Resumen de Languages and school in Catalonia
Joaquim Arnau i Querol, Humbert Boada Calbet
The legal position for the teaching of Catalan has improved since the early 1970s and currently Catalan is the language of instruction compulsory in at least one or two subjects in primary and secondary education in Catalonia. The provision of finance and staff has not run parallel to this development and training programmes have been created. The article discusses research on development of different models of schooling and on linguistic abilities and qualifications of teachers. In the final section, the results of recent evaluation research are presented. The proficiency of pupils in Catalan and Castillian was found to be determined by ‘environmental’ and ‘individual’ factors, and further testing indicated specific weightings for eight different factors. Conclusions for the distribution of languages in the curriculum are discussed.
