Bi-Lingual Children

These all Spanish stations and Telemundo are one of the main reasons the booming and ever growing Latino population (especially here in Arizona where we now have, by some estimates 800,000 illegals),are not learning English as the waves of immigrants did in the past. That, and the radical "LaRaza" movement making inroads into some of our schools and Universities.

A very large part of the Latino community here, mostly illegals, do not want or plan to learn English. In Phoenix, our schools have been mandated by the federal government to spend at least 4 million additional dollars to teach these "English learners" children of illegal aliens this year or face steep fines.

If parents would simply turn off these Spanish stations and encourage their children to watch and listen to English speaking media, this might help the problem. In addition, the adults might learn some English.

My 4 year old granddaughter (whose mother and other grandparents are from Poland, and recently became citizens) was fully bilingual at the age of 3, even though she learned Polish exclusively first, by my son and daughter-in-law's choice, as they knew she would easily pick up English later when she was fully immersed into the culture. We had our doubts about that, but now we see their wisdom.

The problem is that most of these kids will never be "immersed" into our culture as the parents, for the most part, want to live in the U.S., enjoy all of our benefits, but still retain wholly the culture of their home (predominately, Mexico and other Latin American countries)!

Here in Arizona, Spanish speakers are so heavily accomodated everywhere (all of our government documents are printed in Spanish), that it is conceivable that eventually millions of people will never have to learn English to live here.

Unfortunately' the parents don't realize that their children's opportunities will be severely limited by their not knowing the"language of the land.

The schools' efforts to teach English to these kids are often thwarted because a lot of the children show no interest in learning English, coming from a household where Spanish only is spoken and the radios and TV are blaring only Spanish programs. Small children are able to pick up languages so quickly if they are exposed enough to them.

If these children were required to learn basic English skills (at their parent's own expense) before they enter kindergarten, a lot of these parents might be motivated to encourage their children to listen to and watch American TV, especially PBS educational programs.

Here in Arizona, just that one cultural change would save the state millions of dollars that could be better spent on other educational needs that would benefit All of our children.