Building a Transnational Connection: Implementing Bilingual Education for Public schools
Bilingual education is finally growing as a positive learning experience in the American education system. With proposition 58 passed, California can join the other states that include bilingual education in the early school systems. The dual-language classrooms can help improve children in decoding texts, empathizing with fellow classmates, engaging in classroom discussions, protecting the cognitive decline and dementia (when older), and improving the attention span. I believe that the dual-language classrooms will improve children’s learning ability, and it should be implemented in the school system to enhance children’s perspective of cultural acceptance. The dual-language classrooms should continue to improve as the states continue to use this system over the years. With the dual-language classroom still in the “trial and error” stage, the system could improve tremendously in the next few years, allowing _____-Americans to embrace their dual-identities.
By allowing dual-language classrooms, children can take pride in speaking and writing in their languages. They don’t have to feel ashamed of their non-English language. From Anzaldua Gloria’s Borderlands La Frontera “How to Tame a Wild Tongue:”
To be close to another Chicana is like looking into a mirror. We are afraid of what we’ll see there. Pena. Shame. Low estimation of self. In childhood we are told that our language is wrong. Repeated attacks on our native tongue diminish our sense of self. The attacks continue through our lives.
Children do not need to feel that their sense of self is diminishing with these dual-language classrooms. They can be proud of their language while also learning English, or vice versa. They can take pride in their _____-American identity through the linguistic identity.
Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity — I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language. I cannot take pride in myself.
— Anzaldua Gloria.
Language is the bridge that connects our communities together, whether in diasporic communities or in larger communities. Allowing languages, other than English, to be taught in school will help the growth of a transnational community where people can interact with one another without having to use English as the international language. As the bilingual education system improves and grows, the English language will change and transform with another language, like Spanglish.
Until I am free to write bilingually and to switch codes without having always to translate, while I still have to speak English or Spanish when I would rather speak Spanglish, and as long as I have to accommodate the English speakers rather than having them accommodate me, my tongue will be illegitimate.
— Anzaldua Gloria
With the dual-language classrooms, people may not need to accommodate those who speak English with translation because the importance of learning different languages is understanding the other person. In America, the importance of learning English only is still prominent in the education system.
While traveling, I’ve heard American people ask, “Why don’t the people from [insert country] know English?” as if English should be spoken in every country and that these kinds of people don’t need to worry about language barrier because everyone “should” know English. English is the imperial language, attempting to implement the language in a globalized manner. In certain countries, learning English automatically gives higher status in society, suggesting that learning English is a privilege that everyone should have but can’t have. With bilingual education, English does not have to be the main bridge that connects the global citizens together. Bilingual education will be able to provide more opportunities to build a global connection with other countries. As of right now, there are some issues with the bilingual education.
Which languages are being taught? According to NPR,
“…public schools are assigned by lottery to dual-language classrooms that offer instruction in Spanish, Japanese or Mandarin, alongside English.”
These are the only languages available as a dual-language as of recent news. These are the most prominent languages to learn in a dual-language classroom because learning these languages can help maintain business relations between countries. Unfortunately, people, like me, who do not have any ethnic relations with any of the provided languages will either have to learn three languages or drop their home language.
Learning three languages is beneficial in the future if the person is literate in all three languages. Usually, the language that is used in the house is lost first because that language is not used as much as the languages taught in school. Children spend most of the hours at school than at home. The linguistic identity is still threatened by the limited languages that are taught at school. There are too many languages to conduct all of the languages within the classroom setting. But if the community or district can gather a consensus of languages spoken at home, then being able to learn that language is a possibility; plus foreign language teachers will be in high demand. But as of recent news, the dual-language only consist of Japanese, Mandarin, and Spanish. Although the languages are limited, implementing bilingual education is a start to build connection between people of different cultural backgrounds.
