SOUTH BEND — His high school math students in Los Angeles struggle with English. But Jaime Escalante won’t indulge them by speaking their native language — usually Spanish — in the classroom.

No, the Latino teacher expects them to learn English the way he did when he moved to the United States in 1964 at age 32.

By forcing themselves.

In June, Californians voted to make his style the law. Proposition 227 largely eliminated bilingual education from the state’s public schools. For 20 years, bilingual education has allowed teachers to use students’ native language in class.

On Friday, roughly 150 local college and high school students and community members listened and peppered Escalante with questions about the pros and cons of the issue. The discussion was part of the daylong “Conversations on Race II” sponsored by Indiana University South Bend.

Escalante said he has no problem with students speaking Spanish — or any language — outside of the classroom. But students must master English in his class, he said, because along will come the Scholastic Aptitude Test, and then college, and then the workplace.

“At the end, you’re going to have to face the test, and it’s going to be in one language,” he said.

Since the law went into effect this past semester, it’s too soon to see signs of progress, said Escalante, who played a major role in pushing for Proposition 227. Students who know no English have one to two years to learn the language, then begin all-English classes, he said.

Escalante also inspired the 1988 film “Stand and Deliver.” The movie shows him reversing the progress of his failing, inner-city Latino students within a year. In reality, he said, it took him 10 years to argue with and finally gain the support of school administrators for his controversial teaching style.

“I work with kids who come to school only as a chance to socialize,” he said. “They go to school and find a boyfriend, girlfriend and talk about three things: sex, music and drugs.”

California students in bilingual education are two years behind the others “because they tend to speak one language and not the one they need,” he argued.

At home, families tend to speak only Spanish because it’s so natural to them. Students have scored low on the SAT and, therefore, had little interest in attending college, he said.

In class, he gets over the language difficulty by breaking down complex subjects into simple English. He teaches students the “key words” necessary in math and drills them with several tests. They look for the keys words they know and answer only those questions; the other questions only waste their time, he said.

He lies to them a little. For example, he says that he’s the one who came up with the idea of the three-point shot in basketball. That leads conveniently to a geometry discussion of arcs.

But he gains his real support from parents, not the principal.

“The principal is only for decoration,” he said.

Escalante started his own parent-teacher association.

He calls each of his students’ parents and asks them to come with the students to a potluck, where he explains his philosophy. Two weeks later, he calls back the parents to attend another potluck — without their children — and tells them how to talk with their children.

He gives them three T’s:

* Tell your kids, “I love you.”

* Touch your kids. Ask them, “What are you learning? What did you do in school?”

* Time. “You don’t waste anything when you devote time to your kids,” he said.

He tells parents to discipline their children with CIA:

* Control your anger.

* Immediately respond to your child.

* Appropriate — use appropriate language, not vulgarity.

He encourages parents to call him about any problem. That allows him to warn students, “If you don’t do your homework, I’ll call your mom.”

It always works. Students say, “No no no, don’t call my mom.”



Comments are closed.