Losing Ground (Hispanic children fall behind their peers in cognitive skills quickly, a study finds)

National Review ^ | 10/29/2009 | Heather Macdonald

[SeekAndFind]

A forthcoming study on Hispanic children’s cognitive skills underlines the challenges the country faces in aspiring to close the achievement gap between these children and their white and Asian counterparts. Hispanic “children fall behind their peers in mental development by the time they reach grade school, and the gap tends to widen as they get older,” reports the New York Times. “The drop-off in the cognitive scores of Hispanic toddlers, especially those from Mexican backgrounds, was steeper than for other [low-income] groups and could not be explained by economic status alone. . . . From 24 to 36 months, the Hispanic children fell about six months behind their white peers on measures like word comprehension, more complex speech and working with their mothers on simple tasks.”

This new study, from the University of California–Berkeley, may be unusually blunt in its assessment of Hispanic cognitive development, but it is hardly unprecedented. A 2004 study by the California Legislative Analyst’s Office found a similar decline in Hispanic students’ ability to keep up with their peers in learning English. Children from Mandarin- and Spanish-speaking households begin kindergarten with similar levels of English proficiency, but their paths quickly diverge. The Mandarin-speaking students make continuing progress in mastering English, while the Hispanic students’ advance stalls out in the second and third grades as the demands of California’s English-proficiency test grow more difficult. Mandarin kindergartners establish oral skills in English in one year, the legislative analyst found, and by the beginning of second grade, they have begun developing a mastery of reading and writing, unlike Hispanics. The widening English-proficiency gap between Asian and Hispanic students may reflect parental willingness to expose children to English at home, but the gap occurs in math as well.

This summer in Southern California, I observed Hispanic students who had been taught in English throughout their school careers, yet who possessed very weak formal language ability. An in-class reading assignment at Locke High School in Watts asked students to answer the question: “Why is it important to use all your skills during your teen years?” A ninth-grader wrote in response: “To make it better.” Another question, “What sudden insight came to the engineer?” elicited the answer: “How to put the little mirrors.” While diagnosing the student-written sentence, “The pigs squealed loudly because the’re [sic] bored at the barn,” a high-school English teacher in Santa Ana asked his class: “Why does the dependent clause need to be in the past tense?” A student answered: “Because you’re talking about a lot of people.”

The Berkeley researchers speculate that the early decline in Hispanic students’ language and reasoning skills may reflect inadequate maternal stimulation in the home. And indeed, a Santa Ana elementary-school principal recounted to me her largely unsuccessful efforts to get parents to teach their children such basic kindergarten-survival tools as cutting with scissors and the words for colors. “Kids come in not knowing the alphabet in Spanish or the sounds of Spanish,” she said. “They use three-word sentences; they come in without oral-language ability.”

The Berkeley study will inevitably be used to buttress the Obama administration’s plans to pour billions of federal taxpayer dollars into early-education programs. As a matter of education policy, such efforts represent wishful thinking. Head Start has been repeatedly shown to have no lasting effect on students’ academic performance. Even the most successful and lavishly-funded of such early-intervention programs — the iconic Perry Preschool Project from the early 1960s in Ypsilanti, Mich. — explained only 3 percent of the earnings of its participants at age 40, and about 4 percent of their educational-attainment levels, wrote John J. Miller in NR in 2007. Replicating the Perry Project’s services on a national scale for Hispanic children would be extraordinarily expensive and produce only modest results. Many children who receive early intervention provide inferior intellectual stimulation for their own children, whether for innate cognitive or for cultural reasons.

But the more interesting implications of the study and others like it are for immigration policy. Our de facto immigration policy is currently weighted to a population that appears to require massive additional government education spending — even before formal schooling begins — to be made academically competitive. This choice would not seem to be economically rational, at least so long as we aspire to universal college-going. If the country remains committed to sending a far greater number of students to college, as even many conservatives continue to be, we better get ourselves a different mix of immigrants if we don’t want to bankrupt our education budgets. Alternatively, if the open-borders lobby prevails and Latin American migration continues to dominate our immigration flows, it’s time to acknowledge that many students never will be college material, nor do they need to be to lead productive, fulfilling lives.

— Heather Mac Donald is the John M. Olin fellow at the Manhattan Institute and co-author of The Immigration Solution.

[SoConPubbie]

It’s the Culture Stupid!

[C19fan]

Anybody really shocked this is happening considering we are importing the bottom of the rung from 3rd World cesspits. Lots of these parents are illiterate in their own language and if see the type of programming on Spanish language TV there is a disntinct lack of anything of educational value. I visited Guatemala City and was shocked at the total lack of bookstores or libraries.

[twigs]

My guess is that one major reason is the attitude of the respective parents toward education. Asians highly value education and go a long way to encourage their children to do well and to prepare for higher education. Hispanics do not value education as highly and would rather see their children leave high school and enter the work force. Many Hispanics are holding onto their native language more.

[Personal Responsibility]

Yet another survey that proves common sense right.

It’s very likely that the Mandarin speaking Chinese kids are forced by parents to learn English because classes are not provided in Mandarin.

It’s equally likely that Spanish speaking Mexican kids are not forced by parents to learn English because classes are provided in Spanish.

The problem is not lack of funding. The problem is that bi-lingual education creates the exact situation it was founded to remove. By giving the kids and parents the safety net of not having to learn English, bi-lingual education keeps kids learning in Spanish.

[Julia H.]

I wouldn’t be too quick to chalk this up to race/ethnicity. The parents usually speak less English than the kids do, and because they often can’t understand the kids’ homework assignments, it’s hard for them to get fully involved in their kids’ education. It isn’t necessarily for lack of trying.

[2banana]

Learn ENGLISH as soon as possible

[Pessimist]

Ok, I’ll be the one to say it. Maybe it’s genetic.

Why do people dance around that issue so much? If it’s common knowledge that “white men can’t jump”, then why can’t other racial characteristics be mentioned?

[originalbuckeye]

I suspect part of this is social promotion. In the mid-90’s, in Southern California, an elementary school teacher friend told me she could not hold back any student unless their parents agreed. I was shocked. I said ‘what if they can't do the work?’ She said it didn't matter. They were passed on if that's what their parents wanted.The Hispanic population was a big part of the ‘passing on’. Very sad. Not preparing students for life.

[PGR88]

It’s not merely “the Culture.”

The USA has set up a perverse system whereby we incentivize not the “best and the brightest” but the “worst and the dullest” to come to the USA. We have created a system where we are seeking to recruit Mexico’s lowest strata for our own welfare class.

It like the Mariel Boatlift all over again, but instead, US policy is asking for it.

[TexasFreeper2009]

I don't understand this whole “Hispanic” label thing.

There is NO Hispanic race.

There are only native Americans, and the descendants of Spanish colonizers.

[DYngbld]

I worked on some schools in Guatemala last year. I met with some of the teachers, most had teaching degrees from the US and had returned to teach. It was nice to see the work (for little pay) they were doing, but it was also sad that so many of the adults there had a very sub-par educations. The children in general got 100% of the teaching at the school.

[squarebarb]

‘lack of bookstores’

Same in Mexico, no bookstores, very few public libraries and those that exist are in terrible shape w/ few books, I don’t get it, in Mexico people just don’t read except local newspapers with big horrible pictures of the latest machetero attack, apparently the public loves big bloody fotos

[Alberta's Child]

That's a good point, but it also underscores just how important it is to get these kids immersed in English as early as possible.

When I was in first grade we had a new classmate who was a recent immigrant. He came from a family where no English was spoken (only Spanish). We had no bilingual education back then (late 1970s) in my home town.

By the time this kid was in third grade his English was perfect -- and I mean PERFECT to the point where you never would have known that Spanish was his native language.

Years later, he told me that he learned English himself as a young kid by watching Sesame Street every day after school. This kid was 6-7 years old, mind you.

[Julia H.]

Agreed. If solid efforts were made to make sure native Spanish speakers learned English as early as possible, they could actually have an intellectual leg-up on their monolingual peers, because learning languages helps the brain develop connections that are hard to make later in life. The prime time to learn new languages is early childhood. It’s bogus that most American kids don’t get to study foreign languages in-depth until middle or even high school.

[junta]

Studies like this are killing the Libertarian’s Magic Borders theories.

[DH]

I was going to write a comment on this but words fail me. The common sense solution is so apparent that I will just leave it alone.

I guess the English speaking people know what it is.

[wardaddy]

how do we know if they fell behind if they were behind to begin with

they are behind in their native land too

look who runs Mexico

[purpleporter]

Ok, I’ll be the one to say it. Maybe it’s genetic.

Why do people dance around that issue so much? If it’s common knowledge that “white men can’t jump”, then why can’t other racial characteristics be mentioned?

---

Because only white people can be tagged with negative qualities.

Also interesting is the fact that Mexico as a whole continues to do poorly compared to other nations, always has. The same can be said with many African countries.

The liberal answer? Just throw more of our money towards the problem.

The naked truth? There is only so much that can be done to bump up educational scores. It is what it is.

[LonePalm]

They should adopt the American culture, learn and use English if they want to succeed here.

Behaviors that work in one society do not necessarily work in another.

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

[Cicero]

Nature or nurture? We really don't know. And frankly it's amazing that anyone was even allowed to publish this study, since it raises awkward questions for the politically correct.

People may remember Charles Murray's book, which was perhaps the most politically incorrect book ever written:

It remains, however, that although all men are born equal, some are innately more intelligent than others. A functional family and a proper upbringing can certainly improve school performance, but anyone who has ever attended school knows that some kids are smarter than others. This doesn't make them better or worse. But it is not productive to ignore reality and pretend that all people are the same, because they are not.

It is also observable that among the stupidest people on the planet are academic intelligentsia and Harvard Lawyers. They are very competent in some ways, but pretty dismal in others.

In other words, stop trying to pretend that every child in the country is exactly the same. Some will be happier doing intellectual jobs. Some will be happier doing manual jobs. If you pretend that they are all alike you will merely succeed in holding back the most capable and turning them into mediocre little products of the public education mill.

Are Mexicans inherently dumber than Americans? I doubt it, but it may be that there is a sorting process that brings the most dysfunctional of them here because they cannot make it in their own country. It also brings the Mexican drug dealers, some of whom may be very smart indeed, but not in a way we would want.

[Paradox]

Ok, I’ll be the one to say it. Maybe it’s genetic.

Maybe, and perhaps it is a particular trait of the less well off Mexicans. As for this applying to "Hispanics".. that is a troubling term really, because you can say an Argentine is Hispanic, but trust me, there is a world of difference between an Argentine and a Mexican. My parents are from another part of South America, and we are a family of high-IQ's. Then again, we were far different CULTURALLY than poor Hispanics, my father was rather well off and made alot of money (yes, legally :)

[YankeeReb]

You beat me to it. Thats exactly right, how many classes are taught in Mandarin. None so the kids are forced to learn English. OTOH not only do we have Spanish classes, but TV shows , signs (go to any Home Depot) and of course we have to “Press #1 for English”.

[La Lydia]

Exactly. The people we are allowing to immigrate here are the dregs of the dregs in their own societies. The educated and the productive don’t need to immigrate. We are taking in the world’s garbage and wondering why it isn’t turning to gold despite our best, very expensive efforts. Our immigration policies work against, not for, our county.

[purpleporter]

Are Mexicans inherently dumber than Americans? I doubt it, but it may be that there is a sorting process that brings the most dysfunctional of them here because they cannot make it in their own country.
___________________________________________

I like your overall post. But how come their country has always performed pretty badly compared to other countries. I think their ENTIRE country is dysfunctional.

[ZULU]

The reason for this is there are too many people coming into the Country right now from illegal sources. Its overwhelming our capacity to absorb and educate them. Its preventing cultural and social assimilation, a key requirement for a successful integrated society. That was done succesfully with earlier immigrant groups in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s beacause the flow was controlled and the people coming in were expected to assimilate to some degree.

In Ancient Rome, they faced the same situation as the Empire aged. Initially, newly added people were given time for social acculturation and their influx actually strengthened the empire. The Army was one of the main elements for accomplishing this.

After the brutal civil wars of the later Empire, entire tribes of foreigners were conscripted into the army to replace losses among Roman troops, allowed to speak their own language in combat, and served under their own chieftains. The need and opportunity for social acculturation ceased to exist and it contributed to the Empire’s collapse.

We should take a warning from history.

[purpleporter]

Also, how in the hell did Australia do so well ex-convicts??

[ZULU]

“Are Mexicans inherently dumber than Americans? I doubt it, but it may be that there is a sorting process that brings the most dysfunctional of them here because they cannot make it in their own country.”

I disagree. It brings the most impoverished which is not the same thing. There is no correlation between poverty and intelligence or functionality. But Mexico is deliberately exporting its social problems - the poor - here and using them as a conduit for American dollars to prop up their flawed, racially strangled society and government.

We need to control the number and nature of immigrants coming here. Its OUR Country, not Mexico's nor the U.N.’s.

If we control the number of new arrivals from impoverished Mexico, and encourage immigration of skilled and educated workers from Mexico and other sources, we will enhance their ability overall to be educated and acculturated here.

But its critical that we stop the immense flood of people coming here illegally. We are not, and should not be, the Welfare Provider for the entire globe.

[khnyny]

Good historical points.

IIRC, in the later history of the Empire, didn’t many wealthy Romans pay non-citizens to take their place in the Roman army? Serving in the military was a part of the Roman civic duty, but that concept disintegrated in later years which was one contributing factor to their demise.

[purpleporter]

Hi,

Sorry that wasn't me that wrote the genetic part. I will use quotes next time. Or better yet can you tell me how to italicize someone’s quote?

I know there is a huge difference between an Argentine and a Mexican.

[LonePalm]

It is the duty of the immigrant to educate themselves assimilate into the new society. It is NOT the duty of the society to provide for assimilation.

We need to remove EVERY illegal immigrant from the country. They may take their dependents born here with them but those dependents should lose any citizenship claims if they leave the country.

I agree that we need to control immigration. I would be all in favor of a fenced and mined southern border.

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

[tumblindice]

http://www.edsource.org/pub_howCAcompares9-08.html

“Overall, it ranks among the lowest on NAEP (the “nation’s report card”), but its scores are much closer to the U.S. average if English learners’ results are excluded.”

[tumblindice]

“Danke shoen Mississippi!” Gov. Ahnuld Blackhead

[AuntB]

” We need to control the number and nature of immigrants coming here. Its OUR Country, not Mexico’s nor the U.N.’s.

If we control the number of new arrivals from impoverished Mexico, and encourage immigration of skilled and educated workers from Mexico and other sources, we will enhance their ability overall to be educated and acculturated here.

But its critical that we stop the immense flood of people coming here illegally. We are not, and should not be, the Welfare Provider for the entire globe. “

BTT!

[Cheetahcat]

Not true Tattooing and spray can skills are up there.

[gubamyster]

ping

[Hardastarboard]

It seems to me that all of the former Spanish colonies, including Spain itself, have not done as well as the former English colonies. I suspect that it’s something to do with the differences between the cultures of the Spanish colonizers versus English colonizers, but I haven’t come to an understanding of the reason.

[SeekAndFind]

We are taking in the world’s garbage and wondering why it isn’t turning to gold despite our best, very expensive efforts

From the Poem of Emma Lazarus inscribed in the Statue of Liberty :

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

[La Lydia]

What is your point?

[Stat-boy]

“The parents usually speak less English than the kids do, and because they often can’t understand the kids’ homework assignments, it’s hard for them to get fully involved in their kids’ education. It isn’t necessarily for lack of trying.”

I went to school with many Asian kids whose parents were not English speaking. Some had parents who barely spoke English, but those parents knew enough to insist the kids work hard to get good grades in school in every subject, including English.

[ZULU]

Originally, service in the Roman Army was a requirement for all citizens under the Republic.

The patrician class provided the higher ranking army commanders and the non-commissioned officer - Centurions, etc. were drawn from experienced rank and file men, all of whom were drawn from the plebeians ranks.

As time went on, and Rome expanded, Roman citizen soldiers were called upon to serve longer and longer terms of service further and further from Rome and Italy where most of them were initially drawn from. The majority of these recruits were small farm-owners.

While off on extended campaigns, they were unable to work their farms and the state seized them for taxes and sold them to wealthy patricians. The patricians then bought slaves, captured by the same citizen soldiers who were losing their land, to work the farms which became plantations.

Two popular brothers, the Gracchi, tried to institute land reforms to correct the situation, but were murdered by the Senate.

In the later Republic, this situation led to the rise of military dictators like Marius and Sulla and Caesar who took advantage of the issue to advance their own personal agendas. In the process, self-destructive civil wars were fought between armies of citizen soldiers. The army began to look for support and loyalty to military leaders rather than to the central government in Rome.

Ultimately, the inability of the Senate to compromise with the rights of citizen-soldiers led to the death of the Republic and the establishment of the Principate under Augustus. The latter took over after a particularly vicious and deadly round of civil wars.

Augustus exempted Italian citizens from the requirement of serving in the Roman Military, ostensibly due to the heavy losses they incurred in the Civil Wars, but probably because he distrusted a military drawn from Italians who might remember the Republic. He instituted a gradual process of recruitment of non-Italian troops from the provinces, although it actually started under Julius Caesar who recruited an entire legion of soldiers from Gaul who were “citizenized” upon recruitment as, technically, only citizens were allowed to serve in the Republican Army.

As the Empire expanded under the Caesars, more and more troops were recruited from conquered provinces, although initially the officer corps was still Italian. At first, these recruits may have been technically citizens, as the Romans used a policy, as far back as the Republic, of providing discharged veterans with land in conquered areas, where they settled, and in many cases, took local women as wives. There sons went on to serve in the Roman military. This policy was followed in Gallia Cisalpina - northern Italy - which was conquered from the Gauls under the Republic.

As the Empire expanded, more and more non-Italian recruits were drawn from different parts of the Empire into the army and Citizenship was offered as a reward after a term of service, again, along with land upon discharge. All recruits had to have at least a rudimentary knowledge of Latin as that was the language of the army. They were also exposed to other points of Roman culture. Terms of service and points of discharge were ofter far from the area of recruitment. Hence the Army became a massive engine for acculturation into classical Roman society, and spreading Roman culture as well as integrating the empire and its people.

In the 200’s there was another series of vicious civil wars. The Principate never established a formal method of succession and whenever an Emperor died, there was a tendency for civil wars to break out between different generals and their military forces, for the Emperor's slot.

As a result of this particular series of vicious civil wars, and resulting attacks from barbarians beyond the borders seeking to take advantage of the situation, there was a need for a “quick fix” by recruiting large new forces to replace those who were lost. The Romans decided to recruit en masse large numbers of barbarians into their military forces to fight against other barbarians at the borders.

The effect of using the army as a means of social acculturation then ceased. The result was a gradual barbarization of the military, the government, and society.

This is a brief simplification of a complicated situation to the best of my understanding of it. And a lot of it is also guess work by experts in the field based on the little written information we have and archeology.

It is true that at certain periods in the late empire, when the growing shortage of available recruits resulted in impressment, some individuals may have paid to avoid service. As in our Civil War, some people also mutilated their hands by removing thumbs so they couldn't hold a sword.

All of this contributed to the shortage of available manpower which resulted in barbarian tribesmen, being nations in arms, providing the only source of weapons-familiar troops. None of those forces could ever come close to the well-disciplined, trained, and equipped forces of the late Republic and Early Empire however, in battlefield effectiveness. They were warriors rather than soldiers.

To read more, see Adrian Goldsworthy’s books on the Roman Army.

[C19fan]

It seems to me that all of the former Spanish colonies, including Spain itself, have not done as well as the former English colonies. I suspect that it’s something to do with the differences between the cultures of the Spanish colonizers versus English colonizers, but I haven’t come to an understanding of the reason.

There have been whole books written on this topic. Some of the major ideas: 1: "Fundamentalist" 16th century per-Reformation Catholics vs. 17th century Protestants. Spanish colonizers took with them a very Thomist hierarchial view of society to the New World. The 17th century settlers and later took with them a view the growing view that Monarchs were not there by divine right and limits can be placed on their power. 2: Spanish colonizers were interested in one thing: wealth. Become wealthy in the New World and go back to Spain. While English colonizers went to America to start a new life although some went for money too, a la Jamestown, while others went for religious freedom, Maryland, PA and Mass. 3: The Northeast colonies had a much more equitable social socio-economic structures than Spanish colonies. The Southern colonies were more hierarchial but the small farmers in the Western fringes provided a counterweight to the plantation owners. There was no small scale freeholders in Spanish America. Land was controlled in large haciendas.

[SeekAndFind]

What is your point?

That because it has been EMBEDDED in our national psyche through that poem, we are actually REAPING what that sentiment sowed.

[Gondring]

if see the type of programming on Spanish language TV there is a disntinct lack of anything of educational value

I beg to differ. You forgot anatomy and sex ed.

My former co-worker pointed out that with the Spanish-language channels, there's no need for The Playboy Channel.

[ZULU]

There is another reason.

There was no aristocracy in the United States - ever.

New Spain was loaded with aristocrats, newly minted and old blood.

The American Revolution was due to a desire for the American colonists to maintain the freedom- political and economic, to which they had become accustomed over the years without meddling from Britain and Parliament.

The South and Central American Revolutions, for the most part, were revolts by the local aristocracy against the Dons in Spain. There was little economic consequence as far as the entire system was concerned.

Even today, in these states, the higher one goes in society, the “whiter” it becomes as the descendants of the American aristocracy - for the most part of Spanish blood, continue to monopolize the economy and the wealth. The result has been revolutions in places like Bolivia, which are conducive to the advance of communism and socialism.

A dangerous situation indeed.

[La Lydia]

Yes, I agree. Thank heavens it isn’t embedded in the Constitution. And Emma Lazarus was a communist.

[Gondring]

Yes, purpleporter, and, in fact, it’s the harder-working and ambitious who make the effort to come here. Also, Mexico is not homogeneous, genetically or culturally.

I think that much is tied to the religion...not that Roman Catholicism directly encourages what we see, but I suspect it’s the distortion of the culture’s foundational teachings.

[El Gato]

It’s equally likely that Spanish speaking Mexican kids are not forced by parents to learn English because classes are provided in Spanish.

That may be, but the article says these kids are coming to kindergarten deficient in *Spanish* language skills as well. Three word sentences. Don't know the alphabet *in Spanish*, don't know the names of colors *in Spanish*.

[Gondring]

Why is it rare for "Roman Catholic" countries to win Olympic gold medals?

Different values placed on hard work, personal responsibilty, restraint and self-discipline, materialism, personal freedom, etc.

"The spirit of play is Catholic; the spirit of work is Protestant." --Michael Novak; The Joy of Sports

[SwinneySwitch]

We have Vietnamese refugee children that graduated HS valedictorian and salutatorian in one generation. It depends a lot on the parents.