| A Brief Introduction to Second Language Education in America In 1968, the American government instituted the Title VII Bilingual Education Act which offered money from the federal-national level of government to individual public school districts for them to use to create programs to help deal with the growing number of children entering the American public school system who spoke limited or no English. With the money from Title VII, many school districts across America, and especially in areas with high immigrant populations instituted new programs to help immigrant and other non-English speaking children enter the American school system. For these children, called Limited English Proficiency(LEP) learners, or English Language Learners (ELL's), school is a special challenge and the government wanted them to be able to learn and grow alongside their English speaking schoolmates. The initial push of the Title VII program was towards what is called Bilingual Education, which means that the children learn at school in their own language while slowly switching over to English classes over a period of years. The idea is that if they learn math and science in Spanish, when their English skills become good enough they can use those same math and science skills in English in later years. The intent was to ease the children into English while still keeping them educated at their grade level. However, not all school districts could afford to institute bilingual programs or wished to put them into place because they required hard to find specially trained teachers and often there weren't enough students of a particular language group to justify spending the money for bilingual teachers. So instead many school boards chose to use a more traditional method of second language education, the English as a Second Language(ESL)/Immersion method, where the child is taught only in English and either spends all day or part of the day in a regular classroom depending on their needs. The ESL/Immersion method of teaching LEP learners was seen as more attractive both by school boards and by members of society who felt that in the United States children should only be studying in the language of the United States, English. So although the Title VII program encouraged Bilingual education, it didn't force districts to use bilingual education, and ESL/Immersion programs still continued to be the ones which were most commonly used. In the 1990's a movement started in the American public school system towards what is called Inclusion, this is where all children, including those who are physically, mentally or learning disabled, and including LEP learners, are taught together in the same room. The idea behind inclusion is that it allows children who have problems to grow up in a normal school environment where they will have chances to spend time with others of their age group without being separated in some way. To make this work, LEP children are "pulled out" of the classroom for some time each day for special help with English, but otherwise attend class normally like any other student. They are expected to try and keep up, even if they speak little English, and teachers hope that being surrounded by English all day will help to speed the LEP children's own English learning speed. In 1997 in California a Millionaire named Ron Unz started a movement which resulted in Proposition 227, which stated that the only language of California is English and that all education in California should also be in English. This proposition was in response to both the use of Bilingual education in some California school districts and growing social concerns that the large Spanish speaking minority of California was remaining "Spanish" and not becoming "American". Proposition 227 passed in California's legislature, and California became the first of several states including Oregon, Arizona and Rhode-Island to declare that their only official language is English. In 2002, the Federal Government under the Bush Administration made law their No Child Left Behind Act (NCLBA) which included in it Title III, the English Language Acquisition Act. The NCBLA replaced the laws of which Title VII was a part, so Title III became the new rules for any school district which receives money from the federal government, of which 95% of school districts do. Under Title III, all school districts in all States are given extra money to use to teach LEP learners and they are required to offer those children English language education programs if there are enough children in need to warrant special classes. However, Title III also requires that children be taught English as quickly as possible so they can participate in statewide standardized testing, and heavily encourages schools to use ESL/Immersion methods instead of Bilingual education methods. As well, the NCLBA also requires that all students, including LEP students participate in statewide standardized tests without special consideration because they have limited English ability. If a school's test scores do not improve over a 4 year period, the government will come to the school and make changes to fix what they see as a problem in the education there such as firing teachers and principals. LEP students have low test scores in English because it is not their first language, this makes them bad for schools who need to raise their test scores in order to meet government standards. And, in schools with high immigrant populations it means that they will not be able to raise their test scores enough to meet the government standards because LEP learners are simply not capable of passing the tests. This is the dilemma of NCLBA which America is facing today. Back to Main Page... |