I periodically teach art classes on "art day" in elementary schools here in southern California. At the school that I was sent to today I was horrified to discover that in one of the 2nd grade classes, only Spanish was being spoken. ALL of the textbooks, calenders, breaktime reading materials, handwritten messages on the chalkboard were all in Spanish. The teacher in this public school was speaking only Spanish to the kids. I tried to tactfully ask about this and she indicated that this was the classroom for kids who only speak Spanish to gradually being introduced to English. Seeing no hint of English anywhere in the room I asked how they were learning English and she said "oh we have a special English speaking time at the end of the day". This time turns out to be a whole 20 minutes of English. But in reality this was a classroom full of 8 yr olds who where getting their American education, paid for with my tax dollars in Spanish. These were such sweet kids that I could not teach adequately because everything I said had to be interpreted by their teacher into Spanish. I don't think these kids are being done any favors by making it easy to not have to learn English in school.