新加坡雙語小學生的優勢語言

Dominant Language of Bilingual Primary Students in Singapore

自從新加坡實施雙語政策以來，新加坡人的英語能力越來越強，華 語能力的發展相對落後。本次研究旨在探索新加坡華族小學生的優勢語 言，從而描述雙語能力。36 位來自四所鄰里小學的學生參與了此次研 究。研究工具包括看圖敘事任務和訪談。所有研究參與者分別用華語與 英語完成敘事與訪談。研究比較了學生的華語與英語在信息量、流利 度、詞彙複雜度與語碼轉換四個方面的表現。結果表明，整體上英語是 被試的優勢語言，英語的優勢主要體現在語碼轉換與流利度兩個方面。 但每位學生在不同指標上測得的優勢語言不一致。綜合不同測量指標 後，36 位學生中有15 位學生為華語主導，18 位學生為英語主導，3 位為 平衡雙語者。

Since the implementation of the bilingual policy in Singapore， Singaporeans’ English proficiency has improved whereas their Chinese proficiency has deteriorated. This study aimed to explore the dominant language of Chinese primary students in Singapore to describe their bilingual competency. Thirty-six from four primary schools participated in this study. They each completed a story telling task and an interview in both Chinese and English. Participants’ Chinese and English oral performance was compared in terms of amount of information， fluency， lexical complexity and code-switching. The results showed that in general English was their dominant language. The participants’ English was found to be advantaged in fluency and code-switching. The individual participant’s dominant language varied across the measures. Considering the participants’ performance on all the measures， 15 participants were found to be Chinese-dominant. 18 participants were found to be English-dominant， and 3 were balanced bilinguals.