Question:
I have volunteered in a first grade classroom for the last six years.
Last year my daughter was in this class and there were six ELL students,
three lower level, and three higher level children. I got to know them
well. They were pulled out occasionally for ESL instruction and they
were progressing quite well. By the end of the school year they had
learned to read and write in English as well as learn the meaning of
words. This year, in second grade, these children are in a Spanish
speaking only classroom right next to my daughters classroom so I see
the same children often. They are taught in Spanish first and will
later English will be introduced. I'm afraid that they will forget the
English they have learned. I question whether these children should be
exposed to English more, they seemed to pick it up quickly. I know that
their Spanish culture and traditions should not be forgotten, but
learning English well in our society is so important.
Answer:
I teach ESL within my regular English classroom--I have about 8 ESL
students. General theory on ESL/bilingual education says that a student
needs to be fluent in his/her first language in order to succeed in picking
up a second language. So it may be that these students are also being taught
in Spanish to improve those skills before being asked to apply them to
English.
It always helps to have ESL students exposed to English. But it's not
necessarily wrong, they way these kids are being taught. Teaching them in
their first language helps them understand concepts, then they can work on
translating those concepts to English. OTOH, I worry about underexposure of
English in my own classroom sometimes. I started the year with two
Spanish-speakers who often worked together; they spoke English out of
necessity and are doing well. Recently two more Spanish-speakers joined my
class; one is almost completely monolingual, and one of the others
translates for her a lot. I have noticed lately that the first two girls
speak more often in Spanish, now that there are four of them.
I think at some point, these students will be included in the regular
English-speaking classrooms. At least, that's what I've seen in my
experience when students are self-contained for ESL. At some point they have
a reasonable understanding and can attend regular classes
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