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Show Spanish immersion program aids students ; parental support asked "This is not an experimental program. Its success is well established. The key is good teachers and a well thought out curriculum." said Dr. Ray Graham regarding the Spanish immersion program. Dr. Graham, a linguistics professor at BYU, addressed parents at the Manila Elementary School recently to inform and answer an-swer questions regarding bilingual education. According to Dr. Graham, all research previous to 1967 indicated that bilingual children did poorly on school tests, intelligence tests, etc. compared to their monolingual counterparts. That was until Wallace Lambert, a psychologist from Canada, conducted con-ducted carefully controlled tests. He matched monolingual and bilingual children from the Quebec area according to their intelligence, socio-economic backgrounds, age and other variables. His research, and the research of others since then, indicates that bilingual children do at least as well as their monolingual peers, and in many instances better. Wallace also discovered that the greater the education and wealth of the parents, the higher the achievement of their bilingual children. "We are almost arrogantly monolingual in this country, although currently there has been more interest in speaking a second language," said Graham. Graham cited that over .600,000 children in Canada are involved in bilingual immersion programs. These same immersion programs have sprung up across the United States offering education in German, Ger-man, Spanish, French and Chinese. Graham stated that he would have no qualms about enrolling his own children in such a program and is currently pushing for a Spanish immersion program in his daughter's elementary school. Graham related that research from all over indicates that upper middle class children who are bilingual are actually enhanced intellectually. According to Graham, the fourth grade students at Cherry Hills Elementary in Orem tested higher in their language skills than several third and fourth year students in the BYU Spanish program. Many of those BYU students had served Spanish-speaking missions. "A parent shouldn't think he can't help or support his child in such a program just because he himself doesn't know a second language," said Graham. He suggests that a parent read to his child, let his child read to him, and then talk about what they have read. Parents can also find resource material in the BYU library and support from community education classes. He also encourages parents to form support groups where they can lobby, outline unified curriculum goals, aid teachers and create floating textbook libraries between schools to help cut expense. According Ac-cording to Graham, bilingual programs are only slightly more expensive than regular programs. Graham said that the success of the Spanish immersion program will depend on parents who are willing "to go to bat for it." And that it always make a difference "when parents are involved and pushing for education." Later in the meeting, Evelyn McNair, president of Parents for Spanish Immersion, introduced Carol Rawson, the new second grade teacher. Miss Rawson is from Wyoming and has served an LDS mission to Guatemala. She graduated from BYU last week. She expressed excitement to be involved in the bilingual immersion program at Manila Elementary. Diana Call, chairman of Parents for Spanish Immersion, announced that she and America Chumpitaz, the first grade teacher, are collaborating in putting together Spanish booklets and tapes for the children to use during the summer. The instructional material will help the children to retain their Spanish vocabulary during vacation and assist parents in working with their children. The charge for the materials will be kept to the cost of producing them. The booklets and tapes will also be available to parents whose children will be entering Spanish immersion next fall. |
