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Chancellor
Joined: 31 Oct 2005
Posts: 1337
Location: Ji'an, China - if you're willing to send me cigars, I accept donations :)
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 Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2007 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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| mdk wrote: |
Overseas the ability to read, speak and write English is a nice advantage.
In the US, the ability to read, speak and write English is crucial to obtaining an education. So you propose to just dump non-English speaking students into class with no prep, I suppose? |
I propose they learn English the way that American children learn it. You know as well as I do that children don't come out of the womb knowing how to speak a language.
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| I think what all the children in the US - regardless of where they come from - deserve is a teacher who is committed to seeing that they have the best chance possible to learn and progress-- instead of sitting around and blowing smoke about the way things ought to be or were done by some hypothetical people in past generations. |
There's a deeper issue involved here, though - pandering to people who want all the rights and benefits of being an American without actually being an American.
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| I saw - when I was working in Indian Health Service - what happens when you take non-english speaking students and totally ignore L1. I also have friends who had to endure being punished for speaking Spanish while they were in primary school. Those that learned anything did so IN SPITE of their teachers and not because of them. It's like some tale from *beep* that makes you want to make sure such people never inflict their "teaching" on children again |
I'm not sure that punishment is ever helpful in such situations but I don't have a problem with the language submersion approach. |
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Chancellor
Joined: 31 Oct 2005
Posts: 1337
Location: Ji'an, China - if you're willing to send me cigars, I accept donations :)
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| Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2007 7:36 pm Post subject: |
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| MikeySaid wrote: |
| I find myself in a strange place in a discussion like this one. I CHOSE to learn Spanish starting in 1995 and it is amazingly useful here in California, particularly when I leave the community I am currently living in. I am also engaged to a Mexican woman and moving to Mexico to teach in about a month. Here in California the jobs are not piling up for those of us who speak Spanish because it is looked at as dime-a-dozen. |
Go where the jobs are. 
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| Need someone who speaks Spanish on staff? Hire a Mexican! That's kind of how it works here... in fact, simply being a non-native speaker (however fluent you may be) calls your abilities into question because most hiring managers DO NOT speak the language and can't even assess your ability level. Most of them would much rather hire a Mexican who speaks "pretty good" English and just trust that they can read and write Spanish--a large majority of those who come to California to work are horrible at orthography and write in the vernacular, often unaware of the simple difference between haber and a ver. |
What does it say about an employer that's not willing to find a way to have language ability assessed if such ability is necessary for the job?
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Anyhow, many-a-state in this country has a Teaching Fellows program, where they take partially qualified people and essentially pay for them to get qualified and come teach in their state. I've never heard of an opportunity to go to Utah and work with a population like that... but here's the funny thing....
OUR SOULTION IN THE STATES ISN'T TO FIND PROPERLY EDUCATED AMERICANS OR EVEN TO TRAIN THEM... we are seeking labor from abroad to deal with the influx of ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS. |
What raised my eyebrows when I read the article was that it was referring to English language learners - people who are learning English. Why would you need to seek labor from a country where English is not the dominant language to hire teachers for students who are learning English?
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| Subjects like these are often divisive... and I can see why. I am completely divided as an individual. I am for bilingual education... and I think every child in California should be learning Mandarin or Spanish starting in kindergarten. But, at the same time... I think the children of non-English-speaking immigrants should be learning INTENSIVE ENGLISH. |
I guess when I hear the term "bilingual education" I keep thinking of students being taught various subjects (math, science, etc.) in two languages simultaneously. I have no objection to foreign languages being taught in school (though I'd probably start it in kindergarten and have it continue all the way through 12th grade); but if students are going to come to the United States from other countries, I expect them to learn English - particularly since a certain level of English-speaking ability is required before they can become citizens.
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| Take a look at the middle class in almost any country and you'll find children learning in at least two languages... and it seems to work pretty well. As for California becoming a Mexican colony... it's funny how cyclic things tend to be. |
Are they learning in those languages (bilingual or multilingual education) or are they learning those languages (refer to my previous comment about what I think of when I hear the term "bilingual education")? |
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rusmeister
Joined: 15 Jun 2006
Posts: 867
Location: Russia
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| Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2007 7:40 pm Post subject: |
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To add something rational here, let me point out that it is far less traumatic for kindergarteners than for kids of high school age to be thrown in a submersion environment - elementary school kids tend to go native within a year or so; high schoolers never have much of a chance. I did have one girl - Sheena F, from South America who had really supportive parents (remember, I taught beginning ESL in high school) who went from zero to hero and graduated with honors and deserved it. But her parents had made sure she had some real education in Spanish before she ever came to me. (I do remember how after being bumped to the 2nd year group in her 2nd semester she scored only 65% on her first test and burst into tears, and how I let her step out and went out to comfort her; she went on to SDAIE the following year) But that was a big exception and a lot of her knowledge was simply transferred from Spanish. High school kids usually don't see that kind of success.
Chancellor is right that they ought to be assimilating into American culture and the English language, and hopefully the only question people here have is how to facilitate that. The wrong way to facilitate that is to import Mexican teachers. |
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Mr. Kalgukshi
Mod Team
Joined: 18 Jan 2003
Posts: 6613
Location: Need to know basis only.
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| Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2007 10:19 pm Post subject: |
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| I've just deleted two postings for being off topic. Lets stay on topic and away from personal opinions of a political nature. This thread will be monitored closely to insure there is no repeat of off topic postings. Should there be, responsible members will be sanctioned. |
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mdk
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Posts: 425
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| Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 2:58 am Post subject: |
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| elementary school kids tend to go native within a year or so |
To add something factual here, now they can chat with their classmates (but not read) but they are two years behind those classmates in everything else. You have condemned them to a two year lag in reading, writing and the rest of the curriculum when you refuse to teach those subjects in L1.
I think the situation speaks for itself. If I had gone to a foreign country with my own kids when they were little, I wouldn't have tolerated them being "taught" that way. I don't, in fact, believe any responsible parent would do so. Taking a two year penalty to learn English is an unfair burden and American children deserve bilingual teachers. |
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Chancellor
Joined: 31 Oct 2005
Posts: 1337
Location: Ji'an, China - if you're willing to send me cigars, I accept donations :)
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| Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 1:39 pm Post subject: |
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| mdk wrote: |
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| elementary school kids tend to go native within a year or so |
To add something factual here, now they can chat with their classmates (but not read) but they are two years behind those classmates in everything else. You have condemned them to a two year lag in reading, writing and the rest of the curriculum when you refuse to teach those subjects in L1.
I think the situation speaks for itself. If I had gone to a foreign country with my own kids when they were little, I wouldn't have tolerated them being "taught" that way. I don't, in fact, believe any responsible parent would do so. Taking a two year penalty to learn English is an unfair burden and American children deserve bilingual teachers. |
Why is it an unfair burden? Their parents chose to come to America; the disadvantage of not speaking the language goes with the territory and it's their responsibility to overcome the disadvantage. As for not being able to read, there are plenty of native speakers going through public schools who can't read or whose reading is several years behind grade level. You insist that these children who are learning English aren't learning to read but one would think that reading the language is part of language instruction. |
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mdk
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Posts: 425
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| Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 10:25 pm Post subject: |
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It is unfair because these are the children of American working men and women. In many cases they have been born in the US and have full citizenship. They are entitled to the same educational opportunity as native english speakers...period.
It is unfair and discriminatory to provide them with less educational opportunity than their peers. That was settled in Brown vs. Board of Education.
It constantly amazes me that in a case such as this where nobody is hurt by providing equal educational opportunity to these children, one finds such heat generated. It's no skin off anybody's nose if these children are given the same chance as their native english speaking peers. It only makes the country stronger and benefits everyone if our tax money is spent to provide the best education possible.
I have just returned from rural Illinois. The local meat packing plant was actively recruiting for the third shift - in Spanish. Now if somebody has a bone to pick with the meat packer for enticing these workers up from Mexico, that's nothing to me. Just don't penalize the children of some American workers because of the language that happens to be spoken in their home.
It's only a short step from discriminating against those workers to handing American teachers the dirty end of the stick. The next thing you know American teachers aren't going overseas because they like it, they're overseas because of poor working conditions here in the US. |
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MELEE
Joined: 22 Jan 2003
Posts: 2583
Location: The Mexican Hinterland
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| Posted: Fri Jun 29, 2007 11:29 pm Post subject: |
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| mdk wrote: |
The next thing you know American teachers aren't going overseas because they like it, they're overseas because of poor working conditions here in the US. |
The next thing? mdk I think it's already happening. I enjoy a much better standard of living than I would teaching in most parts of the US. I bought a house on a 0% mortgage that the Mexican government gave me. I was the sole wage earner in my family while my husband was in grad school (with 0 tuition, again, thank you Mexican government) And I can afford a full time live in housekeeper/nanny. The ironic thing is I live so much better here in Mexico, while Mexican risk there lives to try to get into the USA. Why? because Mexico is still an under-educated country, while people with my educational background are a dime a dozen north of the boarder, people who barely finished junior high and are willing to pack meat at ten dollars an hour on the third shift are rare. Here it's the other way around. Which is partly why the whole program is a little wierd, langauge issues aside, school teachers make a fairly good living in Mexico, I wonder who is signing up for this program and why? |
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Chancellor
Joined: 31 Oct 2005
Posts: 1337
Location: Ji'an, China - if you're willing to send me cigars, I accept donations :)
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| Posted: Mon Jul 02, 2007 3:38 pm Post subject: |
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| mdk wrote: |
| It is unfair because these are the children of American working men and women. In many cases they have been born in the US and have full citizenship. They are entitled to the same educational opportunity as native english speakers...period. |
No one is being denied the same educational opportunity as native English speakers.
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| It is unfair and discriminatory to provide them with less educational opportunity than their peers. That was settled in Brown vs. Board of Education. |
But they're not being provided with less educational opportunity than their peers (of course, whether native English speakers could be considered "their peers" is subject to debate).
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| It constantly amazes me that in a case such as this where nobody is hurt by providing equal educational opportunity to these children, one finds such heat generated. It's no skin off anybody's nose if these children are given the same chance as their native english speaking peers. It only makes the country stronger and benefits everyone if our tax money is spent to provide the best education possible. |
It's already equal - the language of instruction is English. These children are not being denied the same educational opportunities as the native anglophones - they simply have an additional (and temporary) hurdle to overcome as a result of not being able to speak and read English.
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| I have just returned from rural Illinois. The local meat packing plant was actively recruiting for the third shift - in Spanish. Now if somebody has a bone to pick with the meat packer for enticing these workers up from Mexico, that's nothing to me. Just don't penalize the children of some American workers because of the language that happens to be spoken in their home. |
As long as the workers come to the United States legally, I don't care whether a meat packing plant recruits workers from Mexico. But I do expect them to learn English once they're here and I expect them to make sure their children learn English.
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| It's only a short step from discriminating against those workers to handing American teachers the dirty end of the stick. The next thing you know American teachers aren't going overseas because they like it, they're overseas because of poor working conditions here in the US. |
I'm not sure how you came up with this paragraph in the context of what you said in the paragraphs before it. Perhaps you could explain further. |
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mdk
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Posts: 425
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| Posted: Mon Jul 02, 2007 10:45 pm Post subject: |
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Well Chancellor let's take our copy of Kant off the shelf and and apply the categorical imperative to see how equitable this practice is. If English speaking children were dumped into a Spanish speaking classroom and told to pick it up as best they could, would you call that fair? I don't think so. If it wouldn't be equitable to teach English speaking Americans in Spanish, then how is it equitable to teach Spanish speaking Americans in English?
As to how worker solidarity applies to teachers as well as foreign workers who have been enticed up here to have their labor exploited that should be self evident. Perhaps you are one of those unfortunate people who get lulled into thinking they are "professional" which in turn separates their situations from other workers. Well, isn't that like the house servants looking down on the field hands?
Americans like to boast that they have a classless society. In the strict sense that is true, you need class consciousness to have a class. In America we only have social strata. That doesn't change the fact that the administrator drives a BMW, has a good health insurance and solid retirement benefits. Do you have that as a teacher? There may be a few, but is it the rule?
That is the oldest trick in the book. Management 's subtle use of language (or race issues) to divide the workers and exploit them.
It is all the more ironic to see teachers (who like to call themselves educated) fall for such a sucker tactic. |
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rusmeister
Joined: 15 Jun 2006
Posts: 867
Location: Russia
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| Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 5:45 am Post subject: |
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| mdk wrote: |
Well Chancellor let's take our copy of Kant off the shelf and and apply the categorical imperative to see how equitable this practice is. If English speaking children were dumped into a Spanish speaking classroom and told to pick it up as best they could, would you call that fair? I don't think so. If it wouldn't be equitable to teach English speaking Americans in Spanish, then how is it equitable to teach Spanish speaking Americans in English?
As to how worker solidarity applies to teachers as well as foreign workers who have been enticed up here to have their labor exploited that should be self evident. Perhaps you are one of those unfortunate people who get lulled into thinking they are "professional" which in turn separates their situations from other workers. Well, isn't that like the house servants looking down on the field hands?
Americans like to boast that they have a classless society. In the strict sense that is true, you need class consciousness to have a class. In America we only have social strata. That doesn't change the fact that the administrator drives a BMW, has a good health insurance and solid retirement benefits. Do you have that as a teacher? There may be a few, but is it the rule?
That is the oldest trick in the book. Management 's subtle use of language (or race issues) to divide the workers and exploit them.
It is all the more ironic to see teachers (who like to call themselves educated) fall for such a sucker tactic. |
There is a lot of truth in what you say, mdk. Nevertheless, it is possible to disagree with your conclusions. However, it is impossible to argue (arrive together at truth that all can agree on) when political views are held as dogmatically as religious ones are.
I speak as an immigrant who has learned the local language and risen to the challenges. I am from a poor family and am the first person from it to ever go to a university, so as with education, I am not speaking as an armchair general. I have 3 kids being raised in Russia and am struggling mightily so that they will know the language, be literate, know the history and the culture, and will feel at home in America. I know what it means to be an immigrant and have/raise children abroad from firsthand experience.
Actually, the situation you describe is entirely 'fair'. An English-speaking child thrown into a Mexican or Russian classroom IS expected to learn the local language of instruction. This standard is held everywhere in the world and so, is completely fair. The child in such circumstances has to rise to the challenge of a second language. It is only recently that in the US the odd notion has arisen that everybody should be catered to in their native language, with a complete disregard for the dominant language around them. This cripples the people living there so that they do not understand much of what is happening around them, and not speaking the language well or being illiterate blocks them off from every other avenue of improvement or advancement. The key is in learning the local language. It is not in a mad scramble to find teachers from a hundred different countries who will be in every village and town teaching children in their native language. You've been reading too much Joel Springer if you think that is what ought to be done. It is impossible and ultimately cripples the adults that they become. It is possible for a child thrown into a new environment to learn the dominant language in 1-3 years, depending mostly on age and nominal support. It is not possible to throw the burden of requiring every school district to have teachers competent and fluent at all levels in a hundred languages with full material support, or even a dozen for that matter. They can't even do it well with one - how could you expect them to do it for two or three?
To refer back to my role-playing game days, he becomes a double-experience point (e.p.) character, who advances more slowly, but is compensated by having greater knowledge and ability than his peers (if he accepts the challenge).
I hope you've understood from my other posts that I am against the class formation you describe where Mexicans or whover become second-class Americans. I fought for my kids when I worked in California so that they would not be condemned to a career at Jack-in-the-Box. I'm just saying they need to learn English and learn it quickly. It is up to the parents to maintain the development of the child's first language. It is NOT up to a given society. Such a 'right' is imaginary. I say this wishing I had more support for raising my kids as Americans.
(Hope I haven't been offensive with any of this.) |
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johnnyappleseed
Joined: 26 Jun 2007
Posts: 89
Location: Vsetin Czech Republic
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| Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 6:16 am Post subject: |
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In the country I live in(the Czech Republic), expat parents have two choices: enter the kids into expensive "International Schools" or send them to state schools.
The children that go to State schools do NOT get instruction in English; but they pick up Czech quickly, and there seems to be little problem.
Why would it be different for Mexicans in an English speaking country? |
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MikeySaid
Joined: 10 Nov 2004
Posts: 509
Location: Torreon, Mexico
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| Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 6:33 am Post subject: |
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| johnnyappleseed wrote: |
In the country I live in(the Czech Republic), expat parents have two choices...
...The children that go to State schools do NOT get instruction in English; but they pick up Czech quickly, and there seems to be little problem.
Why would it be different for Mexicans in an English speaking country? |
First you have to consider the level of education of the people of which you speak. Expats living in the Czech republic (not immigrants or migrant workers who follow harvests) will tend to be of higher socioeconomic status. This will afford their children a certain advantage over the children of Mexican immigrants in the United States. An educated parent is going to be more capable of helping his/her child with homework. Also, educated parents are more likely to provide their children with a good educational base to stand on.
To me comparing the children of expats in the Czech Republic to the children of migrant farm workers, dishwashers and day laborers is very apples to oranges.
It starts at home. And while many immigrants from Mexico put forth the same efforts as rusmeister... many do not. Whether that be cultural stubbornness, lack of resources, or a simple unwillingness to participate, it makes a big difference in the educational successes and failures that their children have. I think the attitude of many Mexican immigrants affects their children's academic performance. Most of the people who cross the Rio Bravo or the Sonoran desert into the US do not do so with the intention of staying permanently. The idea is usually to save up a nest egg and return home. But, life gets in the way of living and all of a sudden they have a house in San Jose and three kids.
Forgive me for rambling. |
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johnnyappleseed
Joined: 26 Jun 2007
Posts: 89
Location: Vsetin Czech Republic
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| Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 1:33 pm Post subject: |
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Well, now wait a minute, though. There are also white and black, native speaking English American parents who don't do their part to help their children's education, whose "socioeconomic status" is more or less low--yet those white/black American children get no special guidance or help, do they? Why should a Mexican migrant be treated differently?
If the parents do not want to/can't play a part in their children's education, is it the state's role to step in? AT what point? ANd how could that feasibly be done, anyway? How is the state going to check up on whether the citizen's are helping with their children's homework or not?
It's a sad, lumpy world; but there's only so much that the state can do.
My belief is that child can learn languages very quickly and education in Spanish would not help them in a country in which ENglish is the dominant language. In my opinion, they are doing the Spanish speaking kids a disservice rather than the other way around, though I think their intention is actually noble.
Ultimately, I'm pro-immigrant, being an immigrant myself. If I had a kid here in CZ, should I demand an English-speaking education from the State? I'm really serious. I would not get it if I did; and it would not be controversial, either. People would say: you live there, learn the language or go.
I wouldn't demand that, though.
I'd rather my child spoke Czech and fit in.
These children of expats speak Czech better than their parents probably ever will. Their parents do not help them much with their Czech homework--they can't; though t heir socioeconomic status is usually pretty high.
IN fact the expatsin question's educational role has been in homeschooling them in ENglish, esp. spelling. |
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mdk
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Posts: 425
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| Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 1:57 pm Post subject: |
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| These children of expats speak Czech better than their parents probably ever will. |
Really? Can they pick up that horrendous Czech phoneme that even Mr. Havel is said to be unable to pronounce? 
But the Czech republic is not the US and people are not bombarded by images of rich people all day and left to ask why they do not live like that.
If I cannot persuade you with an ethical case, how about a practical case?
The main international youth hostel in Barcelona is in a rich mansion that was built by a family of bankers. It has a large defensible wall with a gate house which was clearly built with the Paris commune in mind.
But it did not help those people. When the civil war started the anarchists put them up against a wall with the rest of the people they were totally p.o.'d with. If I recall my history Catalans were looking down at the Spanish speaking immigrants because they wouldn't bother to learn Catalan like they "ought" to. Gaudi's Holy Family cathedral was conceived as an arguement that workers ought to follow the church and the status quo. Maybe they would have better spent their money on improving elementary education for the working immigrants their prosperity was built upon.
I believe in individual responsibility too, but that hardly mattered when Los Angeles exploded in the riots. I saw chicanos looting TV's along with the rest of them.
I believe the final toll for that little adventure was pegged at 500 billion. How many bilingual teachers could you afford for 100 billion? Maybe you ought to drive through Boyle Heights sometime and check out the atmosphere. You can get some good hispanic food, but it does sort of remind one of Popocatepetl starting to smoke. |
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