An edited collection of the most recent research on immersion education, the contributors to this exciting work are among the foremost writers and researchers in the area, some of whom were central to the establishment of immersion programs. This book follows the fortunes of immersion education beyond its starting context in Canada and shows how it has been adapted to many new contexts in a host of countries or in multilingual environments with highly variable linguistic situations.

Immersion education is sometimes spoken of as if it were new: In fact, it is well established, both in Canada and now throughout the world. This timely work concludes that immersion education is a success story. This book brings us up to date on research that shows why immersion education has succeeded in the 21st-century global village when one might consider English the only language of interest. Bilingualism and multilingualism are more important than ever, and immersion is consequently crucial for competence and must be developed in conjunction with the learning environment in the particular country as well as learners’ goals.For instance, given the importance of new technologies today, it might seem that the Internet, being considered international, would be the same everywhere throughout the world, and English, being the international language, would increasingly be the only language of importance. However, this is too simplistic: The Internet adapts to local conditions; the technology is international, but the content is often local. This is why competence in multiple languages remains important today, contrary to predictions: Immersion education is crucial in acquiring this competence.

This book presents fascinating studies of immersion programs in Finland, Hong Kong, and the United States as well as a more traditional setting, Canada, where immersion education’s profile has also changed with new conditions. Additionally, this work presents studies of literacy as well as the more usually researched oral production. As discussed in the foreword, communication across languages and cultures is crucial to success in today’s world for nations, societies, and individuals. Communicative competence is more likely to be achieved in the immersion context than the traditional classroom.

This work provides a description of the latest research on the pathways to multilingualism—as mentioned in the title—which include early immersion, sustained immersion education from preschool to the university and beyond, integration of language and content in communicative language learning situations, and support for native languages. This book contains three main sections: Part 1, “Evolving Perspectives on Immersion Pedagogy” (Met; Fortune, Tedick, and Walker; and Palmer); Part 2, “Evolving Perspectives on Language Development in Immersion Classrooms” (Swain and Lapkin; Lyster and Mori; and Sodergard); and Part 3, “Evolving Perspectives on Social Context and Its Impact on Immersion Programs” (Lindholm-Leary and Howard; Dagenais, Richards, and Burnaby; and Hoare and Kong). There is, additionally, an introduction consisting of two chapters that provide invaluable overviews of immersion by the two editors and by Genesee. Chapter 1 is an excellent account of immersion, including the most recent terms used, and Genesee adroitly replaces immersion in today’s global village (chapter 2). The conclusion by Tucker and Dubiner is a synthesis of the main themes: the need to focus on language development within the teaching of content, the need for more focus on form and function, literacy and academic success, the role of teacher in social change, the aim of broadening the base of those to be included in immersion, and the need to prepare students for life in the global village.

Contributors are an interesting mix of established and new authors, with general chapters as well as detailed studies giving us a scholarly review of the state of the art in the immersion education world. Additionally, this work predicts future directions of immersion education and makes suggestions for these directions, in the light of research so far.  The research presented broadens our knowledge of different aspects of immersion. In terms of methodology, this book presents new ethnographic studies that show us what precisely happens in the immersion classroom during the acquisition process. Other discussed studies focus on areas of language less studied: communicative competence, pragmatic competence, or issues of identity construction for students in immersion classrooms. Detailed accounts of teacher input are provided, allowing for a closer analysis of interactions between teachers and students and providing a picture of the precise input to which students have access. For these reasons, this work is not only compelling reading for researchers but also for teachers in immersion classrooms. This book greatly expands our knowledge of the entire area of immersion education.