There is a new program that is being funded by government money (definitely local tax dollars, not sure if any federal tax dollars are involved) in the Glendale, CA elementary school system to promote foreign language immersion learning. 50% of a child’s classes will be taught in a language other than English. The program includes Spanish, Armenian, German, Korean and Japanese.
Photo from Rafu Shimpo
It’s not always cities in diverse coastal states that may have these types of programs. There is a charter grade school in Minneapolis that does immersion in Mandarin Chinese.
Photo from Time MagazineInteresting. I wonder where these schools get the funding for their program?
There’s got to be a mini-caption contest with the photo above…
{ 19 comments… read them below or add one }
Okay, I’ll start:
“Kushibo! When you grow up you must defend Korea in the blogsphere!”
Here’s an answer from the article:
If the program is open to out-of-district students, then it is likely that the program is being paid for mostly from the federal grant. With shrinking local school budgets, no school can afford to educate kids from other districts.
A former colleague taught in a Korean-English dual immersion for LA Unified. She told me that by about 3rd or 4th grade, the kids who spoke English only at home couldn’t keep up with Korean as the academic language demands increased because the parents at home couldn’t help. Our Spanish-speaking kids have the same problem, and that is why our school has a federally funded after-school program 3 days a week.
Another problem with dual immersion is maintaining numbers. Some kids drop out, but it is hard to replace them with kids literate in both languages. Dwindling enrollment makes it difficult to maintain the program in the upper grades.
My caption entry:
“Say “what” one more time Mother%!^$er I dare you!”
Relative to the midwest. Twin Cities are home to a diverse population that enjoys the rich cultural offerings and an active, outdoors lifestyle in spite of long, brutal winters.
I’ve been favoring programs like this for quite a while, but it’s important to keep this stuff in perspective and not to get carried away. These programs will certainly improve language education in America (not hard, that) but they’re not going to turn America’s language education into Singapore’s or Scandinavia’s overnight.
Caption:
“You eyeing my piece 50 cent?”
Caption:
You write that Korean correctly or I’ll show you how dong chim is done with one hand!
“I throw up the deuce like dis, for the homies East Side… Nam San!!”
–
“Oh, yes, motherfuck bitch, you wool pee bery solly. Now, smell mai finga!”
–
“Yes, it’s true, Mizar5 sucks his own dick”
–
“When are you going to yawn?!?”
——
Sorry, I’ve got zero high-brow type comedy in me.
I’m no authority, but I believe this type of program may also be in operation in at least some public schools in the Seattle area. When I lived there, the school near my home operated under a dual immersion environment. That was almost fifteen years ago, however.
Oofa! Look at that mug.
Not too different from our daughter’s school, although I don’t think they teach the pleaser there.
Some funding comes from the DOD, and the Korean consulate gives a small amount.
Which government? I’m sorry, but it is not apparent from your article which country this article is about. I know that Minneapolis is in the USA, but what about the other city mentioned?
They’ve been doing something similar to this in the Chapel Hill, NC school district for a few years now. The following website has some info on the district and the programs available there.
http://www2.chccs.k12.nc.us/education/components/scrapbook/default.php?sectiondetailid=34596&
2 schools have dual language immersion program, while the other 3 are ESL and language intensive but don’t yet offer a full dual language curriculum. Of the 2 dual language schools, one is Chinese-English and the other is Spanish-English, and students do have to apply and be accepted. Tuition is also required (unusual for a non-charter public school), tho I’m not sure what kind of financial support might be available to those who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford additional bills.
A couple of old high school classmates have kids in the Chinese dual-language program at one of the schools there and I wasn’t overly impressed with the progress I saw, at least from them, but that’s not necessarily an indication of the whole program. The program apparently got its start with Federal money and has now been taken over solely with local and private funding. There are actually 2 programs, one Chinese and one Spanish, and students do have to apply and be accepted and there is a tuition involved, tho I’m not sure what kind of financial support might be available to those who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford additional bills.
Being close to the university at Chapel Hill I imagine there isn’t much trouble getting enough native speakers of each language to make the programs viable; don’t think this would work in outlying areas where it’s more difficult to assemble qualified teachers as well as the number of native speaking students necessary to make curriculum like this work.
Antti,
Glendale is in the state of California, U.S.A.
I do provide a wiki link to Glendale in the post.
@ Sonagi # 2
Interesting post: starting next summer i will hire a Chinese tutor for my son to start learning Mandarin, we have some bilingual Italian/Mandarin schools here and i would like to send him to one in a few years (let’s say starting grade # 6, he’s currently in grade # 3). You think with the help of a reasonable amount of time with a Chinese tutor at home he would be able to keep up with the program in school ?
Antti? Holy Shit
Wow… all this interest in learning Mandarin. It’s not even the language that most of the historical Chinese dynasties spoke.
WangKon LOl yes but if force him to learn Cantonese that’s the time he calls child protection services…funny thing my Korean girlfriend keeps telling me all the time to be less strict with him…and i’m supposed to be the Italian slacker in the couple. Wish she would be that sweethearted when she corrects my fairly poor Hangul writing attempts
Then forget hanja and teach your kid simplified Chinese!
You must log in to post a comment.
{ 1 trackback }