Thread: Spanish Program Being Expanded in Schools

http://www.heraldsun.com/state/6-625680.html

Spanish pilot program being expanded Miss. school district
Jul 12, 2005 : 9:29 am ET

HERNANDO, Miss. -- A pilot program that teaches Spanish to students at five DeSoto County elementary schools will be expanded this upcoming school year.

DeSoto County officials said 11 schools will be added to the program that uses a teleconferencing system.

Martha McIntosh, director of management information systems for the school district, said the district hopes to hire three additional Spanish teachers within the month to help implement the expanded program.

"All 11 of the new schools in the program will be operational at the end of this month," McIntosh said.

She and other school officials met with Leonard Salley, president of VisiCom Corp., last week. VisiCom is headquartered in Stone Mountain, Ga., and has statewide video conferencing contracts in North Carolina, South Carolina and Mississippi.

Tina Streeter, distance learning coordinator for the district, said about 200 students in kindergarten through fifth grade were taught last year by teacher Kristi Burns.

Burns said adding 11 new schools to the program will cost about $143,000. Hiring teachers for those classes would cost the district more than $600,000 in salaries alone.

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Information from: DeSoto Times Today, http://www.desototimes.com

This just drives me UP THE WALL. How can their school system afford to be teaching Spanish?? There should be NO NEED for OUR children to learn Spanish. They need to set up schools on the border to teach the Hispanics how to speak English and they would have to master it before they got to 1st base.

This story isn't clear of why the program is being expanded.

Being multi-lingual can be helpful. The question that needs to be asked is what is the most beneficial 2nd language for students to learn. I'd argues that it isn't Spanish.

Right now, the government doesn't need Spanish speakers--it needs loyal Americans who can speak Arabic, Chinese, Korean, and Russian.

What's happening in the US is that businesses are catering to the 20 million illegals, basically forcing employees to have to learn Spanish if they want a job. So the tail is wagging the dog.

That's the problem when the bottom-line focus of the marketplace take priority over what's best for the country.

If they implemented this in my kid’s school i would be pitching a fit about it. Child of that age are there to learn English material for when they want to learn another language they have that right in H.S. or college. It shouldn’t be offered 1st grade to 5th it serves no point. Now who is being assimilated? It would seem that we are being assimilated into accepting them. Not going to happen.

Pro

You are absolutely right, PRO! I would be raising immortal if my elementary school age child was being FORCED to learn Spanish. That does sound like we are forcing AMERICAN children to assimilate as opposed to what SHOULD be happening. This is AMERICA. If ANYONE whose language is other than English chooses to come to our country LEGALLY, it should be MANDATORY that they master the ENGLISH language. In fact, much more time should be spent helping our children actually MASTER their mother tongue so that we could put a stop to the "street talk" that we so often hear.

Originally Posted by Prometheus

If they implemented this in my kid’s school i would be pitching a fit about it. Child of that age are there to learn English material for when they want to learn another language they have that right in H.S. or college. It shouldn’t be offered 1st grade to 5th it serves no point. Now who is being assimilated? It would seem that we are being assimilated into accepting them. Not going to happen.

Pro

It is well known that foreign languages can be more easily learned when a child is younger, and this is why some schools are more and more including foreign language instruction in the curriculum. With Hispanics making up the largest minority and ever growing, knowledge of the Spanish language may turn out to be a wise investment.

By the way, "pitching a fit" is not a good example of behavior that you should be demonstrating to your child.

That is BS and English is the first language of this country, if those that want to learn another language they can do that when they offer it in H.S. and in College. It is unacceptable to force young ones to have learned a language of group that is here because they are here. My Irish ancestry had to learn English when they came here and no one was expected to learn the Irish language. All you want are our children assimilate into and accepting the Hispanics as equals. I am sorry but you know what they will never be equal as along as those that come here are coming here illegally. Your wise investment is nothing more than an acceptance that we acknowledge those that are here and refuse to assimilate.

Thank you

Pro

Originally Posted by Prometheus

If they implemented this in my kid’s school i would be pitching a fit about it. Child of that age are there to learn English material for when they want to learn another language they have that right in H.S. or college. It shouldn’t be offered 1st grade to 5th it serves no point. Now who is being assimilated? It would seem that we are being assimilated into accepting them. Not going to happen.

Pro

I totally agree with you. More and more students are 'passing' high school english, without even learning how to pronunciate, add comas, quotes, accents, etc. They don't know the difference between saying 'nothing v. anything'. 'Ain't is frequently used in a sentence and it's not even a word. Maybe 'ain't' is in a dictionary now, but it was never a word. If it is, what does this abreviated word stand for; 'a is not' or ' a isn't'? Kids need to get back to learning the basics of the english language before they can tackle a second language. And for any of you who want to correct my english, I already will admit that over the years, I have lost my ability to properly use comas, quotes, semi-colons, etc.,
so don't bother tyring.

Hey Butterbean, you misspelled "commas."

He he!

It AIN'T no big deal though. :P

Our teachers, back in the dinosaur age when I grew up, would say "ain't fell in a bucket of paint long years ago."

It seems "ain't" has now crawled back out of that bucket.

Originally Posted by butterbean

Originally Posted by Prometheus

If they implemented this in my kid’s school i would be pitching a fit about it. Child of that age are there to learn English material for when they want to learn another language they have that right in H.S. or college. It shouldn’t be offered 1st grade to 5th it serves no point. Now who is being assimilated? It would seem that we are being assimilated into accepting them. Not going to happen.

Pro

I totally agree with you. More and more students are 'passing' high school english, without even learning how to pronunciate, add comas, quotes, accents, etc. They don't know the difference between saying 'nothing v. anything'. 'Ain't is frequently used in a sentence and it's not even a word. Maybe 'ain't' is in a dictionary now, but it was never a word. If it is, what does this abreviated word stand for; 'a is not' or ' a isn't'? Kids need to get back to learning the basics of the english language before they can tackle a second language. And for any of you who want to correct my english, I already will admit that over the years, I have lost my ability to properly use comas, quotes, semi-colons, etc.,
so don't bother tyring.

Butter,
Good point. I didn’t even think about that. We have these so called schools that are behind and having problems passing students and some want to introduce another language? I don’t think so, we need to focus on one language and if those that are successful want to learn another language then so be it. Another language shouldn’t be learned to accommodate others than refuse to learn the standard language. When someone goes to another country they are expected to learn that language if they expect to work or visit.

Pro