Friday Blog Round-Up

This week, we have a few reflections from teachers who are actually working in the trenches and giving their all to educate our kids. Here, Ms. Frizzle has a very interesting and artistic reflection on an interaction with one of her students. Another NYC teacher, who writes the Syntactic Gymnastics, blogs about the "sinking ship" that is her school. I include her link with much sympathy and empathy for her, as the description she gives of her school reminds me all too much of where I taught last year.

The Daily Grito will be on hiatus from December 21st through January 2nd. Have a wonderful holiday and we look forward to seeing you in the New Year!

New Students, New Schools

Here's a nice complement to two issues I've been writing about recently: bilingual education and how schools are coping with the recent influx of Spanish-speaking immigrants. Seems like the NYC suburbs aren't the only towns that are being forced to redesign their curriculum to address the needs of English Language Learners; the suburbs of Dallas are doing the same.

Wednesday Issue: Bilingual Education y Los Candidatos

When asked during last week's GOP debate how he would work to improve our nation's public schools, Mitt Romney pointed to his work in Massachusetts as a model for the nation, declaring, " ...we also fought for English immersion. We wanted our kids coming to school to learn English from the very beginning."

Romney is not the only presidential candidate to support English immersion programs and he is certainly not the most vehement supporter. Case in point: Tom Tancredo, who skipped the Univision debate because he opposed the idea of having his remarks translated into a language other than English.

Compared to other issues, such as affordable health care and the war in Iraq, bilingual education has gotten fairly little airtime during this the presidential race. However, with immigration being a hot-button issue on the table, bilingual education is sure to come into the spotlight soon.

And the candidates are prepared. When Hispanic Link, a weekly newspaper on Latino issues, surveyed the campaigns on this issue, most candidates had statements ready. The outcome? Clinton, Richardson, Dodd, Edwards and Obama were for bilingual education - including instruction in the students' native languages*. Romney and Tancredo were against bilingual education and support English-only instruction.

* I've specified this because the term "bilingual education" sometimes includes English-only ESL programs (although the reason for that is...unknown).

What are the candidates basing their decisions on? Well, it's probably not conclusive research. As EdWeek's Mary Ann Zehr notes, high-quality research about English language instruction programs is scant. There are a lot of different methods for teaching English as a second language, but none can be ranked as the absolute best form.

My suspicion is that their positions on bilingual education are too-closely linked to their immigration stance. Candidates who want to make a show of their patriotism and their "tough stance on illegal immigrants" cry "English-only, English-only." In doing so, they deny important opportunities to both ELLs and native English speakers - opportunities like two-way dual immersion schools.

At a time when America's international test scores are dropping, we should be seeking ways to make ourselves more globally competitive - and that means not isolating ourselves linguistically. Imagine the possibilities of a bilingual or trilingual America where all students were able to speak, read, and write in at least one other language. Their opportunities - and those of our country - would be endless.

Chiming in on the selective teaching pool...

The Quick and the Ed points out that although the new ETS study shows that America's teacher pool is improving, it is still sorely lacking in minority teacher candidates.

I agree with them that this is a major issue that needs to be addressed quickly. It needs to be addressed form two angles: attracting more minorities to teaching as a career AND getting more minorities to the point where they could actually BE a teacher (i.e. a college degree). After all, if only 12% of Latinos have a bachelor's, it would seem a bit idealistic to imagine that a large percentage of the nation's teaching corps would be Latino.

Therefore, this is an issue that reflects on (and affects) the teaching profession, but our education system as a whole. Let's start the reform from the bottom up: How can we get more minority students into 4-year college programs and THEN attract them to teaching?

Seems like a big question.

"Que Ningún Niño Se Queda Atrás:" Take That, NY Times

Catching up on some weekend reading, I came across the NY Times Article, "No Child Left Behind? Say It in Spanish." I followed their advice with the title of this post.

The article explains how the schools in NYC's suburbs are coping with the large influx of Hispanic immigrants that have recently settled in the area. In recent years, the 19 suburban counties closest to NYC have experienced a 17% growth in the Hispanic population under age 15, forcing schools to re-evaluate their ESL and Hispanic outreach programs.

Randolph, NJ was chosen as a example of one suburban district that is learning to cater to the needs of Spanish-speaking families. After noticing a drop in the test scores of an elementary school with a high number of recent immigrant students, the district initiated a multi-pronged plan to improve the academic performance of its ELL students. This included reducing class sizes, hiring a reading specialist and a full-time social worker, and initiating a "Noche Latina" outreach event for Spanish-speaking parents.

So far, test scores seem to be rising, but the ultimate result remains to be seen.

Amazingly enough, there hasn't been political backlash against these new expenditures, despite the fact that other schools in the district have seen budget cuts. Randolph's superintendent said the following: “...[I]t costs more to educate some kids, and it’s going to cost more to educate immigrants,” Mr. Riley said. “Once you accept that, everything falls into place.”

In this case, the new programs seem like a thoughtful, reasonable investment. We'll see what other districts follow their lead and how they work to find cost-effective ways to educate their ELL students.

Wednesday Issue Delay

The Wednesday Issue is in the works, but as I am scrambling to finish a surprise project, it looks like it will be delayed until tomorrow. Apologies to all.

Wednesday Issue: Bilingual Education y Los Candidatos

When asked during the final GOP candidate debate how he would work to improve our nation's public schools, Mitt Romney pointed to his work in Massachusetts as a model for the nation, declaring, " ...we also fought for English immersion. We wanted our kids coming to school to learn English from the very beginning."

Romney is not the only presidential candidate to support English immersion programs and he is certainly not the most vehement supporter. Case in point: Tom Tancredo, who skipped the Univision debate because he opposed the idea of having his remarks translated into a language other than English.

Compared to other issues, such as affordable health care and the war in Iraq, bilingual education has gotten fairly little airtime during this the presidential race. However, with immigration being a hot-button issue on the table, bilingual education is sure to come into the spotlight soon.

And the candidates are prepared. When Hispanic Link, a weekly newspaper on Latino issues, surveyed the campaigns on this issue, most candidates had statements ready. The outcome? Clinton, Richardson, Dodd, Edwards and Obama were for bilingual education - including instruction in the students' native languages*. Romney and Tancredo were against bilingual education and support English-only instruction.

* I've specified this because the term "bilingual education" sometimes includes English-only ESL programs (although the reason for that is...unknown).

What are the candidates basing their decisions on? Well, it's probably not conclusive research. As EdWeek's Mary Ann Zehr notes, high-quality research about English language instruction programs is scant. There are a lot of different methods for teaching English as a second language, but none can be ranked as the absolute best form.

My suspicion is that their positions on bilingual education are too-closely linked to their immigration stance. Candidates who want to make a show of their patriotism and their "tough stance on illegal immigrants" cry "English-only, English-only." In doing so, they deny important opportunities to both ELLs and native English speakers - opportunities like two-way dual immersion schools.

At a time when America's international test scores are dropping, we should be seeking ways to make ourselves more globally competitive - and that means not isolating ourselves linguistically. Imagine the possibilities of a bilingual or trilingual America where all students were able to speak, read, and write in at least one other language. Their opportunities - and those of our country - would be endless.