← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · JoseyWales
Thread ID: 20597 | Posts: 9 | Started: 2005-10-10
2005-10-10 16:02 | User Profile
someone told me that most public schools in texas now have mandatory spanish lessons in the elementary schools. can anyone confirm ? im leaning more and more toward homeschooling, im just not sure im cut out for it.
2005-10-10 17:27 | User Profile
Homeschooling is a good idea. I used to do placement testing for a Texas junior college about 15 years ago. 80-85% of our students tested so poorly that they had to enter the remedial program (these are high school graduates mind you) of that 80 some percent almost 75% of those tested at or below a 7th grade level. It's very hard to do worse than that schooling your own and very easy to homeschool and go way past anything the empire can turn out.
I do not know about today, but when bilingual ed first started in Texas my parents opted for my brother not to take it. For half a day he was placed in the back of a room with a coloring book while the others learned Spanish.
I grew up "on the inside" of the system and say all this as someone who has taught in our state institutions, and whose parents were teachers and school administrators. Get your kids out and keep them out!
2005-10-10 18:32 | User Profile
[QUOTE=JoseyWales]someone told me that most public schools in texas now have mandatory spanish lessons in the elementary schools. can anyone confirm ? im leaning more and more toward homeschooling, im just not sure im cut out for it.[/QUOTE]
I believe Spanish class is now a standard part of many elementary schools, including far north of Texas. Any class in elementary school is be default mandatory because children don't select their classes.
2005-10-10 20:35 | User Profile
I have required my children to take foreign language. My brother is fluent in Russian, my sister in French and German, and I speak a bit of Spanish and Italian.
Since we live in Texas, the will take Spanish or one of the other offered languages (French and German) all four years in High School. My daughter will finish year 4 Spanish this year.
Why am I so hard over on this? I lived overseas, and I found being able to adapt to a foreign language, something having taken foreign language makes easier to do, a handy talent to acquite. We must prepare our kids for life. And I may need to start learning Chinese. :bash:
Choosing to be limited to a single language strikes me as foolish. That said, I insist that English be America's official language. Spanish is a relatively introduction to foreign language, given its generally orderly Latin root structure.
AE [QUOTE=JoseyWales]someone told me that most public schools in texas now have mandatory spanish lessons in the elementary schools. can anyone confirm ? im leaning more and more toward homeschooling, im just not sure im cut out for it.[/QUOTE]
2005-10-11 00:45 | User Profile
I do not like "wetbacks" so I took Latin rather Spanish in School. As said jozen1 said "Homeschooling is a good idea." I think public schools are just too unsafe and your children will not learn much.
2005-10-11 03:14 | User Profile
Whatever happened to taxpayers ruling what gets taught? I know that went out around 1960. I grew up in a very "wetback" area. I took French just to spite them. What can I say, when I went to France about half of what I said came out Spanish! It is a very good idea to learn another language, if for any other reason that it usually helps with English. Learning different rules and vocabulary can really help with understanding how English works, since it is made up of so many other languages words. But having said that, if an elementary school is teaching Spanish and not focusing on basic reading, writing, and arithmatic then something is very wrong.
2005-10-13 03:27 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Faust] I think public schools are just too unsafe and your children will not learn much.[/QUOTE] Depends on where you are, and I supplement what they are taught. Part of my duty as dad. :smile:
AE
2005-10-13 14:13 | User Profile
Of course, what many of the bilingual ninnies fail to mention is that most mestizo wetbacks don't speak Spanish either. Don't worry about your children learning Spanish in school-- what they will learn is that the pidgeon language spoken by Mexicans is hardly Spanish, but makes Black English sound like Shakespeare.
2005-10-13 22:27 | User Profile
True enough that. When working with those remedial college students I often asked when they were reversing syntax, "How would you write this in Spanish?". I figured that at least this would give us a lead in to English. No chance, not a single one could coherently write or read in Spanish. In the end they could barely speak either language and illiterate in both. True testaments to our public education system.