Best of Two Worlds at Language Schools

When Sherry Regnery saw the flyer advertising the Language Academy at Jefferson School, a kindergarten through third-grade elementary school in the Carlsbad Unified School District, she couldn’t get on the phone fast enough.

“The program sounded so absolutely wonderful. I went and saw it, and signed up Noah (her son) for the second-grade class,” Regnery said. That was in June, 1990.

This fall, Noah, 8, began his second year in the program. His parents drive him from his Carlsbad neighborhood school, Hope Elementary, so he can participate in the Language Academy program.

The Jefferson Academy students, some of whom began the program in kindergarten, are taught in Spanish and in English. The classes are a 50-50 mix of native English speakers and native Spanish speakers.

“ Cuantos bloques balancean la manzana (How many blocks balance the apple)?” teacher Jill Cooper asked her first-grade students. Around the room arms attached to blond-haired, blue-eyed children and to brown-haired, brown-eyed children shot up simultaneously.

The students can answer the question in English, but Cooper said what is important is that they understand it in Spanish.

“This program places a great value on learning a second language,” Cooper said. “It encourages kids to get along with all kinds of people.”

Jefferson Academy students continue their language study at Pine School, also part of the Carlsbad Unified School District. In fourth through sixth grade, Pine School uses computer-generated programs to teach subjects such as science in Spanish. Students at the school often write their own Spanish-language programs, according to Principal Stephen Ahle.

Although the Jefferson program is only in its third year, the Valley Center Union School District piloted the bilingual approach in North County 10 years ago, according to Lucy Haines-Aviles, director of categorical programs at Valley Center.

The first group of students, who began taking Spanish and English in kindergarten, are now entering ninth grade.

About 30% of Valley Center’s 750 students, in grades kindergarten through sixth, participate in the program. In seventh and eighth grades, the students can take Spanish literature or a science class in Spanish, Haines-Aviles said.

“We are promoting bilingualism and bi-literacy,” Haines-Aviles said. “By the fourth to sixth grade, the students are totally immersed in the second language.”

In the primary grades, the students study the core curriculum--language arts, reading and mathematics--in their primary language, be it English or Spanish. The content areas--science, social studies, art, physical education and music--are taught in the second language, Haines-Aviles said.

Teachers teach in Spanish and in English on alternating days to the younger children, and on alternating weeks to the older ones, she added. By the third grade, students are learning to read and write in their second language, and by the fourth, they learn the entire curriculum in their second language, with two weeks in Spanish and two in English.

Other elementary school districts that offer Spanish-English elementary programs include Fallbrook and Encinitas. Paul Ecke Central School in Encinitas offers a program for kindergarten through third grade. At Flora Vista School, kindergarten through sixth-graders can take beginning, intermediate and advanced Spanish in the before-school enrichment program.

In the Fallbrook Union Elementary School District, students in grades kindergarten through sixth have participated in a Spanish-English program for 10 years, according to Mike Choate, assistant superintendent of educational services. Both La Paloma and Live Oaks schools offer the program, although it is not offered at the two schools the district operates on the Camp Pendleton Marine base.

Most secondary schools in North County offer foreign language classes for high school graduation requirements or for college entrance. The University of California schools require study of another language for admittance, as do many private universities. Recently, the California State school system added study of a foreign language to college entrance requirements, according to Fred Dobb, state consultant for foreign languages.

“Three-fourths of the students sign up for Spanish,” Dobb said, adding that there has been a steady increase in the number of secondary students enrolled in foreign language classes over the past eight years.

State law requires that California secondary schools offer English as a second language to non-native students.