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My Own Teaching Experience Dear Mrs. Gloria Tuchman, Thank you for expressing, so well, my concerns for bilingual education as it is often implemented. I listened with great interest to your interview and question-answer period with Mr. Elder. Aristotle wrote that "all who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth." In my classroom I believe that view exemplifies my efforts to providing students with the finest educational experience and learning environment that is available. I have taught over twenty years and over and over I see that total immersion with sheltered English works well with most students. When I receive a student that speaks little or no English, all of my classroom students become tutors. Each student signs up for a fifteen minute tutoring session with the non-English student. We use the old ESL language cards. The whole class goes over the weekly lesson with me so that they are mirroring correct sentence structure. Example, "This is a tree," "What is this?" We follow the lesson order provided by the Asian Studies teacher. The tutoring takes place during the follow-up portion of the regular lessons that take place during the day. Each tutor only misses one fifteen minute follow-up activity a week. Once again, thank you for expressing so well my concerns, Shirley Durbin
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