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February 1, 2008

Oregon and Monona Grove Add Elementary Spanish

Gena Kittner:

wo Dane County school districts will be saying "hola " to new language programs at the elementary level this fall.

In the Oregon School District, Spanish will be taught in kindergarten through fourth grades starting this fall, with fifth and sixth grades added in the fall of 2009, said Courtney Odorico, Oregon School Board member.

Teaching only Spanish is a scaled-down version of what the district originally considered -- teaching a different language such as Japanese, Chinese or German -- at each of its three elementary schools.

"I think parents were a little worried about not having a choice, " Odorico said. Also, "there were very few certified teachers in Chinese and some of the other languages we were looking at in the state. "

The School Board approved the program at a meeting Monday.

Spanish also is the language of choice for elementary students in Monona Grove, where the School Board approved the program earlier this month.

The parent response was overwhelmingly for Spanish, said Bill Breisch, curriculum director for the Monona Grove School District.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at February 1, 2008 6:01 AM
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Comments

Will Madison ever catch up to the rest of the communities in our area?

With the diversity that we see in our community, MMSD stats indicating around 25% of the school population made up of Asians & Hispanics, and I'm sure there are other ethnicities not included. How long are we going to remain a primarily mono-lingual school district?

Nuestro Mundo is such a huge success that they have a waiting list. Is that not a message to the board and the district in general about what our community would like to see in education for our children?

When will we really be educating global citizens by giving them the lens of a second language & culture, or third, or forth, to see, understand and communicate with all the citizens in our community and outside in the world our children will enter after graduation?

Years and years of research prove that the best time to start learning a language is when children are very young. It helps in wiring their brains for math and English not to mention exponentially increases their ability to learn additional languages. Is there really any reason to wait? Do we want our children to be behind those of our neighboring communities and neighboring states?

Come on Madison. Get with the program!!!

Posted by: Lauren Rosen Yeazel at February 4, 2008 10:31 PM