'Mom, I'm a nino!': Georgia's first bilingual public school opens

Associated Press ^ | Aug. 26, 2006 | GIOVANNA DELL'ORTO

[VU4G10]

FOREST PARK, Ga. - On his first day of school, 5-year-old Al-Khafid Sharrieff Muhammad came home to tell his mom he didn't understand what anyone was saying in class. Just as she was second-guessing sending her child to Georgia's first dual language public school, he grinned and started rattling off all the Spanish words he learned.

"Do you know what a nino is? It's me," Rashida Muhammad recalled Al-Khafid as saying.

While the country is divided over the role of immigrants and the importance of a national language, some English- and Spanish-speaking parents in this Atlanta suburb are bypassing the debate by sending their children to Georgia's first bilingual public school, where the goal is to have all students literate in both languages by fifth grade.

Their motivations are as diverse as the little kids excitedly chatting with one another in Unidos Dual Language Charter School's one-story building in a residential neighborhood near Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

There are Hispanic immigrants who are worried their U.S.-born children will not know Spanish, and Americans who want to give their children a competitive edge, all spurring an increase in bilingual education across the country.

"I hope people start looking at a diversity of languages as a must, and stop looking at America as a one-language country," said Pedro Ruiz, president of the Washington-based National Association for Bilingual Education.

Teaching children in their native tongue as well as English has been common throughout U.S. history. The historical goal, like that of most language programs targeting immigrants, is to help students become more proficient in English without falling too far behind in coursework.

The predominance of English, however, has been the underlying value - with bilingual education losing ground whenever the debate over immigration heats up, said Donna Christian, president of the Center for Applied Linguistics. In May, the Senate passed two measures declaring English the nation's official, "common and unifying" language.

But the increasing desire to preserve the immigrants' heritage and the economic recognition that being bilingual is a plus on a resume is leading to a growing number of dual language schools like Unidos. There are more than 300 such programs in the U.S., the first of which opened in 1962 in Florida, and most teach Spanish and English, according to the Center for Applied Linguistics.

Those programs aim to make children equally literate in two idioms while sending the message that starting with a language other than English isn't an handicap.

"It encourages cross-cultural understanding," said James Crawford, an author on U.S. language policy and a founder of the Institute for Language and Education Policy. "Minority kids are no longer recognized as having a problem."

The 132 students at Unidos get about 70 percent of their reading, writing, social sciences and math in Spanish, and 30 percent in English, said school founder Dell Perry.

That balance scared away some English-speaking parents in this predominantly black county, where only about one out of 10 residents are of Hispanic descent. When Perry won approval from the Clayton County school board to open the charter school, she received several e-mails from people upset with the decision, including some who complained that "those people need to learn English."

Contrary to the perception that bilingual education is for immigrants who don't want to assimilate, two-thirds of Unidos students are English-speakers. They include some immigrants' children who are likely to forget their heritage tongue unless they keep studying it and others whose parents want them to learn Spanish because "it's sort of where things are going," Perry said.

The seven teachers, all of whom have at least a basic knowledge of both languages, use only one language in the classroom and rely on hand gestures, miming and lots of repetition to keep the children's attention.

During the first two weeks of school, they've been learning about colors, numbers, the month of August and the letters A and E - as well as about making friends with children from vastly different backgrounds.

"Kids who've never seen Hispanics before - they want to eat beside each other, they fight to sit beside each other," said Lynda Quinones, who teaches English at Unidos. "If it wasn't this environment, they'd probably be attacking each other."

As he was getting out of class one recent afternoon, David Mata, a 6-year-old whose parents immigrated from central Mexico 10 years ago, said shyly his favorites about school are learning to write, to draw and the two friends he's made.

His mother, Micaela Mata, who speaks English "more or less," said she hopes David will teach her because she was a teacher in Mexico and dreams of becoming one at Unidos. She wants David to be a "well-educated child" and have a job that's "not too hard," not one of the labor-intensive, blue-collar jobs that are typical among immigrants.

A vast majority of Hispanics at all educational levels believe that immigrants' children need to be taught English, according to a June survey by the Pew Hispanic Center. Similarly, many parents with no Hispanic ties are pushing for dual language schools because they realize knowing a foreign language is an asset, Ruiz said.

Yolanda Hood enrolled her 5-year-old son, Thaddeus, in Unidos with the hope he's young enough to learn Spanish effortlessly. She said that will help him thrive in a country that's increasingly diverse.

"We'd be really arrogant to expect everybody to speak English," she said.

[tsmith130]

On his first day of school, 5-year-old Al-Khafid Sharrieff Muhammad came home to tell his mom he didn't understand what anyone was saying in class. Just as she was second-guessing sending her child to Georgia's first dual language public school, he grinned and started rattling off all the Spanish words he learned.

My mind is on overload. In what language did little Al-Khafid Sharrieff Muhammad tell his mom this?

[NaughtiusMaximus]

And what, pray tell, is a "nino"?

[skeeter]

"We'd be really arrogant to expect everybody to speak English," she said.

Oh brother. Its all over but the cryin'.

[Mr. Buzzcut]

Georgia?!

We're doomed.

[raybbr]

Yolanda Hood enrolled her 5-year-old son, Thaddeus, in Unidos with the hope he's young enough to learn Spanish effortlessly. She said that will help him thrive in a country that's increasingly diverse.

Sad. She's bought into the "new America".

THE "NEW AMERICAN"..........<

We are now one of the largest Spanish-speaking nations in the world. We're a major source of Latin music, journalism and culture.

Just go to Miami, or San Antonio, Los Angeles, Chicago or West New York, New Jersey ... and close your eyes and listen. You could just as easily be in Santo Domingo or Santiago, or San Miguel de Allende.

For years our nation has debated this change -- some have praised it and others have resented it. By nominating me, my party has made a choice to welcome the new America.

As I speak, we are celebrating the success of democracy in Mexico.

George Bush from a campaign speech in Miami, August 2000.

You can read the speech here.

Here is an excerpt of a good critique of that speech:

In equating our intimate historic bonds to our mother country and to Canada with our ties to Mexico, W. shows a staggering ignorance of the civilizational facts of life. The reason we are so close to Britain and Canada is that we share with them a common historical culture, language, literature, and legal system, as well as similar standards of behavior, expectations of public officials, and so on. My Bush Epiphany By Lawrence Auster

The Path to National Suicide by Lawrence Auster (1990)

An essay on multi-culturalism and immigration.

[Stayingawayfromthedarkside]

Hey Yolanda, Do they say this in Mexico, "We'd be really arrogant to expect everyone to speak Spanish"? crickets chirpping..... I didn't think so. This is another reason I refuse to learn Spanish. I bet Yolanda would have a problem with her child learning Russian or say Arabic. What bunch of crap. CLOSE THE BORDER!!!

[kinoxi]

The 132 students at Unidos get about 70 percent of their reading, writing, social sciences and math in Spanish, and 30 percent in English, said school founder Dell Perry. That balance scared away some English-speaking parents in this predominantly black county, where only about one out of 10 residents are of Hispanic descent.
70% spanish in an area of 10% Hispanic descent. I've got a motto for the 'school'.
"Creating tomorrows dissent...today!".

[ElkGroveDan]

This is what has driven other nations to civil war. Even Canada came close during the 70s with Quebec's own terror groups and federal troups stationed in suburban neighborhoods -- all over the spoken language.

These people think this is all cute and warm, fuzzy PC. It's not.

[brytlea]

A little boy.
susie

[raybbr]

Teaching children in their native tongue as well as English has been common throughout U.S. history.

What a crock. There was no Serbian or Czechoslovakian or Polish taught when I went to school.

[Mogollon]

"I hope people start looking at a diversity of languages as a must, and stop looking at America as a one-language country," said Pedro Ruiz.

Well Pedro, the less the U.S. is like other spanish-speaking countries the better. Ninety percent of them aren't even 1st world countries.

[Kakaze]

" "We'd be really arrogant to expect everybody to speak English," she said."

God forbid we expect them to learn the language of the free world.

[Cobra64]

American peso.

[Cobra64]

A little boy. susie

Is that like a boy named Sue?

[Cardhu]

And what, pray tell, is a "nino"?

It is niño - pronounced as ninyo - a little boy.

[Fiddlstix]

And what, pray tell, is a "nino"?

A misspelling of "niño".
Pronounced like Neen-yoe

It means little boy.

[BenLurkin]

Stupidity.

[ElkGroveDan]

Front de liberation du Quebec

The FLQ was a group of Quebcois founded in February of 1963, ....

Members and sympathizers of the group were called Felquistes , a word coined from the French pronunciation of the letters FLQ. Some of the members were organized and trained by Schoeters, a Belgian revolutionary and alleged KGB agent, whose hero was Che Guevara. At least two of the FLQ members had also received guerrilla training in selective assassination from Palestinian commandos in Jordan. .... The latter two of these cells were involved in what became known as the "October Crisis," the first terrorist crisis in modern Canadian history.

From 1963 to 1970, the FLQ committed over 200 violent political actions, including bombings, bank hold-ups and at least three killings by FLQ bombs and two killings by gunfire. In 1963, Gabriel Hudon and Raymond Villeneuve were sentenced to 12 years in prison for crimes against the state after their bomb killed Sgt. O'Neill, a watchman at Montreal's Canadian Army Recruitment Centre. By 1970, twenty-three members of the FLQ were in jail, including four convicted murderers, and one member had been killed by his own bomb. Targets included English owned businesses, banks, McGill University, Loyola College, and the homes of prominent English speakers in the wealthy Westmount area of the city. On February 13, 1969 the Front de liberation du Quebec set off a powerful bomb that ripped through the Montreal Stock Exchange causing massive destruction and seriously injuring twenty-seven people.

As a Marxist group, the FLQ was also opposed to the United States' ruling class and one cell supposedly plotted to blow up the Statue of Liberty, but they were apprehended before this could occur.

In 1966 a secret eight-page document titled Revolutionary Strategy and the Role of the Avant-Garde was prepared by the FLQ outlining its long term strategy of successive waves of robberies, violence, bombings and kidnappings, culminating in insurrection and revolution.

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