Bilingual Education

Re “Yuri and Patrick: 2 Faces of State’s Troubled Schools,” Oct. 29:

Your generally commendable article contains an unfortunate passage that, because of its inaccuracy, casts a negative light on the academic accomplishments of featured fourth-grader Yuri de la Paz and on the bilingual program at her school, Leo Politi Elementary. As Yuri’s third-grade Spanish reading teacher at Politi, I would like to set the record straight.

It is untrue that for three years, Yuri “spent half of each day learning English and half studying math, science and geography in Spanish.” In fact, up through third grade, Yuri studied Spanish reading, while she learned to speak, but not write, English in ESL classes; in math, science and social studies lessons she heard her teachers use both Spanish and sheltered English.

To earn the “transitional English student” label mentioned, Yuri had to pass a battery of exams to demonstrate functional oral English fluency and third-grade level Spanish reading and writing ability. Yuri’s English writing sample quoted in the article reflects a bare two months of formal literary English instruction, not three years, as implied.

As for the misstatement that now “all (of Yuri’s) instruction is in English but her textbooks are in Spanish”: Yuri has an English reading text, but it is below grade level. When she must study grade-level concepts, in social studies, for example, it behooves her to read the material in Spanish, which is still her dominant tongue.

JEANNE M. WINN

Los Angeles