This week I decided to test the prior Spanish knowledge of my seventh grade students by asking them to interview a partner in the language and then write a newspaper article about their subject. I didn't expect them to know how to conjugate every verb or even form complete sentences in Spanish. What I was looking for was creativity and their ability to use the book or ask questions when they needed help. Thankfully, many of them did and I enjoyed walking around the room and seeing the learning process in action.
The experience of having a foreign language class is invaluable. However, a recent article in the New York Times suggests that as schools face budget cuts, foreign language classes are among the first to go.
From the article:
"And in New Jersey, the Ridgewood district is replacing its three elementary school Spanish teachers with Rosetta Stone, an interactive computer program that cost $70,000, less than half their combined salaries."
I believe that a teacher who inspires students to learn not just the basics of Spanish but also its utility in the real world is far more beneficial than any software program. I try my hardest to tell my students that Spanish will benefit them beyond their wildest dreams in the future. I explain that in California it is vital to at least have conversational knowledge of Spanish because it will help them communicate with the growing Hispanic population. Knowing a foreign language will also give them a leg up on the competition in the global economy.
I am fortunate to teach at a school that includes foreign language in its curriculum. The unfortunate part of my job is that I do not see all of my students every day because of a rotating schedule. This makes it difficult to gauge the progress of my students. However, I make the most of it by inspiring creativity and interest in the language. I believe an assignment that tests their knowledge is a solid foundation on which to build their Spanish skills.
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2 comments:
I think that it's sometimes difficult to make a connection between learning a language in the classroom and its real-world application. This, of course, is the challenge that teachers face: answering the question of relevance. Spanish is especially relevant for the reasons you said, but it will be hard for students to understand this until they're confronted with situations in their own lives when they say "man, I really wish I knew Spanish!"
What I think also compounds the difficulty of relevance is that many of even the best Spanish teachers have a hard time actually making students passable when it comes to real world speaking of the language. Really learning to speak a foreign language fluently is extremely difficult for most people without being immersed in the language. This relevance issue is even worse when kids are in a situation and think, “Wow I really wish I knew Spanish right now, too bad I don’t even after taking, and getting As in, Spanish classes for the last 5 years.” This is not meant to be a shot at the original poster because I have a huge amount of respect for foreign language teachers for many reasons, one of which being that I realize I could never teach a different language myself.
My personal opinion on language education is to reevaluate it from beginning to end, because I think kids would have as much interest and find as much relevance here (if not more) as in any other subject assuming they would actually be able to speak the language respectably among native speakers. This is not an accomplishable task for one teacher teaching kids for 45-60 minutes a day for one school year, so it would require at least school, if not district or cross district coordination. In the meantime teachers, like the original poster are left to do the very best they can and inspire their students enough to transcend the difficulties of foreign language education in our schools.
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