Why does everyone prioritize language immersion?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sela's really struggling and has been for years. The Hebrew attracts low-income AA kids from religious Christian families.

Stokes attracts far fewer FARMs than it did in the early years.

YY is thriving - their FARMs rate is thought to be in the single digits this year.

Sela is not struggling - it’s fully enrolled with wait list; and has been tier 1 two years in a row.

Yes it is. Sela almost closed several times. They're fully enrolled for ECE mainly because it's become very difficult to get into ECE programs that aren't in Ward 7 or 8. Hardly anybody stays at Sela to the upper grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

But almost all the bilingual programs are Spanish here. I imagine many in French at Stokes have a familial connection to French. So you're really just talking about Sela and Yu Ying.

[Anonymous]

My kid is doing just fine in English and the target language she's learning at school. She actually said she likes French better. I don't speak it but I'm happy she has had the opportunity to learn another language.

You've been given a variety of reasons why people may choose to go this route, Op. Hopefully you got the answers you were looking for.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

But almost all the bilingual programs are Spanish here. I imagine many in French at Stokes have a familial connection to French. So you're really just talking about Sela and Yu Ying.

That said, I do think it's important to have a desire to really HAVE your child speak a second language, as your priority, not any of the "brain boosts" or whatnot. It's not a minor thing that just kind of makes the school better, abstractly. I wish those enrolling at bilingual schools all felt strongly about the language itself, and the accompanying culture, and weren't just applying because of the rankings (top level Tier 1's). I think that is pretty clearly the case with a few families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

The problem really is that the quality of most of the language immersion programs in the US is not high and the society is monolingual, so there is no real culture context to support a second language learning. While kids in the multilingual part of the world might enjoy this "cognitive boost", kids in the US who have limited exposure might not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sela's really struggling and has been for years. The Hebrew attracts low-income AA kids from religious Christian families.

Stokes attracts far fewer FARMs than it did in the early years.

YY is thriving - their FARMs rate is thought to be in the single digits this year.

Sela is not struggling - it’s fully enrolled with wait list; and has been tier 1 two years in a row.

PP you're responding to doesn't mean struggling in an academic sense, they mean struggling to keep the percentage of black students enrolled low enough to make the school attractive to DCUM parents. This is the subtext in every other post on this board: whenever a person's post doesn't make sense erase the pretext they're fronting of "academics" or "high SES" or "motivated cohort" and just insert the real thing they're looking for: fewer black kids. Suddenly the logic holds.

[Anonymous]

We will be pulling out our son from an EOTP immersion school if called of the waitlist for 4 WOTP schools; numbers <5. He’s in first grade and not doing very well in our opinion. We just hope it’s not a culture shock for him if we get a call.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

Umm...a large portion of the society is NOT monolingual. It just depends where you hang out. HUGE number of Spanish speakers and culture in DC area and many other parts of the country.

The problem really is that the quality of most of the language immersion programs in the US is not high and the society is monolingual, so there is no real culture context to support a second language learning. While kids in the multilingual part of the world might enjoy this "cognitive boost", kids in the US who have limited exposure might not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

But almost all the bilingual programs are Spanish here. I imagine many in French at Stokes have a familial connection to French. So you're really just talking about Sela and Yu Ying.

That said, I do think it's important to have a desire to really HAVE your child speak a second language, as your priority, not any of the "brain boosts" or whatnot. It's not a minor thing that just kind of makes the school better, abstractly. I wish those enrolling at bilingual schools all felt strongly about the language itself, and the accompanying culture, and weren't just applying because of the rankings (top level Tier 1's). I think that is pretty clearly the case with a few families.

Yes, my DD is bilingual since birth, and goes to an immersion school for her third language which we don't speak at home. Everyday after school, she spends at least one hour reading in English (she is a 2nd grader reads at 5th grade level), 1/2 hour reading her other native language, and every other day has 1 hour tutor for her 3rd. Screen time is only in the other two languages.

We put in a lot of efforts, but since she started young, she takes ownership in all three languages and accepts them as part of her life. These is no resentment but some time management issue. You always need to make time for the other two languages and not let English completely dominate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

I applaud you for knowing you and your children’s limitations. I’m being sincere. It annoys me when people think about enrolling their 2nd grader in an immersion school, or when they do nothing to help the language along.

My elementary school kid reads better in his target language than in English, but he has spoken it since birth with me. I’ll let him know this is just a fad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sela's really struggling and has been for years. The Hebrew attracts low-income AA kids from religious Christian families.

Stokes attracts far fewer FARMs than it did in the early years.

YY is thriving - their FARMs rate is thought to be in the single digits this year.

Sela is not struggling - it’s fully enrolled with wait list; and has been tier 1 two years in a row.

Yes it is. Sela almost closed several times. They're fully enrolled for ECE mainly because it's become very difficult to get into ECE programs that aren't in Ward 7 or 8. Hardly anybody stays at Sela to the upper grades.

You may need to catch up. Their 2018 enrollment is below and they accepted no new students for 3rd or 4th.

PK3 39
PK4 40
K 31
1st 33
2nd 24
3rd 24
4th 11

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sela's really struggling and has been for years. The Hebrew attracts low-income AA kids from religious Christian families.

Stokes attracts far fewer FARMs than it did in the early years.

YY is thriving - their FARMs rate is thought to be in the single digits this year.

Sela is not struggling - it’s fully enrolled with wait list; and has been tier 1 two years in a row.

Yes it is. Sela almost closed several times. They're fully enrolled for ECE mainly because it's become very difficult to get into ECE programs that aren't in Ward 7 or 8. Hardly anybody stays at Sela to the upper grades.

You may need to catch up. Their 2018 enrollment is below and they accepted no new students for 3rd or 4th.

They also have a reenrollment rate of over 80%. They struggled with enrollment during their first two years, but never ever got close to closing. They are one of the most financially solvent charters historically.

PK3 39
PK4 40
K 31
1st 33
2nd 24
3rd 24
4th 11

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

But almost all the bilingual programs are Spanish here. I imagine many in French at Stokes have a familial connection to French. So you're really just talking about Sela and Yu Ying.

That said, I do think it's important to have a desire to really HAVE your child speak a second language, as your priority, not any of the "brain boosts" or whatnot. It's not a minor thing that just kind of makes the school better, abstractly. I wish those enrolling at bilingual schools all felt strongly about the language itself, and the accompanying culture, and weren't just applying because of the rankings (top level Tier 1's). I think that is pretty clearly the case with a few families.

The case with many high SES immersion families, they just don't admit it, or perhaps know it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please don't crucify me for asking, but I really don't understand why so many parents prioritize language immersion. I fell prey to this myself and was crushed when we didn't get our top pick in the lottery. However, now that i know my child better, I'm fairly certain DC would have struggled in a dual language environment. And as a result, we would have struggled as a family to support DC.

Are there academic studies that show immersion is really better? Or is this this just the current parent obsession?

We had the option of a language immersion or English track and we chose the English track and it was the right decision. We were more interested in the kids learning how to read and write well in English and be able to learn math and science in English. The foreign language track can be another obstacle for some kids.

Good for you. Language immersion programs are faddish. They come at the expense of learning English. If an American family has no real connection to to the culture or language, and the language isn't Spanish, the likelihood that the kid will still speak the language as teenagers, let alone adults, isn't high. New research indicates that the famous "cognitive boost" bilingual adults enjoy is pretty much BS.

I applaud you for knowing you and your children’s limitations. I’m being sincere. It annoys me when people think about enrolling their 2nd grader in an immersion school, or when they do nothing to help the language along.

My elementary school kid reads better in his target language than in English, but he has spoken it since birth with me. I’ll let him know this is just a fad.

If a family can't or doesn't bother to reinforce the target language at home, and/or doesn't continue with the immersion through around age 12, watch the kids lose it later. You meet Oyster grads at Deal whose Spanish is only a tad better than that of classmates who started learning Spanish in 6th grade. I spoke good Russian (which my parents don't speak) at age 8. I can't hardly speak a word now.