Kindergartners Getting the Word Out on Dual Immersion

When Jillian Colla’s kindergarten teacher commands her to “ven a la alfombra,” “escribe tu nombre” or “levante la mano,” the native English speaker knows what to do: She comes to the rug, writes her name or raises her hand.

But that wasn’t the case just seven months ago, when 5-year-old Jillian would return home confused and exhausted after a full day of class instruction in Spanish--a language she didn’t know.

Christopher Castillo understands that frustration. His children, both native Spanish speakers, often struggled to learn as they were immersed in classes taught solely in English.

Now, Jillian and Castillo’s 6-year-old daughter, Cecilia, are classmates in a new two-way immersion program at Montalvo Elementary School, where each is learning basic reading and math skills taught mostly in Spanish and helping one another along the way.

The early results of the innovative program--rare in Ventura County but used in about 100 schools across the state--have impressed parents fluent in both languages. Castillo watched as his little girl went from confusion during the English-only portion of instruction to the beginnings of bilingual proficiency.

“In the six-month period, the difference is amazing,” Castillo said. “She’s started reading in English, she watches TV in English and she can translate from one language to the other. Before she would always say ‘no entiendo.’ ”

Katie Colla, Jillian’s mom, said she enrolled her daughter in the pilot program partly because of her own frustration working for a medical group and not being able to communicate with the many Spanish speakers she encounters.

“She is just learning in leaps and bounds,” Colla said, adding that Jillian often instinctively answers questions in Spanish and teaches her mom a new Spanish word every day. Their current favorite is mariquita, which means ladybug, among other things. The other night, Colla said, Jillian awoke from a dream and began speaking the language.

“I’m really pleased with the program,” Colla said.

More than halfway into the school year, assessments show all 40 students enrolled in the two kindergarten classes--half of them native Spanish speakers and half native English speakers--are meeting grade-level expectancy in language arts, said Montalvo Principal Cynthia Medina. Most are also at grade level in mathematics.

“It’s really an enriched education,” she said. “The idea is you can learn to read in any language, and then you can transfer those skills.”

Medina said that with help from a federal grant that provides $250,000 a year, the program will be expanded to upper grades for the next five years, at which time, educators say, students will be proficient in both languages.

In 28-year-old Lupe Alpuche’s colorful classroom Wednesday, small groups made up of an equal mix of English and Spanish speakers rotated around four learning stations. One group recited and copied down vocabulary words they would encounter in stories. In another area, students drew pictures to go with the words.

Alpuche and Gina Ruffinelli, the other teacher in the program, never speak English in front of the children. Instead they use hand gestures or ask bilingual students in the class to translate. It’s part of a strategy to immerse both sets of students in the Spanish language, she said.

When it’s time to teach lessons in English--about 10% of the school day--Alpuche and Ruffinelli trade classrooms. That way students don’t know that either teacher speaks English at all, they said.

“Because Spanish is a minority language in society, we try to give it prestige in the classroom by only speaking Spanish,” Alpuche said.

“If they knew we spoke English, it would be easier for them to shut down,” added Ruffinelli, 25. “This forces them to increase their Spanish vocabulary.”

Although the state requires only a five-year commitment to a dual-immersion program, Ventura Unified School District officials would like to see it continue through the secondary grades.

“The intent is to see something successful, and if it’s going to be, there’s a strong desire to see it continue on,” said Cliff Rodrigues, a school board member and director of technology, media and bilingual education for the Ventura County superintendent of schools office. “If there’s a way to keep the skills going in both languages, it’s all the better for those kids.”

Research has backed up that assertion, said Edda Caraballo, a bilingual education consultant in the California Department of Education. Students who have gone through dual immersion programs elsewhere in the state have outperformed their peers on the Stanford 9 standardized test, studies show.

Despite the controversy that swirls around bilingual education in California--particularly after Proposition 227 greatly reduced the number of bilingual classrooms in the state--dual immersion has been more widely accepted, officials said.

Still, there seems to be some reluctance by many districts to try it. Only one district in Ventura County--Pleasant Valley Elementary in Camarillo--has inquired about Montalvo’s program so far.

“There is such a breathlessness for children to speak English and be academic in English from the word go, some feel that they’re wasting time,” Caraballo said. “There are not more of these programs because there is not a majority of people embracing bilingualism.”

Shawna Wagstaff, whose 5-year-old son, Christian, is in Alpuche’s class, admitted that enrolling him in the five-year program was a tough decision that took “a lot of prayer.”

But she said she could not be more thrilled with Christian’s response to the program and the fact that he will be bilingual at such a young age. She has already signed up Christian’s younger siblings.

Christian showed off what he has learned just the other day at a local McDonald’s when, in Spanish, he asked a woman working at the jungle gym if he could go in without socks.

“He’s really adapting well to everything,” Wagstaff said. “And he’s happy.”