Latino English Language Learning Analysis

Language forms a part of culture and identity. Bilingualism is the right to speak multiple languages. Part of bilingualism is keeping and developing a passion for language. In the essay “The New Bathroom Policy at English High School,” Martín Espada suggests the definition of bilingualism and the importance of keeping it. Espada understands the difficulty of continuing to speak Spanish.

However, in order for one to truly understand the arguments made by the authors they must also understand the context behind these arguments; therefore, knowing how the individual authors’ definition of bilingualism lets the reader truly absorb what points they’re trying to make and why. In Espada’s essay, he defines bilingualism as a way for a person to remain in contact with their different cultural identities. There are many areas in the essay where the reader could interpret this definition from. However, the most significant piece of evidence appears at the beginning of the essay where Espada mentions his friend Jack Agueros’ analogy to describe his bilingualism “English and Spanish are like two dogs I love. English is an obedient dog.

Given that first issue starts out at home with language barriers when parents are not able to assist their child with the problems they may need help with. But, may continue when certain high schools are only interested with their top 10 graduates or in other words the students with the highest honors, or are just wanting you to get your degree and get out of there depending on the school and the area that it is in. A study done by the University of Georgia did an analysis on Hispanic high school seniors on track to graduate who were all invited to participate in a program to transition them from high school to college. The entire goal of this program was to increase the number of students who applied to college. Luckily this programmed increased

Socioeconomic obstacles impede the academic achievement of students. “Hispanics have poverty rates that are two to nearly three times higher than whites; and 40 percent of their population is foreign born” (“Hispanics: Special Education and English Language Learners”). Living in poverty affects educational attainment. There is a gap in the educational outcomes because of socioeconomic status (SES). Moreover, the American Psychological Association (APA) states, “large gaps remain when minority education attainment is compared to that of Caucasian Americans”.

Not only do they struggle with isolated schools separated from wealthier and better equipped White schools, but they must endure with their inadequate facilities and their lack of solid educators and school administrators. Also, due to the segregated nature of their schools, Latinos must meet much hostility when it is time they enter the workforce, as attributed to white student’s equal amount of segregation from Latino students. Another obstacle they have to deal with that is absolutely vital to the amount of success they achieve in tier life is their lack of bilingual programs being taught in this e segregated schools, due to the lack of bilingual educators. Due to the lack of communication occurring between white school systems and Latino schools, students are losing much potential cultural capital that they stand to gain wit the great amount of diversity occurring between these two groups. Though the solution to these problems is implementing assimilation into both White schools and Latinos schools through effective bilingual programs.

This growth has led Latinos to become one of the “largest” racial/ ethnic groups in American Higher Education: 55 million strong, as estimated by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2014. Yet, they are one of the least educated and the least represented ethnic groups in educational institutions. However, they are the least studied and represented ethnic groups in educational institutions. The Latino representation in educational institutions are lower compared to other ethnic minorities.

An education should be a priority to all students and we, as the Latino community, must reshape the policy flaws to establish a foundation that will help the growing Latino community. From my own personal experience,

Despite an increase of education scores in the past decade, the United States still trenches behind many countries. Scores found in the Programme for International Student Assessment, the most popular cross sectional test, finds that the United State ranks thirty-eight out of seventy-one countries in test performances of english, math and science literary. But within the country itself contains a deeper issue. The term “achievement gap” is used to describe the polarity between the academic performances of minorities, such as Black and Hispanics, to those of Asians and White students; which are found to be much lower than the latter. Besides test scores, this achievement gap is most apparent in grades and drop-out rates as well.

There are many limitations and difficulties to attain accurate results on the differences of bilinguals and monolinguals, however, researchers and educators are positive about the benefits of being bilingual or multilingual. Hopefully new research and studies in the near future will be able to solve the questions and

The Latino community is the most rapidly growing minority group in the United States. However, it is also one of the minority group that have faced many barriers in their educational opportunities throughout its history in this nation. The United States is knowing because of it offers equal opportunities for everyone, yet a poor quality education still exists in many of our Latino community schools. A poor quality education that leads to other issues in the system of education among our Hispanic/Latino students. The dropout rates from high school in the Latino students is very high.

In her article, “Teach Them Spanish Early, Too,” Carlene Carmichael questions why young Californians are not being taught a basic understanding of both the English and the Spanish language. Carmichael contends that more job opportunities are available to bilingual applicants. She suggest that children could be taught both languages together from a young age. Carmichael pities the many Americans who are barred from employment at bilingual businesses because of this disadvantage and she wonders if anyone else feels the same. Carmichael’s suggestion to offer Spanish curriculum to young children and teach both English and Spanish at the same time makes a lot of sense; After all, California does recognize both English and Spanish as official

In “Teach Them Spanish Early, Too”, Carlene Carmichael argues that a second language should be offered to Americans. Carmichael seeks equality for everyone and she wants the same opportunities of also being taught a second language. Children are learning English so other children should be taught Spanish. In addition, Carlene Carmichael states that she feels sorry that many Americans that are applying to jobs are at a disadvantage because they cannot speak Spanish. I agree with some of Carlene Carmichael’s arguments, but many qualifications listed do not require Spanish, the applicants just need to have experience working.

Additionally, it was noted by Mendez et al (2015) that many students, specifically Latino English language learner students’ were able to learn through various modalities such as visual cues, answering questions, writing, and drawing as it was related to activities done in the classroom, that would allow them to reinforce their understanding of the meaning of new words. Indeed, most students learn vocabulary indirectly when they hear and see words used in many different contexts, for the Latino Dual language learner students, they had prior knowledge during their early years in school. In short, the researchers did not find any discrepancy between Latino English language learner students when compared to their peers in terms of vocabulary

In research done by by Kelley and Kohnert (2012), 8-13 year-old Spanish-speaking ELL students were tested on their recognition and production of English vocabulary to provide evidence of a cognate advantage for Spanish-speakers. The study tested 30 typically developing children who spoke Spanish at home and English at school. The researchers used two vocabulary measures in the study. The first, PPVT III, measured students’ recognition of spoken vocabulary words (their receptive vocabulary) by asking students to choose one of four pictures that corresponded to a spoken vocabulary word. The second, EOWPVT, measured their production of a vocabulary word from a given picture (their expressive vocabulary).

The United States is a place of freedom. We are a mixing pot that unifies as one. Many religions, cultures, and languages make their home in the Unites States. Many foreigners see the U.S. as an opportunity to seek better lives and education, but when it comes to foreigners and native-born non-English speakers that do not yet know English, it becomes a little more difficult to go about an average day let alone make a better future. Children in school often become English Language Learners, or ELL, to assimilate to the American standards.