Abstract

It is interesting to notice that many of the publications referring to multilingual education use metaphors referring to movement. Thus, we have Beyond Bilingualism (1998), Pathways to Multilingualism (2008), Forging Multilingual Spaces (2008) and Towards Multilingual Education (2009), among others. These seem to indicate that although bilingualism and bilingual education are a well-established part of the field, emphasis on multilingualism is still evolving. This is ratified in Genesee's (2004: 570) discussion of key aspects of bilingual education for majority students where he observes, ‘The evidence to date concerning trilingual education is encouraging; but we currently lack detailed understanding of the effectiveness of these programs.’