ESOL kindergarten questions

[Anonymous]

A unique situation that I am wondering if anyone here has insight into:

I have DS going into pk3. I already have my lottery list submitted for him. Our IB is not an option (bunker hill) but we have listed Sela as what I believe will likely be a safety, along with Langley and garrison.

I just learned last night that my nanny's DD, just turned five, is going to come to live with us from her country (Guatemala) in the next month. Nanny's DD speaks no English and has had zero early childhood education. My nanny is paid through a payroll company so she will have no trouble proving residency for our address so my understanding is that her DD could enroll in Bunker Hill by right without even entering the lottery. However, I'm worried that her DD is unlikely to succeed at Bunker Hill. . Nanny knows nothing of the lottery but I'd like to see if there are schools that may be better educational opportunities than Bunker Hill for her.

Wondering a few things- any way to determine whether some of the charters would be a good fit for nanny's DD? Maybe I should be looking at immersion schools? She could certainly demonstrate Spanish dominant if we applied to any of the dcps.

It would of course be a lot easier if nanny's DD went to the same school as my DS, although I think the chances of arranging that are slim given the fact that there would be no sibling preference. Any suggestions on trying to maximize the likelihood of them ending up at the same school? The obvious answer is to send both to the IB but I'm not willing to do that.

Finally, anyone know of any services that would provide some English help or other socialization for nanny's DD in the 5 or so months between her arrival and next school year? My nanny takes DS to lots of story times and could bring her DD along as well of course but I'm think that her DD may need something more than what is appropriate for my English speaking 2 year old.

[Anonymous]

Use learndc.org to find schools (charters or DCPS schools) with decent percentages of ELLs, which means they shoudl have resources to support kids learning english

You can find this by going to this website http://www.learndc.org/schoolprofiles/search entering the name of a school, and clicking on the Equity Report.

Scroll down and filter to search by Need.

[Anonymous]

Thanks, this is helpful, I'd never used this tool before.

[Anonymous]

OP - so she will arrive in March/April?

I think the best thing to do is enroll her in school asap, not wait til the fall. The sooner she gets exposure to English the better.

When is the child's birthday? If she only turned 5 after Oct 1 you could try to find an open PreK 4 space somewhere for the rest of this year, and enter lottery for K in the fall.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - so she will arrive in March/April?

I think the best thing to do is enroll her in school asap, not wait til the fall. The sooner she gets exposure to English the better.

When is the child's birthday? If she only turned 5 after Oct 1 you could try to find an open PreK 4 space somewhere for the rest of this year, and enter lottery for K in the fall.

I strongly agree and would love to do that. She just turned 5 last week though so it is pk4. How would I go about finding open pk4 slots at schools without waitlists? Do schools actually admit new pk4ers this late in the year? I basically assumed that they don't since it isn't by right.

[Anonymous]

Lamb lottery deadline is coming up fast. I'd submit that one now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - so she will arrive in March/April?

I think the best thing to do is enroll her in school asap, not wait til the fall. The sooner she gets exposure to English the better.

When is the child's birthday? If she only turned 5 after Oct 1 you could try to find an open PreK 4 space somewhere for the rest of this year, and enter lottery for K in the fall.

I strongly agree and would love to do that. She just turned 5 last week though so it is pk4. How would I go about finding open pk4 slots at schools without waitlists? Do schools actually admit new pk4ers this late in the year? I basically assumed that they don't since it isn't by right.

You need to get on the phone and start calling schools. It's a long shot but you may get lucky.

[Anonymous]

Call Bethune.

[Anonymous]

Will start calling tomorrow. Thanks all.

[Anonymous]

I think immersion would be a great fit -- they would help develop the child's literacy in her first language.

I'd look more closely at Cleveland, Stokes, Bruce-Monroe, Powell, Bancroft, Marie Reed .. depending on commute.

[Anonymous]

I can't really speak to the relative quality of any of the schools listed, but I have worked with a fair number of ESOL kids (not as an ESOL teacher, as other school staff.) Kids at that age pick up language extremely quickly if they're immersed in it.

In my experience, students who come in at the beginning of the year speaking no English spend about the first five or six months not saying much at all, then start to gain confidence and really blossom. That's not to say that they'll be fluent that early, but they'll be able to participate in class, interact with friends, etc. And, with her coming in so young there's a good chance that she'll catch up with her peers pretty quickly.

[Anonymous]

Hi OP, I started in this country at 4 speaking very little English (hi, bye, banana) and now, I speak very little of my home language. In the 70s we didn't really have "Esl" and you just got tossed into the class.

At 5, the kid will have a few crap weeks and then should be fine.

[Anonymous]

The biggest issue is how rich her language is in her native language. The more songs, books and conversation she has been exposed to, the better. If she is on track developmentally she will pick up English quickly.

[Anonymous]

Just curious: are you cool with all this being sprung on you?

[Anonymous]

Check out Brightwood-they have a huge ESOL population, as a result they have many teachers who are very experienced with new comers and lots of resources.