¿Habla Español? Your kids may soon

The Skagit Valley Herald ^ | 12/01/2003 | Steve Howie

[MontN]

¿Habla Español? Your kids may soon
By STEVE HOWIE

MOUNT VERNON — The school district is studying the possibility of converting one or more of its six elementary schools into dual language programs where the day is divided between lessons in Spanish and English for all students.

"Research says that's the best delivery model," Superintendent Mack Armstrong said. "Then the question is, Why wouldn't we do it?"

...

Armstrong's enthusiasm for the idea follows a visit to the district two weeks ago by Richard Gomez, bilingual education director for the state education department in Olympia.

In the last three years, Gomez has spearheaded efforts to create 17 dual language schools in the state, primarily in eastern Washington. In his previous job in Texas, he helped establish 50 of the schools.

Click here for the whole enchilada...

[Lexinom]

You've just accused anyone who isn't willing to cede our American culture to other foreign cultures of being a xenophobe.

This is not about "targeting" anyone. If a Mexican family wants to come across the border - legally - to seek a better life and future for themselves and their children, they are acting in the best tradition of each of our forbears, no matter who they were, what color, or what dialect. This is hope: hope with the expectation to become an American, work hard, and achieve the American dream. Absolutely nothing wrong with this.

It IS, however, about preserving the very culture that made them want to come here in the first place. Would a multicultural America, built on the sifting sands of postmodern meaninglessness and existential despair, provide any basis for hope? We must, must, MUST, consider the implications of this, and consider what America will look like - economically, culturally, politically - in 20 years, 50 years, 100 years if we continue sailing our present course.

[Coleus]

`

[marron]

To me the best way to learn a foreign language is to go to a country that speaks it and learn it the immersion way. An hour or two every day doesn't work well and takes years. You can learn in just a couple weeks just being around only those who speak that language and you pick it up very quickly that way.

You can learn enough survival Spanish to survive very quickly that way, and I highly recommend it. But remember that the people whose accents and grammatical errors we mock here learned their english the same way. If you intend to move beyond survival language skills, you at some point need to do something more rigorous.

It does take years. But when you think about how long it took us to be articulate in English, and to be able to handle subtleties and difficult concepts, that should be no surprise.

It takes both. Neither, alone, is sufficient.

[MontN]

In Mount Vernon, like so many other communities in our country, there are large contingents of non English speaking immigrants. Are the Russians,Dutch,Swedish,Norwegians, expecting American taxpayers to teach their children in THEIR native languages? No. They want their children to learn "the English" but yet retain their culture and share it with us. Hard working legal immigrants have always been welcome in America!

[MontN]

In Mount Vernon, like so many other communities in our country, there are large contingents of non English speaking immigrants. Are the Russians,Dutch,Swedish,Norwegians, expecting American taxpayers to teach their children in THEIR native languages? No. They want their children to learn "the English" but yet retain their culture and share it with us. Hard working legal immigrants have always been welcome in America!

[Glock17]

I wouldn't mind this if the non-English speaking students were required to leard English as well, but they are not doing so. In Texas they started teaching my kids Spanish in Kindergarden. But the immigrants are not learning English. You do the math. We're hosed, and thare's nothing that can stop it. Adiós América

[marron]

Would a multicultural America, built on the sifting sands of postmodern meaninglessness and existential despair, provide any basis for hope?

The problem, in my view, is that the people teaching our kids believe in these shifting sands of postmodern meaninglessness and existential despair, and we pay them to do it. If not one more Mexican crossed the border it would all be just as lost, because these same people would still be teaching our kids.

Mexicans, by the way, don't believe in existential despair, they walked a hundred miles across the desert to pack meat. Their kids will, though, because they will graduate from an American high school.

[FITZ]

The topic of this thread is that in some schools, the government is forcing one foreign language over the others and people will resent that. Spanish has been one of the offered languages in many schools for many years ----- no problem --- but something else is going on with this. They eliminated the other foreign languages in many of the high schools here and require all kids to take Spanish --- that isn't right.

[ClintonBeGone]

It IS, however, about preserving the very culture that made them want to come here in the first place.

I suppose in the eyes of some your state of Missouri is not only the geographical center of our country, but apparently also the cultural center. I've just spent a week in NYC on business. Please tell me where in Manhattan I can find the culture that you speak of.

[RightWingAtheist]

Because I was a gifted student, my parents put me into the French (Catholic) separate school system in Ontario. I never was able to grasp a working writing or conversational use of French and I had to suffer through a Franco-centric curriculum that told us how the English and Americans were all jerks who stole land from the Indians and the French (sound familiar?). The crummy, government-funded Catholic school system played no small role in my rebellion against both religion and liberalism, as well as my seething opposition to multiculturalism and bilingualism.

[nutmeg]

ping!

[FITZ]

What I recommend is taking two semesters of Spanish --- or whatever language to get the basic grammar rules and some vocabulary and then get to a foreign country, travel around by yourself, stay with a local family, don't socialize with Americans while there. It doesn't take years to learn --- you'll be speaking it quite well in no time and you'll learn most of the words from hearing them -- not reading them which gives you a bad accent and pronounciation. It might take years to be a master at the language --- but that's true of those who major in English also.

[Lexinom]

Very well said, marron. Mexicans are largely Roman Catholics. It's not they who are bringing in the relativism and situation ethics and their concommitant cultural decline. Mexican family values in many ways put their American counterparts to shame: they generally care for their elderly, value all human life (born and unborn), and maintain a strong family unit.

Rather, it's the postmodern thinking of the educrats that is ALLOWING the ceding of our American culture by forcing Americans to fund the teaching of Spanish as a pragmatic response to the influx of Mexican immmagrants. This is consistent with, and allowed by, the postmodern relativism embraced by said educrats.

It is a sad situation. I feel sorry for those Mexican kids.

[Eala]

Whatever happened to Latin?

Tha beagan Laidionn agam. Gle\ bheagan.

[Lexinom]

Absolutely fascinating... rebellion against both religion AND liberalism. From the Spencer school, no doubt (certainly not Marx)?

[FITZ]

My neighbors were from Mexico --- their child spoke only Spanish until age 4 and they placed him in an all English private preschool --- no teachers spoke Spanish and most of the kids didn't. School started in August --- by the end of October that kid was speaking English half-way fluently. It's sad because so many of the parents from Mexico here refuse to do that for their children --- they insist they be in all Spanish classrooms ironically called "bilingual" and they never learn English, the public school is too happy to accomodate that.

[Lexinom]

Red states and blue states, my friend. BTW, given a coercive choice, I'd rather lose my wallet here than in NYC (speaking of culture).

[marron]

I envy kids. We met a little girl in Mexico, a little blonde girl, her Spanish was 100% and her accent was flawless, I assumed she was Mexican. She was not. Her American mother had decided to live in Mexico, and simply put her in the local Mexican school. In a very short time you couldn't tell her from anyone else, (except for that hair).

[FITZ]

I tend not to believe that idea about the mind closing or becoming less able to learn once you reach adulthood. If you are motivated (as is a child is who wants to have friends) and learn the immersion, sink or swim way, you can learn easily too. I sometimes saw groups of American students hanging around each other, traveling together --- but that is a mistake if you're trying to learn the language. A American who goes to a foreign country and socializes with only the locals, travels alone and studies the grammar a little every day will learn fast --- in the same time as a child under the same circumstances I think. The problem with an hour of classroom time and then back to what's easy and comfortable is it goes way too slow. I've met people who studied 4 years of Spanish not be able to converse in that language in Mexico at all --- they may have all the rules of grammar down but they don't understand the spoken language -- and that includes slang and expressions they won't teach you.

[Choose Ye This Day]

To me the best way to learn a foreign language is to go to a country that speaks it and learn it the immersion way.

That is absolutely true. Of course, most U.S. children won't ever have that opportunity.

I agree with your concerns about dual language programs. To work well, everyone has to be committed, the teachers need to be enthusiastic and well-trained, and the kids have to CHOOSE to be there.

In Orem, Utah, I saw the results of an *excellent* program that accomplished all these things. Third graders had the fluency of someone who had lived in a foreign country for probably a year. I believe Spanish was the only language they offered at that point, but they may have expanded since then.

But I'm sure this won't be the case MOST places it's tried.