Bilingual Education

I believe that bilingual education would be beneficial to students if the educators are well qualified. To graduate high school proficient in two languages would be highly beneficial to this nation and to jobs like international business or trial translators. American schools do not put a high priority on teaching the students a second language and do not even introduce it until high school. Teaching children a language is much more successful. Also the way foreign language is taught today in America shows little results. How often does an American high school student graduate bilingual just because of the language classes that the school offered? Rarely is that the case. Foreign language programs tend to focus on strict grammar rules. Languages need to be taught the way a child learns their first language. Memorization is the key. Teaching strict grammar lessens the chance of a student to actually pick up the language not giving them motivation to pursue mastering the foreign language. Why continue studying a language that you can't even speak to another speaker? Through memorization comes conversational skills! Then after you can communicate, you can focus on perfecting grammar skills.

My major is Spanish and desire to learn more than just another language and hope for others to learn more languages too. Throughout high school I took Spanish class in which I never excelled, but when I moved to Charlotte, NC my Spanish teacher taught the memorization method and I began gaining conversational skills which gave me the desire to pursue Spanish as my major in college now. Not only will I become accustomed to another culture, but I will have ceaseless opportunities to work in multiple job fields while making good money. Arabic is my next obstacle.