Volume 2, Issue 3 December 2019, pp. 104–120 
Regular Articles
What makes students speak Japanese in immersion programs?
Kumiko Katayama 
1, & Kayoko Hashimoto 2
1 Griffith University, AUSTRALIA 
2 University of Queensland, AUSTRALIA
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29140/ajal.v2n3.225
Abstract
Language immersion programs, which are a form of bilingual education, are shaped by multiple factors, including the specific characteristics of the region, the language, the community and the learners, as well as national and regional policies on language education. While the underdeveloped production skills of immersion students have been identified as the product of teacher-centred and controlled learning environments, it is not known what role background or heritage language students play in the Australian one-way immersion context, where their presence itself potentially enhances the speaking environment. This paper, based on a project on developing speaking strategies for a Japanese immersion program in Australia, argues that the speaking performance of students in immersion classes is also determined by other factors, such as peer interactions with background students, whose treatment in education systems in Australia remains ambiguous, reflecting the history of separation between foreign language education in schools and the maintenance of mother tongues in the community. By applying Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), this paper analyses language policy and educational documents and discusses how the language performance of individual learners could be influenced not only by the curriculum but also by policy makers' improved understanding of individual learners with diverse linguistic backgrounds within schools.
Copyright
© Kumiko Katayama, Kayoko Hashimoto
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Suggested citation
Katayama, K., & Hashimoto, K. (2019). What makes students speak Japanese in immersion programs? Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2(3), 104–120. https://doi.org/10.29140/ajal.v2n3.225
Related Articles:
Incorporating hypnotic suggestion into teacher education programs
Farshad Ghasemi
Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics Published: 31 December, 2019, Volume 2(3), 83–103. 
Voicing the academy
Davina Allison
Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics Published: 31 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 102–117.
Theory of Mind development and narrative writing: A longitudinal study
Birgitta E. Svensson
Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics Published: 31 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 118–134.
Incidental vocabulary learning through watching movies
Robert J. Ashcroft, Joseph Garner, Oliver Hadingham
Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics Published: 31 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 135–147.
The Council of Europe Reference Framework of Competences for Democratic Culture:
Ideological refractions, othering and obedient politics
Ashley Simpson, Fred Dervin
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 20 December, 2019, Volume 2(3), 102–119.
"I don't want to be stereotypical, but..."
Norwegian EFL learners' awareness of and willingness to challenge visual stereotypes
Cecilie Waallann Brown
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 20 December, 2019, Volume 2(3), 120–141.
(Re)imagining a course in language and intercultural communication for the 21st century
Adriana Raquel Díaz, Paul J. Moore
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 29 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 83–99.
Critical intercultural communication education: cultural analysis and pedagogical applications
Sofia A. Koutlaki, Zohreh R. Eslami
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 29 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 100–109.
Advancing intercultural learning in world language education: Recent developments in pre-service teacher education in the U.S.
Paula Garrett-Rucks
Intercultural Communication Education Published: 29 December, 2018, Volume 1(3), 110–122.
The effect of cohesive features in integrated and independent L2 writing quality and text classification
Rurik Tywoniw, Scott Crossley
Language Education and Assessment Published: 20 December, 2019, Volume 2(3), 110–134.