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Posted on 10/11/2003 6:23:55 AM PDT by Theodore R.
English alternatives at home on rise The Census Bureau found that nearly one in five Americans speak a language other than English while at home.
By Michelle Dynes rep2@wyomingnews.com Published in the Wyoming Tribune-Eagle
CHEYENNE - Some 47 million Americans ages 5 and older used a language other than English at home in 2000, according to a new Census Bureau report.
This translates into nearly one in five Americans compared with roughly one in seven 10 years earlier. Most speak Spanish, followed by Chinese, with Russian rising fast.
The Spanish-speaking population rose by 62 percent over the past decade to 28.1 million. But other languages are becoming more prominent. Two million people speak Chinese at home, followed by French (1.6 million), German (1.4 million) and Tagalog, the main native language of the Philippines (1.2 million).
But Russian speakers have had the greatest increase, with 706,000 speakers in 2000, nearly triple the amount from 10 years earlier.
Janice Riedel, an English as a Second Language teacher, said she regularly works with nine junior high students and seven high school students. But these are students with "absolutely no English language skills."
She said a language survey earlier this year within Laramie County School District 1 found that 228 students in grades 7-12 speak at least one other language at home.
Riedel said during her time as an ESL instructor in Cheyenne she's met children who spoke Thai, Russian, Japanese, Spanish, Tagalog and Turkish. Yet she said the top languages she runs into are probably Spanish and Korean.
But she added she's starting to see more and more regional languages from India such as Gujurati and Punjab.
Sometimes these children will even take their lessons home to help their parents learn English. Riedel said she has tapes and workbooks the children can use along with their parents. And last year she had a Mexican student who saved every assignment and handout to teach her mother when she got home.
To some, this is no surprise. Children have more opportunities to learn English and will pick up a new language quicker, according to retired ESL teacher Ludmila Dranchak.
While she said Cheyenne isn't as heavily impacted by immigration as some other areas, there are still families for whom English is not the primary language.
But even after these immigrants learn English, they don't readily drop their native language. Dranchak said for her own family, who came from Venezuela, Spanish was primarily spoken at home.
"Fortunately I did not have the business of speaking a foreign language drummed into me," she said.
She said her family was determined to hold onto its heritage even in a new country. And without regular practice, these language skills can be lost.
"When I used to teach ESL, I encouraged (my students) not to lose their home language but to gain English," she said. "When kids lose their home language, a part of their culture is lost to them."
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Well they have --- and so have the welfare offices. They must supply a welfare handout worker in whatever language the welfare dependent wishes.
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