FORT WORTH, Texas— Cecilia Silva’s first assignment in high school was to read Chaucer, not in Spanish but English.
Though Silva had just arrived in California from Colombia, where Spanish is the native language, she said she had no problems learning in English. More than 30 years after arriving in the U.S., Silva serves as an associate professor for the Center for Urban Education at Texas Christian University’s College of Education and excels the English language.
“From an academic perspective, being in a bilingual program supported me in terms of my academic life,” Silva said referring to the bilingual education she had in Colombia.
Silva now wants the same for children whose native language isn’t English—a bilingual education for academic success.
With rising Hispanic population — 45.5 million in the U.S. and 8.6 million in Texas according to the latest estimate released August 2008 by the U.S. Census Bureau— Texas law requires each school district with an enrollment of 20 or more limited-English proficient students in the same grade level district-wide to offer a bilingual education program.
Margaret Balandran, executive director of the bilingual program of Fort Worth Independent School District, said in an e-mail, the district has implemented research based dual language program for its English language learners.
Becky Cruz, coordinator of the bilingual program in the FWISD said bilingual education is offered in Fort Worth not only to comply with the state law but also in the best interest of the students.
“It’s a legal issue, and we are a bilingual state,” Cruz said.
The district had a traditional bilingual program from pre-K to grade five, Cruz said. Now, it has a dual language program from pre-K to grade one and traditional bilingual program from grades two to three. The dual language program is still in transition and will be extended through the fifth grade. The program is mainly conducted in Spanish because of the majority—more than 20 — of the Spanish-speaking students in all classes.
In a dual language program, students are taught emphasizing on their native language, and in a traditional bilingual program, they are mainly taught in English using minimal Spanish.
Speaking on the effectiveness of the dual language program, Cruz said: “We celebrate that (first language of students) and use it as a strength to move the child forward. It is a big shift in paradigm. We have to understand that (their native) language is a strength, and the child will get better because of that strength.”
Maria Moon, FWISD’s bilingual staff development specialist, said starting the dual language program at an elementary level gives children more time to learn and thus make progress as the academic rigor increases when they move to higher grades.
In FWISD, there are 49 elementary schools with bilingual language programs that help educate Hispanics.
At Sagamore Hill Elementary School, one of FWISD’s schools with bilingual program, posters such as “Yo se le qu vieno- Are you ready?” in the hallway and instructional charts in English and Spanish in classrooms were evident of the bilingual education.
In grade two, Irlinda Raza, teaches science. Though she teaches science safety rules in English, some 7 and 8 year olds in blue and white uniforms asked questions and talked to each other in Spanish. Raza helped these students, most of them with limited English proficiency, in comprehending the subject with hand gestures and repetitive instructions in English and Spanish when necessary.
“We do it (teach) very slowly, repetitive because it’s higher-level English for them,” Raza said.
Cruz sees no difficulties in educating limited-English speaking students. She thinks it’s a way to enhance their academic progress.
“We want to look at students coming with strengths, and we’re going to tap into the strengths they have,” Cruz said. “We’re going to use those strengths as we teach them in their first language and then transferring it to the second language.”
Moon said teachers with special skills who are bilingually certified from the Texas Education Agency help run the program. Speaking with personal experience of being a bilingual teacher, she said children with limited English skills learn better when placed in a bilingual class.
“My philosophy comes from instructional practices from classrooms, and seeing how well children learn and how much they can achieve academically if they are instructed in their native language while they’re learning English,” Moon said.
During her 13 years of teaching, Raza said she sees an improvement in bilingual education.
Parents who speak Spanish want their children to learn English early, Raza said. Starting at an early age gives them more time to prepare themselves for integrating into the larger community. Also, modern technology such as TV and the Internet are also helping the bilingual children to learn English.
However, there are parents and groups who do not want their children placed in a bilingual program, Cruz said.
According to a story in the Dallas Morning News, leading Hispanic civil rights groups – League of United Latin American Citizens and GI Forum, a congressionally-chartered Mexican American veterans organization—filed a petition last year arguing the Texas bilingual/ESL programs are inadequate and have contributed to low test scores and high drop-out rate among limited-English students, especially Hispanics.
But U.S. District Judge William Wayne Justice ruled in July 2007 that the state’s programs for limited-English students comply with federal law and actually are achieving some success for children in elementary grades. The ruling thus allowed public schools in Texas to continue educating through the same bilingual programs that were in effect.
According to a research funded by the U.S. Department of Education, Virginia P. Collier and Wayne P. Thomas studied 23 school districts in 15 states from 1996 to 2002. The research showed that formal schooling in native language contributes to strong achievement in second language, which typically is English. Also, the research showed bilingual school students outperformed monolingual students in academic achievement after 4 to 7 years of dual language schooling.
Balandran agreed and said the program will make students “bilingual, biliterate and bicultural.”
“Our expectation is that they will outperform native English speakers,” she said.
Silva stands as an example to this.
Being in a bilingual program not only broadened her global perspectives but also helped achieve academic success in a non-native language—English, Silva said. And as a parent, she wanted her children to have access to more than one language to compete in a globalized world. She stressed the importance of bilingual programs in all schools from an early level.
“If the U.S. is going to compete in global economics, the notion of bilingualism should be a part of the conversation,” Silva said.