In Canada, language has always been a very sensitive social and political issue. Due to the language barrier, the gap between French and British Canadians and their communities leads to social instability. It was not until the Canadian Parliament passed the "Official Languages Act" that English and French were official languages that this problem was actively solved. However, the solution of this problem has caused the employment crisis of monolingual Canadians. As early as the mid-1960s, British Canadians in Quebec began to clearly realize that their employment and survival required a high level of French (French is the mother tongue of most people in the province and the official language of the province), and they mainly taught grammar and recitation training, which prevented them from communicating and working in French, thus losing many employment opportunities. Therefore, mastering a second language is directly related to the survival and development of Canadians. But at that time, it was directly related to the survival and development of Canadians. 1965 In September, the immersion experiment of French in St. Lambert, Canada began to carry out "immersion" education. By the end of 1970s, it had achieved unexpected results and caused a nationwide sensation.
When the French immersion teaching experiment in Quebec was introduced by the media and academic journals, French immersion began to spread to the whole country. From 65438 to 0977, Canada established Canadian parents for French (cardiopulmonary resuscitation). The association is composed of more than1.20 thousand parents from all over Canada, and has more than 1.50 branches all over the country, which has played a great role in the spread of French immersion teaching mode. As the most typical model, the early full immersion French teaching in Saint Lambert School has been widely publicized.
According to 1996 (Canadian Census, 1996), 17% of Canadians, that is, 4.8 million Canadians can speak English and French, which is 195 1 higher than12. The vast majority of the bilingual population is concentrated in Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and New Brunswick. But in recent years, the number of bilingual people in all provinces is increasing. Bilingual teenagers in Canada (15- 19 years old) account for more than 24.4% of the total number of teenagers, and some provinces reach more than 40%. Today, more than 300,000 students in Canada receive second language immersion education every year. Culnmins( 199 1) estimates that there are thousands of special studies on immersion education in Canada, and almost every new immersion project has its own research. In recent twenty years, French immersion teaching mode has not only been widely promoted in Canada in various forms, but also applied to many second language teaching. For example, Spanish is also used in the teaching of many second languages. For example, Spanish and Chinese immersion teaching have also begun.
The success of various immersion experiments has promoted the development of immersion teaching mode in Canada. The results of research and evaluation show that through the development of immersion teaching mode. The results of research and evaluation show that students' achievements in immersion and subject courses are significantly higher than those of students trained in other foreign language teaching modes. Immersive children have strong cultural sensitivity and show positive attitude and understanding towards other cultures, which is conducive to strengthening exchanges, mutual understanding and respect between British and French Canadians. Immersive students' thinking agility, understanding and judgment are obviously better than monolingual children.
Since 1980s, in addition to kindergartens, primary and secondary schools, the second language immersion teaching model has also spread to higher education institutions in Canada. All professional courses in Mantaihua University provide students with immersion teaching in French and English, and students who pass the second language proficiency test are required to take 1-2 immersion teaching professional courses every semester, and at the same time try immersion teaching in psychology public courses. French immersion teaching initiative has not only caused great changes in French as a second language education in primary and secondary schools in Canada, but also had a strong impact and influence on the whole Canadian education. It is regarded as the most breakthrough achievement in English teaching and the other half of Canada's educational reform.
Step 2 immerse yourself in the world
The second language immersion education in Finland has benefited from Canada's pioneering achievements in this field, and now there are 4000 students learning a second language in immersion teaching. Hungary conducts immersion experiments in English, while Australia conducts immersion teaching in French, Japanese, Chinese and Indonesian. In recent years, the United States began to use immersion teaching methods to teach Korean, Russian and Japanese. According to a survey conducted by the Center for Applied Linguistics 1997, there are 243 schools in 3/KLOC-0 states in the United States. Nine different languages are taught by total immersion, semi-immersion and two-way immersion. In addition, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Africa and other countries have also tried different types of second language immersion teaching. In recent decades, the attempt of immersion teaching in Canada, the theoretical discussion and teaching practice of second language immersion have made this country walk in the forefront of bilingual education research in the world, and immersion teaching has become a successful model of second language teaching in the world.
Step 3 Immerse yourself in China
Although formal English education in China has a history of more than 100 years, the effect of English teaching in primary and secondary schools is constantly improving, and college English teaching and examination are also constantly reforming. However, the overall level of English teaching in China is not satisfactory, and there is a common problem of "much trouble and low effect", which is manifested in the fact that most students lack English application ability and communication ability, and it is difficult to adapt to the needs of the times. It is especially worth pondering that in children's English teaching, there has never been a way to adapt to children's physical and mental development and let children learn and master a second language easily and happily.
The new situation challenges the educational circles in China: How to meet the needs of the whole people for English? How to start with children and train more bilingual talents to adapt to modernization? French immersion teaching in Canada provides us with a model for reference. On June 1997, when the research seminar on Sino-Canadian bilingual education cooperation project was held in Xi 'an, we discussed with scholars from the University of British Columbia and the University of Toronto, established the "Sino-Canadian English Immersion Teaching Experimental Group" and worked out the experimental scheme. From June 1997, we started the early English semi-immersion teaching experiment in eight kindergartens and five primary schools with different representatives in Xi. The purpose of this experiment is to explore the best way for children in China to learn and master foreign languages, and to effectively solve the problem of the way and quality of bilingual personnel training in China.