Immigrants' stories not foreign to kids
Thursday, February 14th 2008, 12:04 PM

Anita Hot, 9, whose parents are from former Yugoslavia, quizzes Juan RodrÃ*guez about baseball dreams he harbored in his native Dominican Republic at PS 199 in Long Island City.
It's a wonder immigrants in the U.S. haven't been blamed for global warming. After all, from the crumbling economy to increases in crime, they've been accused of just about every other of society's ills.

Which is why walking on Tuesday into teachers Joe Briscat and Kristen Grolimund's fourth-grade class at Public School 199 in Long Island City was so uplifting. Their students are lively, smart, curious and diverse, everything you would expect from New York kids. And as it can happen only in this city, particularly in Queens, they - or their parents - come from 11 different countries.

"Raise your hand if your parents came from a foreign country," the group of 24 9-and 10-year-olds was asked. All the students did.

There was Anita, a self-assured 9-year-old with big green eyes who wants to be a doctor. A Muslim, she was wearing a beautiful gold head scarf.

"My parents are from Yugoslavia, but I was born here. I am a citizen," she said proudly.

And there was Ã