Bilingual teachers can't speak english

[Dom Pedro II]

GePap:

[CorpusScorpius]

Come on their English cant be that bad I do not hear of anyone complaining about those fabulous College Profs w/ accents so thick U have no clue as to what their saying

[RedFred]

Er...'so thick U have no clue as to what their saying' means 'so thick you have no clue what they are saying'?

[mindseye]

Has anyone in this thread studied a technical subject like mathematics or chemisty in a language they were not proficient in?

I once dated a Vietnamese guy who earned a technical degree in computers (studying things like Assembly language), even though his English was pretty elementary. I'm curious about the experiences of others.

While I sympathize with some of the author's intentions, the piece has some serious flaws.

four Cambodian-born teachers who flunked

What was the test like? How large is the supply of Cambodian-speaking teachers in the Lowell area? If they were teaching in Cambodian, how well did they need to speak English?

Massachusetts teachers (...) have been flunking an oral examination in which they are asked to (...) describe their jobs (apparently they don't even know how to say "foreign languages").

Notice that we don't know which part of the oral test they actually flunked, it's the columnist's jab that they did not know how to say "foreign languages". For all we know, they flunked because they couldn't explain what a past participle is. I wonder if the test they took was similar to the American TOEFL test, which is not a very reliable indicator of one's English-speaking abilities (it's a better indicator of one's ability to memorize long lists of obscure, seldom-used words).

I understand all the good reasons not to create an academic ghetto, but I think arguments to completely scrap bi-lingual teaching are terribly short-sighted (and usually made by mono-linguists). Wouldn't it be better to fix the proram? How about easing the kids into learning in English? Wouldn't that be a better idea all-around?

As to those who advocate abandoning the program altogether, I wonder how well their children would do studying chemistry in Cambodian? Would they really "pick up" Cambodian, or would they get frustrated and drop out?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by mindseye
Has anyone in this thread studied a technical subject like mathematics or chemisty in a language they were not proficient in?

Does this somehow mean that bilingual teachers shouldn't be bilingual?

[Japher]

The author takes a lot of jabs:

Failing teachers in other Massachusetts cities are consulting their lawyers, too. How they are doing this is not clear. Maybe they have interpreters

Hahaha, shud-up!

The point of the matter minds-eye is that they are teachers. They are suppose to be teaching bilingual education with English being one of the languages, and they aren't, because they aren't bilingual with English being one of the languages.

[GePap]

There is a very big difference mindseye from learning a technoical subject at a high level (seocndary, university and beyond) and primary education, which is the issue here. I had calculus teahcers who could not speak enlgihs well: that did not matter, becuase you don;t need to know much english to explain calculus to a bunch of colege kids.

Most kids on "bilingal" education end up monolingual, since they neevr get adequate training in english. That is why it is a misnomer. Children at elementary leevl will quickly pick up the language and do as well as they might based on thier ability: they will be fully bilingual since they are likely to speak their native tounge at home, and in the end will end up with an advantage over monolingual Americans who get crappy foreign language education.

[Al B. Sure!]

dated a guy, mindseye? you're gay too?!

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by GePap
They will most likely still speak their other language at home and thus be bilingual.

Not from what I have seen. The kids only speak English after a while, even at home. Some do comprehend their own native tongue while others don't.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by mindseye
I wonder if the test they took was similar to the American TOEFL test, which is not a very reliable indicator of one's English-speaking abilities (it's a better indicator of one's ability to memorize long lists of obscure, seldom-used words).

TOEFL is okay, SAT Verbal is much worse.

[GePap]

Not from what I have seen. The kids only speak English after a while, even at home. Some do comprehend their own native tongue while others don't.

That outcome is more a result of what parents do, not the schools. If parents continue to seak to their children in theirnative language they will retain understanding at least, if not full fluency. Tha state can do nothing about that, but for a child to succeed in the US they need to know english.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by GePap

Not from what I have seen. The kids only speak English after a while, even at home. Some do comprehend their own native tongue while others don't.

That outcome is more a result of what parents do, not the schools. If parents continue to seak to their children in theirnative language they will retain understanding at least, if not full fluency. Tha state can do nothing about that, but for a child to succeed in the US they need to know english.

The parents continued to speak their native language (Cantonese Chinese to be specific) to the kids but the kids would refuse to speak the language, somehow viewing it to be a lower language

[GePap]

Well, then that is the result of intollerance by the kids.

My sister is a bit like this: she won;t speak Spanish on her own, though she remains fully bilingual.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by GePap
Well, then that is the result of intollerance by the kids.

My sister is a bit like this: she won;t speak Spanish on her own, though she remains fully bilingual.

The thing is, this situation is pretty widespread. None of the ABC's (American Born Chinese), CBC's (Candian Born Chinese) or even first generation immigrants who went to the US or Canada when they were kids (as old as 14 or 15) I have met could speak any Chinese dialect fluently, let alone read and write.

[GePap]

Well, that is an issue for the Chinese community, no? cause the same is not true for Hispanics or Russian immigrants I have met.