PreK Foreign Language Immersion - Page 2

[velochic]

My dd is in 1st grade - her 4th year of one-way, full-time language immersion school (private). Her school is IB accredited pre-k through 12th grade. This is her first year of getting any instruction in English... English language arts (reading and writing in English). We are bilingual at home in English and a third language. So dd is trilingual. At school, for the first 3 years all of her schooling was in the target language. Her Spanish is now as strong as the other two languages.

(She has never had a delay in any of the languages, btw... in fact she has always been way ahead in all the languages.)

I cannot stress enough how amazing these programs are. Dd doesn't speak her target language (Spanish, the other track is French) at home. Ever. She never has, which is what we are told to expect. But when she gets to school, it's an amazing transformation.

Just this year, her 4th, is she truly fluent. There are two main distinctions of fluency: BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) is being able to ask for the restroom and understanding the routine of the day. CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) is the level where you can actually teach an academic subject to the child and they understand fully. It takes about 6 months to achieve the first and about 3 - 7 years to achieve the latter (in full immersion).

I think it is particularly beneficial because dd gets a *true* multicultural education. I don't have much time to expound more, but if you want to PM me, I can answer any of your questions (other than those specific to the school itself) on language immersion school in the primary years.

Good luck!

ETA: Dd did have to have IQ testing to be admitted to this school. And a social interaction evaluation. You might verify if this is or is not necessary at your child's potential school. I don't put much stock in these as dd was barely 3 when she had hers! How much can they tell at that age?

[AndrewsMother]

Originally Posted by MattBronsil

Both sound like fantastic schools. It's interesting because I first cringed when I saw this question thinking, "NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!" The reason for that is I live in Taiwan and foreign language "education" is quite different here. Notice I put "education" in quotation marks.

At the same time, I am working hard to change at least some of those problems and see benefits to what you're talking about. A key thing is to make sure the child's needs are met and language acquisition does not become primary over the child's needs. That's generally what happens in most pre-k and k schools I have seen in Taiwan, so my cringe and my bias comes from that. (Yes...I did find schools where that is not the case).

Matt

Both are great schools, I will send you to the link of the Montessori School. Please tell me what you think about their program if you have the chance to look at the site since from other post you have a very good understanding of Montessori. I will keep your comments in mind about the needs of the child over language acquisition if we are accepted.

Originally Posted by RomanGoddess

Well, my DD is trilingual as a result of foreign language immersion so I am certainly not against it. However, I would not enroll in any immersion program in which the foreign language teachers were not native speakers. That the teacher speaks the language "fluently" is not enough, as even fluent speakers do not use proper sentence patterns and have a foreign accent when they speak. If they are native speakers, then go for it!

I love AMI Montessori, too! You can't really go wrong either way.

Both English teachers, the Spanish teacher and the French teacher are native speakers. I took high school spanish and french from non native speakers and I never did as well in their classes as I performed in those of native speakers.

Originally Posted by fadedgirl

I should have said that in San Diego we do have a German Coop Preschool, and a charter public school named Albert Einstein that is German Immersion beginning in kindergarten and then they start Spanish instruction as well in 2nd or 3rd. I have heard great things about Albert Einstein.

There is also a French American School here, while I do not know anyone that has had direct experience with it, we ruled it out as an option fairly early on.

I also agree with ROMANGODDESS: that having native speakers as teachers is of vital importance.

Why did you rule out the French American School?

Originally Posted by velochic

My dd is in 1st grade - her 4th year of one-way, full-time language immersion school (private). Her school is IB accredited pre-k through 12th grade. This is her first year of getting any instruction in English... English language arts (reading and writing in English). We are bilingual at home in English and a third language. So dd is trilingual. At school, for the first 3 years all of her schooling was in the target language. Her Spanish is now as strong as the other two languages.

(She has never had a delay in any of the languages, btw... in fact she has always been way ahead in all the languages.)

I cannot stress enough how amazing these programs are. Dd doesn't speak her target language (Spanish, the other track is French) at home. Ever. She never has, which is what we are told to expect. But when she gets to school, it's an amazing transformation.

Just this year, her 4th, is she truly fluent. There are two main distinctions of fluency: BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) is being able to ask for the restroom and understanding the routine of the day. CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) is the level where you can actually teach an academic subject to the child and they understand fully. It takes about 6 months to achieve the first and about 3 - 7 years to achieve the latter (in full immersion).

I think it is particularly beneficial because dd gets a *true* multicultural education. I don't have much time to expound more, but if you want to PM me, I can answer any of your questions (other than those specific to the school itself) on language immersion school in the primary years.

Good luck!

ETA: Dd did have to have IQ testing to be admitted to this school. And a social interaction evaluation. You might verify if this is or is not necessary at your child's potential school. I don't put much stock in these as dd was barely 3 when she had hers! How much can they tell at that age?

This school is IB accredited pk3- 12th grade. IQ tests are not required for preschool3, but for PK4 and Kindergarten and the WISC IV is utilized for older applicants until 5th grade when the ISEE is required. A classroom observation is required for both the Montessori School and the International school.

I will PM you as questions arise. Thank you!!!