I sent this to our friends in Washington
(FYI, the White House website has posted a lengthy explanation as to why things are different now than they were in 1986. The title is "Fact Sheet: Border Security and Immigration Reform Agreement Overcomes 1986 Mistakes.")
25 May 2007 VIA FACSIMILE
Messrs. Bush, Obama, Hastert, Tancredo, Sensenbrenner, Reid, Durbin
Re: Immigration legislation
Dear Sirs:
John A. Appleman is credited with saying, “Every time history repeats itself, the price goes up.” One need only compare the 1993 World Trade Center tragedy where six people perished with 9/11 where the number of deaths approached 3,000 to validate his words.
You stand on the verge of repeating the mistakes made in 1986. May I suggest that, despite your good intentions, the current immigration reform proposal will prove to be an expensive mistake.
I predict that we will be successful in carrying out the legalization part of the program. We seem particularly adept at doling out benefits.
But we will fail in the enforcement elements of the program. It will happen like this: In attempting to check the eligibility of all workers, along will come the alphabet soup brigade of the ACLU, NCLR, LULAC, MALDEF…with a lawsuit that declares your new law unconstitutional because it violates civil rights. Some federal judge somewhere will rule in their favor, and it will be years before the matter is resolved.
And given High Court rulings like Plyler v. Doe, Amendment XIV interpretations, and the EMTALA cases, the odds are in favor of dismantling your legislation altogether.
And virtually any applicant requirement or enforcement program contained within your reform package is subject to the scrutiny of these special interest groups…and ultimately subject to nullification by the courts.
When that happens we are left with millions of people granted the right to stay, without any of the controls in force to regulate their presence or prevent future generations from following behind.
Recognizing that Mexico alone raises up one million new young adults each year who need jobs (source: Juergen Gatz NAFTA analysis), the problem of today will grow exponentially tomorrow.
We must not allow this foolish reform plan to move forward. Please vote against it.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
ABO vs. Obama - 2004
Back in 2004 I witnessed the old adage, “Things can always get worse.”
Just when I thought the Republican Party in Illinois had hit bottom, they began digging a hole. They were reeling from the Governor George Ryan scandal of selling drivers licenses to fund party activity, followed closely by Ryan’s effort to engineer a legacy for himself by removing the tollbooths. He found no traction with that effort so he commuted all the death sentences in the state. (He finally found something he could do that was outside the checks and balances.)
Now, follow along here because there are a few different Ryan’s in this story, kind of like keeping track of the Johns and the Marys in the New Testatment.
Jack Ryan won the primary election to be the Republican candidate for US Senate in 2004. Peter Fitzgerald would not serve a second term. He was totally frustrated that our elected officials didn’t really want to analyze and fix problems; they wanted to play political games while Rome burned.
It turns out that Jack was not a dull boy after all. His divorce papers became public and they contained some kinky stuff; not at all befitting a family values candidate. So Jack bowed out.
So who do you replace him with after the primary? Logic may suggest the person who came in second. But we don’t do that here in Illinois. The decision defaults to the party bosses to name someone, and they NEVER go with the public’s second choice. It is time for party leaders to exert their influence; take matters into the cloakroom so to speak.
You’ll never find anyone in Washington to admit it, so we’ll have to wait for Karl Rove to publish his tell-all memoirs. But this was a presidential election year and Bush was out to get a record number of Hispanic votes. He began in January 2004 talking about his Guest Worker program for the first time since 9/11. The second place candidate in the Illinois Senate Republican Primary was Jim Oberweis. The message from the White House was that they wanted ABO, Anyone But Oberweis.
You see, Oberweis may have been popular with the voters but he ran TV ads that warned us about the illegal alien problem. He showed pictures of Soldier Field (where the Bears play) and claimed that enough illegals cross the border every week to fill the stadium. That would be 60,000+ per week.
When I saw those ads I thought he was exaggerating. I had never even considered that there was a problem. Sure, I knew some folks snuck across the border, but they kept to themselves. Besides, surely those we pay to protect us had a handle on these things. But no one disputes those numbers any more. Oberweis was right. In fact, maybe his numbers were a little low. If we had only known.
So, who was ABO? Well, the reluctant party chair was Judy Barr Topinka. The party was scandal-ridden and had no money. It would be like making her captain of the Titanic AFTER it hit the iceberg. But Judy was loyal to the wishes of Washington and Oberwies was never considered. Various names were bantered about, mostly the rich and the famous. Even Da Coach, Mike Ditka, was considered seriously. Most Illinoisans never even knew Ditka was a Republican and here he was being considered. But he went on camera and turned them down.
So, along came a carpetbagger by the name of Alan Keyes. Like Hillary in New York, he was going to campaign here having never lived here in his life. Keyes was a conservative talk show host, black, with a history of strong rhetoric. I can’t imagine why Washington would approve him. After all, he spoke out against Dick Cheney’s lesbian daughter (and all gays) and he too had made some statements about illegal aliens. But the party must have seen him as a cipher, a place holder, a zero.
It didn’t take much to realize he was unelectable. We tried to make sense of it all. Maybe he was coming in to go head-to-head with another black candidate. Or maybe he would attract the attention of the far right. Or maybe he was strong enough and loud enough to compete with Jesse Jackson. Nothing made sense. Maybe Bush actually wanted Obama to win. That made more sense than anything else, but even that was a huge stretch of the imagination.
Topinka held her nose and was cordial enough at the start, but even before election day she was wishing him well, SOMEWHERE ELSE.
So that, my dear friends, is how Barry Obama first came to national office. ABO had a name. It was Alan Keyes and he set a record for losing the Illinois Senate race by the greatest margin.
Just when I thought the Republican Party in Illinois had hit bottom, they began digging a hole. They were reeling from the Governor George Ryan scandal of selling drivers licenses to fund party activity, followed closely by Ryan’s effort to engineer a legacy for himself by removing the tollbooths. He found no traction with that effort so he commuted all the death sentences in the state. (He finally found something he could do that was outside the checks and balances.)
Now, follow along here because there are a few different Ryan’s in this story, kind of like keeping track of the Johns and the Marys in the New Testatment.
Jack Ryan won the primary election to be the Republican candidate for US Senate in 2004. Peter Fitzgerald would not serve a second term. He was totally frustrated that our elected officials didn’t really want to analyze and fix problems; they wanted to play political games while Rome burned.
It turns out that Jack was not a dull boy after all. His divorce papers became public and they contained some kinky stuff; not at all befitting a family values candidate. So Jack bowed out.
So who do you replace him with after the primary? Logic may suggest the person who came in second. But we don’t do that here in Illinois. The decision defaults to the party bosses to name someone, and they NEVER go with the public’s second choice. It is time for party leaders to exert their influence; take matters into the cloakroom so to speak.
You’ll never find anyone in Washington to admit it, so we’ll have to wait for Karl Rove to publish his tell-all memoirs. But this was a presidential election year and Bush was out to get a record number of Hispanic votes. He began in January 2004 talking about his Guest Worker program for the first time since 9/11. The second place candidate in the Illinois Senate Republican Primary was Jim Oberweis. The message from the White House was that they wanted ABO, Anyone But Oberweis.
You see, Oberweis may have been popular with the voters but he ran TV ads that warned us about the illegal alien problem. He showed pictures of Soldier Field (where the Bears play) and claimed that enough illegals cross the border every week to fill the stadium. That would be 60,000+ per week.
When I saw those ads I thought he was exaggerating. I had never even considered that there was a problem. Sure, I knew some folks snuck across the border, but they kept to themselves. Besides, surely those we pay to protect us had a handle on these things. But no one disputes those numbers any more. Oberweis was right. In fact, maybe his numbers were a little low. If we had only known.
So, who was ABO? Well, the reluctant party chair was Judy Barr Topinka. The party was scandal-ridden and had no money. It would be like making her captain of the Titanic AFTER it hit the iceberg. But Judy was loyal to the wishes of Washington and Oberwies was never considered. Various names were bantered about, mostly the rich and the famous. Even Da Coach, Mike Ditka, was considered seriously. Most Illinoisans never even knew Ditka was a Republican and here he was being considered. But he went on camera and turned them down.
So, along came a carpetbagger by the name of Alan Keyes. Like Hillary in New York, he was going to campaign here having never lived here in his life. Keyes was a conservative talk show host, black, with a history of strong rhetoric. I can’t imagine why Washington would approve him. After all, he spoke out against Dick Cheney’s lesbian daughter (and all gays) and he too had made some statements about illegal aliens. But the party must have seen him as a cipher, a place holder, a zero.
It didn’t take much to realize he was unelectable. We tried to make sense of it all. Maybe he was coming in to go head-to-head with another black candidate. Or maybe he would attract the attention of the far right. Or maybe he was strong enough and loud enough to compete with Jesse Jackson. Nothing made sense. Maybe Bush actually wanted Obama to win. That made more sense than anything else, but even that was a huge stretch of the imagination.
Topinka held her nose and was cordial enough at the start, but even before election day she was wishing him well, SOMEWHERE ELSE.
So that, my dear friends, is how Barry Obama first came to national office. ABO had a name. It was Alan Keyes and he set a record for losing the Illinois Senate race by the greatest margin.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Bilingual field experience #4
This one isn’t a field experience per se. Though I know the student and her family much better than any of the other kids I’ve discussed here. They are friends of mine. Their oldest girl is the student I observed. We’ll call her Gabby because that isn’t her name (or her temperament).
Gabby did three years of bilingual education in elementary school, and frankly, it was a year too much for her. She quickly learned English, partly because that was a priority for her parents. And she was a fine student all around.
They lived a few blocks from the library so Gabby would spend a lot of time there. She loved books. She would later volunteer at the library.
So, the school district wanted to have a Gifted Bilingual Program to meet the needs of students who were bright but still needed language support. They went to Gabby and her family and begged her to enroll in the program, even though she hadn’t been in a bilingual class for six years! The family refused. Their daughter had already been in a number of accelerated and gifted classes as a mainstream student.
The district continued to beg, saying that she would be an asset to the program. But the family held firm. Gabby held firm. She was part of the regular program and doing well. Why would she want to go back to bilingual anything? (To make the district look good, that’s why!)
Gabby went on to an international studies program in her high school and was later accepted at a well-respected university. Gabby is doing just fine, thank you.
The moral of this story is that school districts sometimes do self-serving things, even if it isn't for the benefit of the student. Parents need to be firm if they feel their child is being used by the system.
Gabby did three years of bilingual education in elementary school, and frankly, it was a year too much for her. She quickly learned English, partly because that was a priority for her parents. And she was a fine student all around.
They lived a few blocks from the library so Gabby would spend a lot of time there. She loved books. She would later volunteer at the library.
So, the school district wanted to have a Gifted Bilingual Program to meet the needs of students who were bright but still needed language support. They went to Gabby and her family and begged her to enroll in the program, even though she hadn’t been in a bilingual class for six years! The family refused. Their daughter had already been in a number of accelerated and gifted classes as a mainstream student.
The district continued to beg, saying that she would be an asset to the program. But the family held firm. Gabby held firm. She was part of the regular program and doing well. Why would she want to go back to bilingual anything? (To make the district look good, that’s why!)
Gabby went on to an international studies program in her high school and was later accepted at a well-respected university. Gabby is doing just fine, thank you.
The moral of this story is that school districts sometimes do self-serving things, even if it isn't for the benefit of the student. Parents need to be firm if they feel their child is being used by the system.
Bilingual field experience #3
My next experience wasn’t part of my punishment for criticizing the bilingual program. In fact, it preceded the entire situation by more than a year.
I had made a goal for myself that I was going to visit at least five schools a year. Sometimes we went to various schools as a matter of course and other times we had a specific purpose. I believe this visit was to find out about a counseling program of some sorts, but such visits also included a tour of the place.
This school can be described as a monument to failed instructional theory. It was one of those “open classroom” designs from the 1970s. Someone wrote a book based on their research that “proved” how well the one-room school house worked. So they built schools all over the country with a large open classroom area that had no doors or partitions. And they turned the teachers loose with their classes and walked away.
The “experts” returned in a couple of years and found the classes set up around the edges with the desks in neat little rows and the teachers talking softly to the students to avoid disturbing the class next to them. Where was the happy din of students of all ages mingled together in learning? Well, it didn’t work, folks!
So, the school districts used partitions to divide up this large hall into classrooms resembling slices of pizza. After spending extra money we were back to the traditional classroom once again, sort of.
It was in one of these wedge-shaped classrooms that I was told of a young fifth grader who had just transferred in. He was from Egypt. His parents had brought him here because his father had taken a job assignment in the area.
I asked, “What do you do for a boy from Egypt?” The principal explained to me that he was placed in the rear of the class along with one of the brightest students. They would work together and this other student would guide him along during the day. He explained that no one in the school spoke Egyptian. (I thought to myself, that’s not surprising but what the boy really needs is someone who speaks Arabic. But I held my tongue.)
The boy had only been here a few weeks and yet I observed that he seemed to be flourishing. Watching TV in English was a big boost for vocabulary and accent. And his family wanted him to learn English and encouraged him.
There were no textbooks for him, no teachers who spoke his language, no Arabic-speaking classmates. And yet somehow he was managing.
His situation is typical. Most school districts are proud to say that their students speak 60 different languages. But only in the fine print do you realize that the bilingual program is almost entirely a Spanish program. Here and there you will see a Korean program or a Polish one, but the business is in the Spanish arena. That’s where all the emphasis is. That’s where the textbooks are. That’s where the payroll money is spent.
The whole sentiment that you have to devote huge resources to kids who don’t speak English only applies if you can build a program around it. Otherwise, the two or five or ten kids who come here from other countries have to sink or swim. There’s not much we can do for them. The teacher and the principal just do the best they can with them.
I’d like to see a longitudinal study of the performance of these oddball foreign students compared with those in a structured bilingual program. My guess is that they’d outperform the transitional kids by a mile. But that would just embarrass the school districts and force them to say that the Spanish speaking kids have other challenges due to the poverty of their families.
It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the program itself. Or could it?
I had made a goal for myself that I was going to visit at least five schools a year. Sometimes we went to various schools as a matter of course and other times we had a specific purpose. I believe this visit was to find out about a counseling program of some sorts, but such visits also included a tour of the place.
This school can be described as a monument to failed instructional theory. It was one of those “open classroom” designs from the 1970s. Someone wrote a book based on their research that “proved” how well the one-room school house worked. So they built schools all over the country with a large open classroom area that had no doors or partitions. And they turned the teachers loose with their classes and walked away.
The “experts” returned in a couple of years and found the classes set up around the edges with the desks in neat little rows and the teachers talking softly to the students to avoid disturbing the class next to them. Where was the happy din of students of all ages mingled together in learning? Well, it didn’t work, folks!
So, the school districts used partitions to divide up this large hall into classrooms resembling slices of pizza. After spending extra money we were back to the traditional classroom once again, sort of.
It was in one of these wedge-shaped classrooms that I was told of a young fifth grader who had just transferred in. He was from Egypt. His parents had brought him here because his father had taken a job assignment in the area.
I asked, “What do you do for a boy from Egypt?” The principal explained to me that he was placed in the rear of the class along with one of the brightest students. They would work together and this other student would guide him along during the day. He explained that no one in the school spoke Egyptian. (I thought to myself, that’s not surprising but what the boy really needs is someone who speaks Arabic. But I held my tongue.)
The boy had only been here a few weeks and yet I observed that he seemed to be flourishing. Watching TV in English was a big boost for vocabulary and accent. And his family wanted him to learn English and encouraged him.
There were no textbooks for him, no teachers who spoke his language, no Arabic-speaking classmates. And yet somehow he was managing.
His situation is typical. Most school districts are proud to say that their students speak 60 different languages. But only in the fine print do you realize that the bilingual program is almost entirely a Spanish program. Here and there you will see a Korean program or a Polish one, but the business is in the Spanish arena. That’s where all the emphasis is. That’s where the textbooks are. That’s where the payroll money is spent.
The whole sentiment that you have to devote huge resources to kids who don’t speak English only applies if you can build a program around it. Otherwise, the two or five or ten kids who come here from other countries have to sink or swim. There’s not much we can do for them. The teacher and the principal just do the best they can with them.
I’d like to see a longitudinal study of the performance of these oddball foreign students compared with those in a structured bilingual program. My guess is that they’d outperform the transitional kids by a mile. But that would just embarrass the school districts and force them to say that the Spanish speaking kids have other challenges due to the poverty of their families.
It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the program itself. Or could it?
Monday, May 28, 2007
Bilingual field experience #2
My second tour of bilingual classrooms was an entirely different experience although she taught right next door to #1 (that's called academic freedom, folks). The teacher was a redhead who had a hint of a Scottish brogue. She was older; perhaps late 40s. She too had labeled items in her third grade classroom. But the index cards were in English and Spanish. And most of the supplemental material around the room was in English.
She was a joy to watch. She taught with such enthusiasm that you couldn’t help paying attention. Most of her lecture was in English, but she watched carefully for comprehension, especially the new students.
She had placed the newcomers close to the experienced ones and sometimes called out things like, “Roberto, help Pedro with that, will you?” And the student would receive only enough Spanish instruction help to keep up with the class.
This woman spoke passable Spanish. Her vocabulary was fine; her accent wasn’t anything spectacular. She had adequate Spanish to work with the parents and manage the classroom, but she was nowhere near the level of a native Spanish speaker. Yet, she was teaching these students and they were learning.
I thought to myself, “This is the type of teacher we need if we are going to shorten the number of years a student stays in the program.”
She was a joy to watch. She taught with such enthusiasm that you couldn’t help paying attention. Most of her lecture was in English, but she watched carefully for comprehension, especially the new students.
She had placed the newcomers close to the experienced ones and sometimes called out things like, “Roberto, help Pedro with that, will you?” And the student would receive only enough Spanish instruction help to keep up with the class.
This woman spoke passable Spanish. Her vocabulary was fine; her accent wasn’t anything spectacular. She had adequate Spanish to work with the parents and manage the classroom, but she was nowhere near the level of a native Spanish speaker. Yet, she was teaching these students and they were learning.
I thought to myself, “This is the type of teacher we need if we are going to shorten the number of years a student stays in the program.”
Survey says...
On January 7, 2004, George W. Bush made it clear that he was going after the brown vote with a vengeance. He spoke from the White House about his Guest Worker Program after a two and a half year silence following 9/11. He was kicking off his Latino campaign for his bid for a second term in November, and getting winks and nods from business interests at the same time.
Within a week of that speech, the Border Patrol began a survey of people caught crossing the Southern border. That survey was discontinued on January 27, 2004 at the request of Washington.
Here’s the link:
http://www.judicialwatch.org/archive/2005/bpsurvey.pdf
For those who don’t want to read the 16 pages, here are the Cliff’s Notes on the survey:
*The Government only released half of the surveys. As bad as this information is, you wonder what they are hiding.
*Country of origin: 88% from Mexico (No big surprise. It is their border.)
*How long do you plan to stay?: More than a year- 43% Forever- 20%
*Have you heard the US is offering amnesty?: 61% said Yes
*Did the hope of amnesty influence your decision to come here?: 45% said Yes
*Will you apply for amnesty?: 81% said Yes
*Have you ever crossed illegally before?: 64% said Yes
*Do you plan to become a US Citizen?: 67% said Yes
*Do you plan to petition for other family members to come here?: 67% said Yes
Gee, I wonder why it took Judicial Watch 18 months to get Washington to release the information. You would think Bush would be proud that people in Mexico are following his programs and pronouncements. And it might have had an impact on the Presidential election.
All’s well that ends well, they say. Bush received lots of campaign cash from big business. He is also estimated to have won 40% of the Hispanic vote in November of 2004. As Henry Cate VII has said: “The problem with political jokes is they get elected.” Or as Ronald Reagan once said: “Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.”
Has anybody seen the latest approval ratings for the President and Congress? :)
Within a week of that speech, the Border Patrol began a survey of people caught crossing the Southern border. That survey was discontinued on January 27, 2004 at the request of Washington.
Here’s the link:
http://www.judicialwatch.org/archive/2005/bpsurvey.pdf
For those who don’t want to read the 16 pages, here are the Cliff’s Notes on the survey:
*The Government only released half of the surveys. As bad as this information is, you wonder what they are hiding.
*Country of origin: 88% from Mexico (No big surprise. It is their border.)
*How long do you plan to stay?: More than a year- 43% Forever- 20%
*Have you heard the US is offering amnesty?: 61% said Yes
*Did the hope of amnesty influence your decision to come here?: 45% said Yes
*Will you apply for amnesty?: 81% said Yes
*Have you ever crossed illegally before?: 64% said Yes
*Do you plan to become a US Citizen?: 67% said Yes
*Do you plan to petition for other family members to come here?: 67% said Yes
Gee, I wonder why it took Judicial Watch 18 months to get Washington to release the information. You would think Bush would be proud that people in Mexico are following his programs and pronouncements. And it might have had an impact on the Presidential election.
All’s well that ends well, they say. Bush received lots of campaign cash from big business. He is also estimated to have won 40% of the Hispanic vote in November of 2004. As Henry Cate VII has said: “The problem with political jokes is they get elected.” Or as Ronald Reagan once said: “Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.”
Has anybody seen the latest approval ratings for the President and Congress? :)
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Bilingual field experience #1
My first visit was to a fourth grade class. When I entered the room I immediately noticed that everything was labeled in Spanish. You know how teachers put up index cards all around the room to identify “clock”, “door”, “East”, “desk”, etc. Well, this teacher had put up Spanish cards all over the room.
Secondly, I noticed that all the supplemental material in the room was in Spanish. So, when a student finished an assignment early or had free time, the material he would pick up would be in Spanish, be it a book or a magazine or a puzzle.
The teacher spoke English well, though there was a hint of an accent. The teacher’s aide spoke only Spanish.
(I want to interject here that the school district took annual trips to Mexico to recruit teachers. On at least one occasion they went to Spain. Teachers they recruited in foreign countries were given help with visas and relocation. They were also granted a two year grace period to get certified. They were required to get the TB test, but otherwise could teach without a certificate. I suggested to HR that they take a recruiting trip to BYU. There they would find students with fluency in whatever language they wanted and, considering Utah’s low teacher pay scale, some willing candidates to fill the positions. I was told that they sent information to BYU but weren’t interested in sending out a recruiter. I guess Mexico City makes for a better junket than Provo!)
Now, back to my visit. I was in the class for a couple of hours and most of the lesson was conducted in English, though I got the distinct impression that she was losing most of the group. I think the show was for me. In fact, one of the kids close by whispered to his classmate in Spanish, “Why so much English today?”
I speak Spanish but I wasn’t about to let the teacher know that.
The goal of transitional bilingual education is to preserve the native language and culture first, then add English to it. As for teaching American culture, that is off limits. We would be forcing our belief system on other groups and we are not imperialists. Whenever I talk to school teachers about this, I get very frustrated. They don’t get the distinction between invading another country and forcing them to follow our ways and expecting people to follow our customs in our country. Like I say, bilingual education thwarts assimilation.
Back to preserving the native language, the kids are being taught the parts of a flower in Spanish first, then in English. Now, they don’t know the parts of the flower in any language, so we teach them the terminology in their own tongue first, then help them translate the information into English. That doesn’t seem right to me. No wonder it takes 4-5 years!
So, this experience was a dog-and-pony show set up for my benefit. I wasn’t buying it. The teacher was focused on Spanish, the room was set up for Spanish, and the aide could not help model the English language because she hadn’t learned it. And she never would by sitting in a class like that. It was a waste of taxpayer money.
Secondly, I noticed that all the supplemental material in the room was in Spanish. So, when a student finished an assignment early or had free time, the material he would pick up would be in Spanish, be it a book or a magazine or a puzzle.
The teacher spoke English well, though there was a hint of an accent. The teacher’s aide spoke only Spanish.
(I want to interject here that the school district took annual trips to Mexico to recruit teachers. On at least one occasion they went to Spain. Teachers they recruited in foreign countries were given help with visas and relocation. They were also granted a two year grace period to get certified. They were required to get the TB test, but otherwise could teach without a certificate. I suggested to HR that they take a recruiting trip to BYU. There they would find students with fluency in whatever language they wanted and, considering Utah’s low teacher pay scale, some willing candidates to fill the positions. I was told that they sent information to BYU but weren’t interested in sending out a recruiter. I guess Mexico City makes for a better junket than Provo!)
Now, back to my visit. I was in the class for a couple of hours and most of the lesson was conducted in English, though I got the distinct impression that she was losing most of the group. I think the show was for me. In fact, one of the kids close by whispered to his classmate in Spanish, “Why so much English today?”
I speak Spanish but I wasn’t about to let the teacher know that.
The goal of transitional bilingual education is to preserve the native language and culture first, then add English to it. As for teaching American culture, that is off limits. We would be forcing our belief system on other groups and we are not imperialists. Whenever I talk to school teachers about this, I get very frustrated. They don’t get the distinction between invading another country and forcing them to follow our ways and expecting people to follow our customs in our country. Like I say, bilingual education thwarts assimilation.
Back to preserving the native language, the kids are being taught the parts of a flower in Spanish first, then in English. Now, they don’t know the parts of the flower in any language, so we teach them the terminology in their own tongue first, then help them translate the information into English. That doesn’t seem right to me. No wonder it takes 4-5 years!
So, this experience was a dog-and-pony show set up for my benefit. I wasn’t buying it. The teacher was focused on Spanish, the room was set up for Spanish, and the aide could not help model the English language because she hadn’t learned it. And she never would by sitting in a class like that. It was a waste of taxpayer money.
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