Should immigrant children be taught in English or in their native language?

Justin Roh

American Government & Politics

Dr. Nanzer

October 26, 2010

Bilingual Education

Bilingual education has become a huge issue recently in the United States,

especially in the southern states. The debate over bilingual education came about

because of the controversy of what it means to be an American, Should we try to

reinforce our native language of English or should we be a melting pot and let

immigrants flourish in our school systems? By definition, bilingual education means

instruction for those who do not speak English by teachers who use the students’

native language at least part of the day. In other words it means teaching students to

be fluent in two languages. There has been a big debate over whether immigrant

children should be taught in both their native language and English or in only

English. Some people say that these students need to learn English as quickly as

possible so they should be in a classroom that is taught in English only. Others say

that it is impossible for these students to learn English quickly and correctly without

using some of their native language in the teaching method. The number of

immigrant children in America’s schools keeps growing and so does the problem of

how to teach them.

 In 1968, Title VII of the ESEA was added. The ESEA is the Elementary and

Secondary Act and was enacted April 11, 1965. The act funds primary and

secondary education. It has been reauthorized every 5 years since then and the

current reauthorization is the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. Title VII encourages

local school districts to establish bilingual programs by using grants provided under

the law. Recently the ESEA has targeted Chapter 1, the program for disadvantaged

children. Currently, Chapter 1 participants are required to “have needs stemming

from educational deprivation and not related solely to limited English proficiency.”

Supporters of bilingualism are trying to get this provision removed because LEP

students (also known as ELLs or English Language Learners) cannot get the help

they need because of it. Many of these LEP students will never make it through

school without some sort of bilingual education. One thing is certain, these

programs must teach students English. But the question is, how?

Opponents of bilingual education say that it “retards the movement of LEP

children into the educational mainstream, as well as into American culture in

general. One method they believe could work is to have LEP students learn English

as quickly as possible and they can then transfer to mainstream classes where

academic achievement will supposedly come more readily. This way the students

have some sort of prelude to going into regular classes. Some opponents of

bilingualism don’t even believe in that, though. Some believe in what they call the

“sink or swim” method or the immersion approach. This means that the students

would not get any extra help and they would be placed directly into regular classes.

This is basically what most immigrants to the United States experienced before the
1960s. In this method, students will be forced to learn English as quickly as possible

on their own without any extra help or else they will not pass. If they do not pick up

on English quickly, there is no way they can make it in school. Is this fair to these

students? What these people are saying is that just because these kids don’t speak

our language they just have to figure things out on their own with no extra help.

Toby Roth is one of these people. Roth says, “Transitional bilingual education is a

dismal failure at what Congress has specifically asked it to accomplish: teach

students English. So long as English remains the language of opportunity in this

nation, we are doing the children of immigrants a grave disservice by giving them

less of what they really need-English classes and English-language instruction.”

What he is saying is that students are never going to learn English if they are taught

in their native language all the time. They will just learn things in their native

language instead of if they are taught in all English in which they will learn things in

English. Learning things in their native language is not going to help them at all

when they get out into the real world where everything is in English. If they learn in

their native language school will be much easier for them, yes, but in the long run it

will not help them at all.

These arguments would be legitimate, but the objective of the ESEA is not to

produce bilingual children. It is instead to teach LEP students in their native

language only to the extent necessary to enable them to learn English. They will not

be taught in their native language for the whole time they are in school but rather

just until they have a grasp on the English language. Once they are fluent in English

they will be taught in all English, which will make them even better at speaking and
understanding the language. This is much better than immersion and just throwing

them into regular classes without knowing the language at all because they now

know what is going on in the class rather than being completely lost for a while and

basically failing until they can pick up some words and figure out what is going on.

Not only is bilingual education about becoming fluent in English more easily

and more thoroughly, it is about students staying fluent in their native language

also. In the immersion process most children are so motivated to acquire English

that they lose their native language. This is bad for a number of reasons. First of all

they should keep some of their culture with them for their whole life. Even though

they are in America they should be proud of where they come from and their native

language. Also, it is definitely an advantage to be bilingual in the world today. I agree

with Toby Roth in the fact that most of the opportunity for work today requires you

to be fluent in English, but with America becoming more and more diverse many

jobs require one to be bilingual. If a child loses their native language when they are

young in order to learn more English, they could be missing out on opportunities for

jobs later in life depending on what field of work they go into. It may be good to be

very fluent in English but it can never hurt to be fluent in English and also fluent in

another language, which is the goal of bilingual education.

To Roberto Feliz, bilingual education meant “the difference between life and

death in my learning.” Roberto was born in the Dominican Republic and loved

school. He then moved to Boston and was enrolled in a school that taught in English

only. Roberto did not love school anymore. He was unable to understand his

teachers, felt lost and wanted to drop out. After letting the school administration
know about his struggles, they placed him in a bilingual program. He then spent his

day in a classroom where he was taught in both English and Spanish. In this

program, he excelled. Roberto was in this program from sixth through 11 th grade

and finally transitioned to all-English classes his senior year. Roberto went on to

graduate from Boston University and Dartmouth Medical School. This is an example

of a student who, without a bilingual education program, would never have even

made it out of high school. If he had stayed with the immersion plan and in all

English classes, he would never had any idea what was going on and might have not

even kept going to school.

Another example where bilingualism is very important is at Beth Israel

Hospital, where Feliz works. At Beth Israel, 25 percent of the patients are Hispanic.

If Feliz were kept in the English-only classes he could have lost his ability to speak

Spanish and never have been able to work at Beth Israel. This is just one example of

many in which jobs require their workers to be bilingual. A bilingual person has so

many more opportunities for jobs today than someone who is monolingual. This is a

huge reason why we should have bilingual education programs instead of English

immersion programs.

English immersion programs are in such a hurry for students to speak

English that they’re not paying attention to students’ cognitive development. In

school it doesn’t matter if a student learns to think in English or a different language,

as long as they’re learning. There should not be as much pressure to become fluent

in English so quickly as there actually is. What is the rush for these students to learn

English? As long as they are learning all the things the state is requiring them to
learn, why does it matter what language it’s in? Sure, English is America’s official

language but about 20 percent of Americans do not speak English. There are many

parts of the country that are dominated by foreign languages and these are not even

all in southern states. So what if these students need to move out of these foreign

language-dominated places, you ask? Well this is what bilingual education is for.

Students will not be fluent in English very quickly but they will learn what is

required of them to graduate. Is that not the goal of the education system? For

students to learn everything required of them by the state, no matter what language

it is taught in? Research shows that the longer students are taught in their native

language, the better they will do not only in elementary school but in secondary

school as well. There is not much of a difference in achievement levels between

English learners in the elementary grades but in high school, the dual-language

students come closer to narrowing the gap between them and the English-proficient

students than those using the ESL approach. “Students in English-only programs

look as though they’re doing really well in early grades but they’ve experienced a

cognitive slowdown as they’re learning English,” says Thomas, who did research on

this at George Mason. So, immersion programs may be better for teaching English to

students at a young age but they are missing out on learning the things that an

elementary student needs to learn. With this in mind, how can one say that an

immersion program is better? It may be better for learning English in the short run

but in the long run bilingual education programs teach English just as well and they

also teach students what they need to know for state requirements. Clearly bilingual

programs are they way to go.

 Congress needs to figure out what is in the best interest for the students. This

may cost more for the students to be in different classrooms with different teachers

but we need to help these kids. This is not just a small number of students we’re

talking about. This is about 20 percent of America’s population. 20 percent of a

population cannot be ignored. 20 percent cannot just be thrown into regular classes

with out any extra help at all. America is called the melting pot for a reason. If we

use English-immersion programs we are pretty much ignoring the fact that we are a

diverse country. What we are saying is that we really do not care about anybody

who is not an English-speaking American. If they can’t speak English, they are not

worth our time to try to work with and they will just have to figure it out on their

own. This is just a ridiculous way to look at solving this issue and helping these

students out. Something needs to be done.

Although many possible solutions to this problem have been brought about,

there is no one solution that is guaranteed to work. This is because every student

learns differently. Some students might actually learn well by being thrown into an

English-only class while others need to be guided along in a bilingual program. I

would say that most students would do best in a bilingual program, though, because

it is very hard to try to learn anything while it is being taught in a language that is

completely foreign to you. I think a dual-language program would be the best way to

teach ELL’s. In a dual-language program, a student would learn everything in two

languages, English and his/her native language. I believe a “full-immersion” type

program would work the best. This means that in kindergarten, things would be
taught in 90 percent of a student’s native language and 10 percent English. From

then on they would gradually be taught in more and more English until they are able

to be in English-only classes without any setbacks. A typical school day would

consist of half the day being taught in English and then the other half being taught in

the native language by the time they are in third or fourth grade. Then by around

eighth or ninth grade the student would be put into all-English classes. The point of

this kind of program would be so that a ELL would learn everything they need to

learn just like a regular English speaking student would in elementary, but at the

same time the student would be gradually learning how to do everything in English.

The advantages of this are that the student will be bilingual and have knowledge of

everything that is required by the state. This is unlike an English-immersion

program in which a student would most likely not be bilingual and also could be

behind according to state requirements.

What it comes down to is that these students need some type of help. They

cannot just be thrown into regular classes with no further instruction because there

is no way they can learn anything from that. They need some type of special help

and the best way to do this is by using a bilingual education program in which a

student is taught in some English and some of their native language until they are

fluent enough to be able to understand what is happening in a regular classroom

and even interact with the teacher and other students.