of an experimental model of the third language teaching in the conditions of multilingualism within the framework of socio psycholinguistic approach to multilingualism; 3)elaborating lingua comparative analysis in English, Russian and Yakut languages in the context of communicative- activity approach to lingua comparative analysis; 4)realization of theoretical analysis on the basis of comparative and contrastive linguistics; 5) implementation of a complex interdisciplinary approach to the interference problem and basing the three- staged strategy of overcoming interference within the framework of the experimental model of the third language teaching; 6) implementation of the psycholinguistic analysis of speech- production and speech perception, revealing the peculiarities of  “the world- picture” formation of the learners in the multicultural environment; 7) testing the model of the third language teaching in the multilingual (bilingual) setting.

Scientific novelty (newness) of our research may be defined this way: a for the first time multilingualism is presented as a multilateral problem (phenomenon) in the investigation of which each discipline reveals its own specific aspect- a new concept of multilingualism; b) for the first time multilevel, multilateral lingua comparative analysis on the operational- activity basis is carried out. As a subject of this analysis are regarded means and ways of thought formation in the target language. The analysis also combines the aspect- level principle of analysis with the operational- activity one. This factor may be taken into consideration when teaching the native language; c) an experimental model of the third language teaching in bilingual environment has been elaborated and tested in practice, in which thought formation and formulation in the third language are being carried in comparison with the native tongue in respect of its skill perfection; d) the model of question may be realized in different variants: on the one hand it may be used not only it comes to the conclusion; e) as a result of intellectual (conceptual) basis of thinking we can state there is a special base of thinking of a human being. Any national language is a result of human being practical activity. Coming from existing reality any national language puts its own contribution to the development of a human being intellect and develops the intellect and his communicative activity, develops “the language picture” of the world, according to the peculiarities of a human being experience. On the basis of this language picture one develops the national language. In case of natural bilingualism one witnesses two equal language systems (when one functions,  the other stops. When the second functions, the first stops). But in artificial bilingualism this mechanism functions only in case, where there are no empty spaces. According to Karlinsky, mixing the elements of the languages takes place when there are empty spaces in the linguistic speech activity- when there are no necessary language means for some special reasons (lack of experience in speech activity in the bilingual or multilingual setting).

Researchers: J. Ronja (1913); Leo V. Sherba (1947); S. Ervin and Ch. Osgood (1954); U. Lambert, J. Gavelka, S. Krosbe (1958); V. Vainrache (1953); I. A. Zimnyaya, I. I. Kitrosskaya (1970) and others.

My work with the problem of bilingualism began when I arrived at the Yakutsk university in Siberia in 1974. Besides basic teaching and research duties I began to write articles dealing with teaching methods of English in bilingual multicultural setting. Investigations of bilingualism, carried out by V. Penfield and L. Roberts (1964) had proved that the most suitable age period for starting bilingual education is the period from 5- 10 years. A. I. Yatsikevichyist recommends totake into consideration the process of thinking in the native language, which are used by the children of ethnic groups in learning foreign languages in bilingual and multilingual setting. As for the problem of “separate” and “joined” localization of speech mechanisms of the first, the second and even the third languages, A. I. Yatsikevichyist stresses that according to his investigation, information is fixed, in general, in the universal code but not a particular language code. But the particular language codes may become also means of fixation, besides other codes (language codes).There are different points of view on this problem. It would be reasonable to try to inform the readers that, first of all, we will pay our attention to the issues dealing with the character of bilingualism’s influence on intellect.

Zimnyaya and I. I. Kitrosskaya put a hypothesis, according to which the semantic field of a bilingual person is single, (not separate) and new notions don’t separate the meaning of the semantic field of a bilingual person but unites and enriches and gives new possibilities to express one’s thought.

I. N. Yorelov puts forward  the notion of functional base of speech- non-verbal information system of learning the existing reality. According to E. I. Isenina, this notion correlates with the notion “semantic field”, proposed by N. I. Zhinkin as a specific one, connecting the blocks of intellect and language. K. James, appealing to the investigations of Brin, Baum, Peters, Richi, considers,  that there should be fixed basic component of grammar of any living language (E. I. Isenina: Saratov, 1986. P. 77)

I. N. Yorelov, on the basis of his own investigation of the basic data of different authors, comes to the conclusion: 1) as a result of intellectual (conceptual) basis of thinking we can state that there is a speak base of thinking of a human being. Any national language is a result. Coming from existing reality any national language puts its own contribution to the development of a human being intellect and develops the intellect and his communicative activity, develops “the language picture” of the world, according to the peculiarities of a human being experience. On the basis of this language picture one develops the national language. In case of natural bilingualism one witnesses two equal language systems (when one functions the other stops. When the second functions, the first stops). But in articulate bilingualism this mechanism functions only in case, where there are no empty spaces in the linguistics (speech activity- when there are no necessary language means for some social reasons, lack of experience in speech activity in bilingual or multilingual setting).

In Doctor Fomin’s monograph “Teaching foreign languages in multilingual (bilingual) setting”, published in Moscow in 1998, the author presented the analysis of this issue. One should stress the importance of psychological approach in investigation of the influence of bilingualism on intellect. The first issue is how bilingualism influences the intellect. The first item in this field is the problem of “separate” or “joined” localization of two or more speech mechanisms in the learner’s memory. This problem had been discussed mainly in the context of psychological approach to bilingualism.

According to our analysis, the debates on this problem had been centered around the theories, put forward by different researchers: J. Ronja (1913), Leo V. Sherba (1947).

Literature Review

         Suzanne Romaine in her monograph “Bilingualism” (Malden, Massachusetts, USA, 1995), analyzed the types of bilingualism (p. 78-85). The author pays much attention to types of bilingualism, taking into consideration Ervin and Osgood, Weinreich’s two coordinate types into one, and puts more emphasis on the context in which the languages are learned and how they are used.

         According to Suzanne, Ervin and Osgood (1954) later ……… Weinreich’s two coordinate types into one, and put more emphasis on the context in which the languages were learned and how they were used. They suggested, for example, that learning another language in a traditional school setting, in which a word from the second language is typically associated with the meaning in the native language, results in compound relation between the first and second language. They also attached more importance to the lexicon, while for Weinreich all levels of language were involved. In my monograph “Teaching foreign languages” (Moscow 1998) I put forward the classification of bilingualism, put forward by scholars of different countries, taking into consideration the different approaches: linguistics, psychological, sociological, didactic approaches to the problem of bilingualism (multilingualism). (Mikhail Fomin. “Teaching foreign languages in multilingual (bilingual) setting”. Moscow: “Mir Knigi”, 1998). My approach is based on the use of lingua comparative analysis of the learning material in teaching of foreign languages in multilingual- bilingual setting. In my approach multilingualism is regarded as a complicated interdisciplinary complex problem (history, development and contemporary state). According to M. M. Mikhailov (1969) in ancient history it appeared as the necessity of the second cult- language and goes back to ancient international relations.

         In our days multilingualism is attaining a particular importance, according to Robert Lado’s investigation “Linguistics beyond culture boundaries” (1957). In Russia this problem is one of the most important problems nowadays. Teaching Foreign languages in bilingual and multilingual setting is one of the most important problems of education in Russia, since Russia is a multilingual multicultural country.

         In my research much attention is focused on bilingual, bicultural family, where we realized the principle “one person- one language”, according to Jack Ronja approach (France) and taking into consideration the experiments with bilingual families, conducted by our department in 2014 in Yakutsk (Siberia). We take into consideration the experiments, conducted with bilingual families (N. Imedadze, P. Kolers, W. Lambert, J. Havelka, C. Crosby).

3. Methods and Data

Based on the theoretical analysis of literary and statistical sources, the use of the chart of observation of bilingual families, interviews, analysis of situations in bilingual families, the results of our investigations were published in 2010 in the city of Yakutsk, Siberia.The current study deals with theoretical and practical aspects of teaching foreign languages in bilingual (multilingual) setting.

         J. Ronja in his investigation “Le development du language observe cher un fant bilinue”, published in Champion- Paris, 1913 underlines that “Bilingualism is a topic which has been studied from many perspectives (see Romaine 1989 edition).

         In our investigation, we present  theoretical  basis of teaching Foreign Languages in bilingual and multilingual setting. This approach is based on the multidisciplinary analysis of multilingualism from the socio psycholinguistic point of view. The problem of interference is a point of the topical interest. We put forward our own model- The Activity model of teaching foreign languages based on the lingua- comparative analysis. Bilingual and Multilingual setting is a point of a topical interest. We take into consideration the terms: “second language learning and Bilingualism”, “Compound- coordinate bilingualism”, “bilingualism and information processing”, “The effect of bilingualism on intelligence”, and other terms dealing with the influence of language acquisition context on bilingualism. We take into consideration the importance of bilingualism study in its social context. Our knowledge of bilingualism is based on complex fieldwork in a bilingual community.

         Suzanne Romaine (1989) underlines that “Languages and language varieties are always in completion, and at times in conflict. Choice a particular language is symbolic of various social and political divisions”.

         In the Sakha republic in Siberia the dominant language is Russian. But at the same time the Sakha language is also official language and the native population speaks the Sakha language mostly to keep its culture and traditions alive to continue to develop folklore, literature, art, theatre, and epic songs. There are journals, newspapers, which are published in the Sakha language and TV and radio programs are in the language of the native people.

         Our approach of the Study of Bilingualism is based on the concept of Mikhail Fomin who regards Bilingualism as a Subject of interdisciplinary analysis: from psychological, linguistic, didactical sociolinguistic points of view.

         According to Mackey (1968: 583) bilingualism has interdisciplinary nature. He was sure that bilingualism (multilingualism) cannot be described within the science of linguistics: “We must go beyond. In a discipline as large and special as specialized as modern linguistics, it is perhaps inevitable that the study of various aspects of bilingualism has been par celled out among various subdiscipline”.

         Our own approach is called “Multilingualism as a subject of socio psycholinguistics and psychological analysis” considers the phenomenon of multilingualism as a subject of interdisciplinary analysis. [1]. From this point of view we describe this phenomenon from different points of view to design the model of teaching foreign languages in bilingual, multilingual, multicultural setting.

         Suzanne Romaine giving descriptions and definitions of Bilingualism underlines, that: “Bilingualism has often been defined and described in terms of categories, scales and dichotomies such as ideal v. partial bilingual, which are related to factors such as proficiency, function etc. at one end the spectrum of definitions of bilingualism would be one which, like Bloomfield (1933: 56), would specify native like control two languages as the criterion for bilingualism. By contrast, Haugen (1953: 7) draws attention to the other end, when he observes that bilingualism begins when the speaker of one language can produce complete meaningful utterances in the other language. Diebold (1964), however, gives what might be called a minimal definition of bilingualism when he uses the term “incipient bilingualism” to characterize the initial stages of contact between two languages. In doing so, he leaves open the question of the absolute minimal proficiency, required in order to be bilingual and allows for the fact that a person may be bilingual to some degree, yet not be able to produce complete meaningful utterances. A person might, for example, have no productive control over a language, but be able to understand utterances in it. In such instances linguists generally speak of “passive” or receptive bilingualism. Hockett (1958: 16) uses the term semi lingualism.

         While allowing for passive bilingualism, Diebold’s definition does not have the disadvantage that practically everyone in the United States< Britain or Canada, and no doubt most other countries, would have to be classified as incipient bilinguals because probably everyone knows a few words in another language.

         Our own observations show that in Yakutsk, the capital city of the Sakha republic, there are Russian people who understand the Sakha speech, but are not able to speak Sakha. About 30% of the inhabitants of the city can understand conversational Sakha in their ordinary everyday life. This phenomenon somehow helps to minimize possible misunderstanding in intercultural communication.

         According to Suzanne Romaine, bilingualism is defined and described in terms of categories, scales and dichotomies such as ideal vs. partial bilingual, coordinate vs. compound bilingual etc which are related to factors such as proficiency, function etc at one end of the spectrum of definitions of bilingualism would be one which, like Bloomfield (1933: 56) would specify ‘native- like control of two languages’ as the criterion for bilingualism.

         By contrast Haugen (1953: 56) draws attention to the other end, when he observes that bilingualism begins when the speaker of one language can produce complete meaningful utterances in the other language. Diebold (1964), as Suzanne Romaine, underlines, gives a minimal definition of bilingualism when he uses the term ‘incipient bilingualism’ to characterize the initial stages of contact between two languages.

         In my monograph, published in Moscow in 1998, I paid much attention to Ronja  J. experiment, and recommended his method for bilingual families in the Sakha Republic in Siberia (the city of Yakutsk). Now many families use the method of J. Ronja successfully. The students of the North-Eastern Federal University conduct research in this field. They presented their research articles in the Internet site collection of articles of our Scientific School “Self development of a personality in bilingual, multilingual setting”.

         We distinguish the following typologies of bilingualism: (see monograph: Mikhail Fomin “Teaching Foreign Languages in multilingual and multicultural setting. Moscow: “Mir knigi”, 1998. - p. 41): 1) linguistic typology (M. Mikhailov, F. Ibrugimov, V. Rosentsveig, E. Vereshagin; 2) Socio-historical: (E. M. Vereshagin, M.M. Mikhailov, F. Filin, V. A. Itskovich, B. S. Shvartskov, V. Stewart, Ch. Fergusson, T. A. Bertegaev, M. Ji, A. A. Leontiev); 3) Socio-historical: L. V. Sherba, A.I. Zorgenfrey, A, V. Jarmolenko, I. A. Zimnyaya, I. Kitrosskaya.

         Psychological and psycholinguistical typology (E. M. Vereshagin, V. V. Belyayev, E. M. Vereshagin, N. V. Imedadze, I. A. Zimnyaya).

         In general the presented analysis is the first attempt of the general survey of the theoretical and practical issues of the problem of psycholinguistical typology of bilingualism (multilingualism).

         In Greece in the middle ages philosophers introduced the terms “macrocosm” and “microcosm”. The latter means a man. In oue research the child is regarded as a creator of himself. As for bilingual child one can say that he is the creator of his own personality. The mechanisms of bilingualism are similar, according to W. Lambert, J. Epstein, R. Kar and other researchers.

         Code- switching can also be used to specify an addressee as the recipient of the message, according to Suzanne Romaine (1989). According to Irene Zimnyaya, thought is regarded as the subject of speech activity, speech is a way of expressing the thought, language material is regarded as the means of expressing the thought.

         In our research of bilingual families we used the age classification put forward by Irene Zimnyaya. According to I. Zimnyaya, the first period of the child’s development includes the period from 1, 5 - 2 years till the age 4. The second period covers 4 – 7 - 8 years; the third period covers from 7 - 8 till 11 - 12 years; the fourth period takes the period from 11 - 12. Our observation has proved that Irene Zimnyaya’s point of view is the most suitable for the investigation of bilingual families.

         In her analysis of approaches of the study of bilingualism Suzanne Romaine underlines that Chomsky’s aim was to make the characterization of what he calls ‘competence’ or knowledge of rules of grammar, the central concern of linguistic theory (Suzanne Romaine, Bilingualism, 1989).

         According to Fishman (1980), diglossia differs from bilingualism in that diglossia represents an enduring social arrangement.

         Y. Desheriev distinguishes 2 types of bilingualism: 10 contact-type bilingualism; 2) non- contact type of bilingualism (this type usually occurs in the far areas from the dominant bilingual community).

         Speaking about bilingual families in Yakutsk we should bear in mind that the dominant population in Yakutsk are the Russians. Nevertheless, the Sakha population of Yakutsk keeps its native tongue successfully thanks to their strong mentality and respect for the ancestors and literacy in Yakut, local radio and TV and newspapers, journals in Yakut.

         Leanne Hinton (1994) underlines that the continued existence of almost fifty native Californian languages with their alternate rollicking and beautiful linguistic creativity as characterized in the essays, is an indication of great cultural strength of California Indian communities. The same is true about the Sakha language in Yakutia, Russia. During our investigation of the bilingual families in Yakutsk we came to the conclusion that bilingual families in Yakutia are well- being, keeping their native languages. The static data is very impressive. Nevertheless, the enthusiasm of parents is very important. Radio, TV programs help the population to stick to the traditions of bilingualism.

         Leanne Hinton in her book “Flutes of fire”: “Still people have a tenacious loyalty to their languages. Although no one is learning the California languages natively anymore, there are many young people around the state who are trying to learn them as second languages. If these community and individual efforts succeed, the California languages may be around much longer than predicted. To paraphrase Mark Twain reports of their death might be greatly exaggerated.

         In analyzing the processes taking place in different steps of bilingual continuum and processes aimed at bilingualization from the early stages we should take into consideration the point of view of E. I. Negnevitskaya (1998, 1987). According to her, the child acquires the language not by means of imitation, but by means of analytical activity, singling out the rules, making up conclusions on the basis of his own experience, observations of the elders’ speech. The point of view put forward by E. I. Negnevitskaya is confirmed by the results of the foreign scholars’ investigation of bilingualism.

         In the analysis of cognitive preconditions put forward by D. Slovin (1984) cognitive preconditions of development of speech grammar connected with the meaning of utterances. The development of speech grammar connected with the meaning and the form of utterances. As we declared at the beginning of the paragraph, the development of cognitive processes and linguistic development of a child go side by side. The child must find linguistic means for expressing his own thoughts and intentions (D. Slovin, 1984).

         Putting forward the question:”What helps the child to acquire language means necessary for bilingual communication?” (D. Slovin, 1984) the author draws his conclusion that: 1) new forms first serve for expressing old function, but new functions first expressed by the old (known) forms (which correlates with starting levels of bilingualism, according to I. A. Zimnyaya, where formation of thought is realized by means of the native language, but formulation- by means of the native language); 2) the development of cognitive processes causes the appearance of semantic intentions, for which demand new means of expressing one’s intentions. According to I. A. Zimnyaya, formation of thought is realized by means of the native language; 3) one can formulate a very strong psycholinguistic universalio: the speed and sequence of semantic relation, expressed by means of the language means remain independent from the language specifics, attained in this particular language. According to I. Zimnyaya, formation and formulation of thought are realized by means of the target language.

         In the realization of logico - contrastive strategy by means of symbolic- lexical charts the term “proto- language” and its rules of functioning discovered by E. I. Isenina - meaningful semantic system means of communication and joint object- activity of the child with his mother, having social meaning and character, serving for communication and in expressing feelings and images of the world and human being correlating the level of the child’s development in a society. The investigation carried out by Leo Vygotsky, A. P. Luria, A. A. Leontyev, I. A. Zimnyaya, T. A. Akhutina, T. N. Naumova and others, the object- scheme- code and special semantic zone connected with blocks of intellect and language (N. I. Zhinkin, I. N. Gorelov, A. N. Leontyev, and A. A. Lentyev);  problem of subjective semantics (e. Y. Artemyeva and others) analyzing the problem of psychological meaning and sense in prespeech communication, E. I. Isenina noted that the psychological meaning is not correlated with linguistic meaning. According to A. N. Leontyev, psychological meaning is regarded as an ideal form existing in the material world is a personal sense as a relation of the person to the surrounding world, subjective - personal motivation.

         For our investigation of Bilingualism the problem of bilingualism’s influence on intellect is one of the primary issues. There are different points of view on this problem. In my monograph “Teaching foreign languages in multilingual (bilingual) setting”, published in Moscow in 1998 (M. Fomin, 1998) I presented the following analysis of this problem: in the framework of this issue one should stress the importance of the influence of bilingualism influence on intellect.

         It would seem reasonable to try to inform readers that first of all we will draw our attention to the issue dealing with the character of bilingualism’s influence on intellect.

         The first issue is how bilingualism influences on intellect. The first item in this field is the problem of “separate” or “joined” existence, localization of two or more speech mechanisms in the learners’ memory. This problem has been discussed mainly in the context of the psychological approach to bilingualism.

         According to our analysis, on this problem debates centered around the theories put forward by different  bilingual multicultural situation in different parts of the world, demanding urgent deep analysis of such a complicated phenomenon as multilingualism, language consciousness.

         Leanne Hinton, associate professor of linguistics and director of the Survey of California and other Indian languages at U. C. Berkeley, underlines that keeping the languages alive is very important nowadays.

The subject of our investigation in Yakutsk university is multilingualism, bilingualism. In the framework of our investigation we examine very carefully the nature, manifestations of multilingualism, its different  sides, aspects.

Our supposition was that the effective teaching of the third language (English, besides Russian and Yakut languages, which are studied by Yakut learners), is possible on the basis of all- round analysis of bilingualism and multilingualism, development of language consciousness, perfecting native language skills. At the same time in the model of teaching of the third language there may be realized a purposeful transition from the initial stage of thought formation and formulation to the highest stage of operational activity- lingua- comparative analysis taking into consideration sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic factors.

The aim of our investigation predetermined by setting up and solving the following theoretical and practical objectives:

1. Carrying out a complex interdisciplinary analysis of multilingualism;
2. Basing an experimental model of the third language teaching in the conditions of multilingualism within the framework of socio psycholinguistic approach to multilingualism;
3. Elaborating lingua- comparative analysis of the English, Russian and Yakut languages in the context of communicative- activity approach to lingua-comparative analysis;
4. Realization of the theoretical analysis of the bases of comparative and contrastive linguistics;
5. Implementation of a complex interdisciplinary approach to the interference problem and basing the three staged strategy of overcoming interference within the framework of the experimental model of the third language teaching;
6. Implementation of the psycholinguistic analysis of speech production and speech perception, revealing the peculiarities of the “world- picture” formation process of learners in the multicultural environment;
7. Testing the model of the third language teaching in the multilingual (bilingual) setting;

Scientific novelty (newness) of our research may be defined this way:

1. for the first time multilingualism is presented as a multilateral problem (phenomenon) in the investigation of which each discipline reveals its own specific aspect, a new concept of multilingualism;
2. for the first time multilevel, multilateral lingua- comparative analysis on the operational- activity basis is carried out. As a subject of this analysis are regarded means and ways of thought formation and thought formulation in target language. The analysis also combines the aspect- level principle of analysis with the operational- activity one. This factor may be taken into consideration when teaching the native language;
3. an experimental model of the third language teaching in bilingual environment has been elaborated and tested in practice, in which thought formation and formulation in the third language are being carried in comparison with native tongue in respect of its skill perfection.

J. Ronja in his investigation “Le development du langue observe cher un fant bilinue” published in Champion- Paris, 1913, underlines that “bilingualism is a topic question which has been studied from many perspectives” (see Romaine 1989 edition).

         In our investigation we present theoretical basis of teaching foreign languages in bilingual and multilingual setting. This approach is based on the multidisciplinary analysis of multilingualism from the socio psycholinguistic point of view. The problem of interference is a point of the topical interest. We put forward our own model- activity model of teaching foreign languages based on the lingua- comparative analysis. Bilingual and multilingual setting is a point of a topical interest. We take into consideration the terms: “Second language learning and bilingualism”, “compound- coordinate bilingualism”, “bilingualism and information processing”, “the effect of bilingualism on intelligence” and other terms dealing with the influence of language acquisition context of bilingualism. We take into consideration the importance of bilingual study in its social context. Our knowledge of bilingualism is based on complex fieldwork in a bilingual community.

         Suzanne Romaine (1989) underlines that “Languages and language varieties in a community, they are rarely equal in status. Languages and language varieties are always in completion, and at times in conflict. Choice of a particular language is symbolic of various social and political decisions”.