Educazione bilingue e multiculturale, istruzione bilingue, immersione totale : Quattro nozioni da definire

Many names are used in the language of sudents' families, school brochures, local educational authorities, etc. (and even in specialistic literature) to refer to bilingual education (in the broadest sense). The A. claims the necessity to define the notions involved more clearly. The notions the paper suggests to identify as separate ones are bilingual education, multicultural education, bilingual instruction and full immersion. In order to define the theoretical framework two sets of variables are chosen. The first set integrates the anthropological model of human relations (I, I and You, I and the Community) and the pedagogical model of educational goals (Self-promotion, Socialization, Culturization); the second set comes from the political sciences, namely from the theory of language policy which distinguishes two types of plurilingual societies, the Melting pot and the Rice salad. Inserting the four notions often referred to as bilingual education into the matrix of the framework above shows that they are quite different processes and should be differentiated, both in curriculum design and in the language used by schools and educational authorities, and in specialistic literature.