LV School Finds Bilingual Success
LAS VEGAS, N.M. At Los Ninos Elementary School here, a reporter has options when trying to decide which language to use while interviewing most of the students English or Spanish. Children in the school's "dual immersion" bilingual education program are comfortable in both languages. Six-year-old Katerina Rael, a first-grader, said, "I like to learn in both languages because if somebody only talks Spanish, I talk to them in Spanish, and if they only know English, I talk to them in English." Katerina's comments are essentially a summation of the program's goals. "Our goal is to create a class of truly bilingual people," said Carmen Holguin, assistant superintendent of instruction for Las Vegas schools. "The world is getting smaller with the NAFTA treaty, and we're so close to Mexico these children can go anywhere, they will be totally employable. And if they want to be bilingual teachers, the demand is there." The Las Vegas school is one of 13 around the state trying to take bilingual education beyond merely transitioning non-English speakers into English or offering just a token amount of bilingual classroom time. Split days The Las Vegas public schools began its bilingual-immersion program at Los Ninos for all children five years ago. The program is optional, and parents have to request that their children be enrolled in the program. More than 90 students now participate. The program started with just a single kindergarten class in 1996. Each year since then, the school has added another grade to the program, and it now goes from kindergarten through fourth grade. The design of the curriculum is simple. In kindergarten, where students attend school for just a half day, children study all subjects comprising 90 percent of their schedule in Spanish. The remaining 10 percent of their time consists of 30 minutes of oral development in English. The same split 90 percent in Spanish, 10 percent in English continues in first grade, when the students' schedule expands to a full school day. In second grade, the Spanish-English ratio changes to 80/20. Subjects continue to be taught in Spanish, but now the students also get 40 minutes of English instruction in a content area, social studies. The Spanish-English split graduates to 70/30 for third-graders and to 60/40 in fourth grade. And when a fifth-grade curriculum is implemented next school year, English and Spanish will be used in equal parts, with half of the day taught in Spanish (literature, linguistic arts, mathematics and science) and the other half of the day taught in English (literature, linguistic arts, social studies and physical education). State involvement This "dual immersion" in both languages is a major leap from other bilingual programs in New Mexico. State funding also is available for what are known as "maintenance" bilingual programs for "ELLs" English language leaners and enrichment programs for students who have become fluent in English. But those programs can be as short as an hour a day, are no longer than three hours a day and don't have the emphasis on having regular school subjects taught in Spanish that the dual-immersion program does. "Two or three subjects have to be taught in the maternal language for it to be considered a (dual immersion) bilingual program," according to Dr. Gladys Herrera-Gurule, bilingual-programs director at the state Department of Education. The state department now is trying to promote the kind of bilingual "immersion" in place at the Las Vegas school. "We're promoting bilingualism and bi-literacy," Herrera-Gurule said. Katherine Sherlock, the state department's bilingual programs adviser, said, "It is called the dual-language program and consists of six hours during which some subjects are taught in English and others are taught in Spanish, similar to the program in Las Vegas." She said that two years ago, the Legislature provided funds for 20 dual-immersion programs for one year. "So the schools that continued with the program after the funds ran out now receive funds for three hours a day from us, and we're trying to change it to six hours," Sherlock said. Herrera-Gurule added, "We want to change the regulations to promote the dual-immersion program instead of the transition (to English) program." The dual-immersion program began as a pilot program in five elementary schools in Albuquerque, Gadsden and Las Cruces. Those programs continue, and in addition to the one in Las Vegas, there are similar programs in elementary schools in Albuquerque, Naschitti, Clovis, Deming, Las Cruces, Los Lunas and Rio Rancho for a total of 13 bilingual-immersion programs in New Mexico today. Parents count The dual-immersion curriculum in Las Vegas' Los Ninos school would not have been possible without the consent of the children's parents. According to Renee Romero, Los Ninos' kindergarten bilingual teacher, "The parents are interested in their children knowing two languages because the parents never learned Spanish maybe the grandparents did." Holguin said parents have an advisory committee for the program and helped develop a master plan. Clara Lopez, coordinator of federal bilingual programs for the Las Vegas schools, added, "They helped us to write the proposal for teachers to get additional training, more materials, furniture and equipment." Although 85 percent of the students at Los Ninos are Hispanic, the majority of the children, according to Lopez, "are monolingual English speakers. You can talk to them in Spanish, but you don't find them speaking it." Lopez speculates that they don't speak Spanish because "maybe they're embarrassed since the use of Spanish was discouraged here in New Mexico for many years. But our Spanish here in Las Vegas is not completely lost. It hasn't been lost forever." Added Lopez, "They learn the official Spanish and the northern New Mexico dialect, so they are keeping their culture and their roots." Herrera-Gurule said the Las Vegas program is working for non-Hispanics, too. "The Anglo children are speaking Spanish like they were from Spain," she said. Growing enrollment The number of Las Vegas children participating in the program has grown every year since 1996. The first year, there were 12 students in the start-up kindergarten class, according to Lopez and Holguin. Those 12 students are now in the fourth grade. This year, there are 25 children in the kindergarten class an increase of more than 100 percent in only five years. The bilingual program also now has 26 students in the first grade at Los Ninos, 18 in the second grade and thirteen in the third grade. With the 12 fourth-graders who started the program five years ago, there are now a total of 94 students in the program. In the 2002-2003 school year, there will be a fifth-grade class in the bilingual program. Despite a shortage of certified bilingual teachers in New Mexico, all of the teachers in the Las Vegas dual-immersion program are certified to teach bilingual classes. Los Ninos school administers an exam each spring called the SUPERA, completely in Spanish, to the students in the dual-immersion classes. The exam measures skills in the areas of reading, language and mathematics. This year, the exam was administered in March. The average scores varied on a 100-point scale, first-graders scored 54 points, second-graders scored 89 and third-graders scored 64. The kids like it Children in the Las Vegas program said recently that they like both Spanish and English. During a reporter's interviews, each child was spoken to in English and in Spanish, and they answered in the two languages. Second-grader Vincent Gonzales, 7, said he likes the two languages because "the words are different when you talk." But Vincent and fellow students such as 8-year-old Cecille Thomas were in agreement that in one respect, Spanish is better. It's a phonetic language where you write what you hear, without many of the difficult spellings of English. As Vincent said, "I like Spanish more because it's easier to write." Nava Principal Says School Working Out Bilingual Program Kinks |