Bilingual daycares in the Netherlands: an analysis of the implementation of bilingual input and underlying ideologies

This paper analyses the motivations behind the implementation of bilingual education in the Dutch preschool system and relates this to the status of Dutch in the Dutch educational system. Based on the analysis of policy documents and questionnaires filled in by parents and teachers, this study reveals two different underlying ideologies that the government, daycares and parents have adopted. The ideology of the Dutch government and daycare organizations visited by a Dutch-speaking audience is centered around Dutch-speaking children acquiring English as a foreign language. On the other hand, non-Dutch speaking parents and daycare organizations visited by an international audience rather want to expose non-Dutch speaking children to Dutch, to facilitate better integration into the Dutch community. The data thus suggest that not only English but also Dutch is important for many parents. Still, the introduction of bilingual daycares is part of an ongoing ‘Englishization’ of the Dutch educational system that has been taking place for decades. Future research should determine what a larger scale introduction means for the status of the Dutch language in the Dutch preschool system in the long run.