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chantel1106
language proposal; For this assignment come up with a summary of…

language proposal; For this assignment come up with a summary of the findings below: the instructions are in bolded and underlined under the links of articles that should be used in the assignment

 

Final Project Proposal

What region/country did you choose and why? 

-We chose to research San Diego, California.

 

 What language are you going to focus on and why?

-We want to find out more about the language of Spanish in our area. We chose this because Spanish is becoming a very common language in the area (the second most spoken language behind English) and we want to find out what resources are in the community that addresses getting more people to either learn the language or progress in speaking and writing it. 

 

Which school(s) did you identify and why are you choosing it?

– We chose to identify the program in San Diego that is called, “Dual Language Immersion”. We are looking to research two way immersion programs in the San Diego unified school district. A two way immersion program is for English only speakers and a bilingual maintenance model for English learners. Dual Immersion programs consist of a 90/10 split where 90% of the curriculum is taught in Spanish and 10% is taught in English. The goal is to teach further grades in a 50/50 split. We feel that this is important to our community because we are curious to see if this model will encourage the maintenance of this heritage language and introduce new bilingual speakers to San Diego. We are also curious to see the academic performance of these students compared to monolingual speakers. Our group agrees that learning Spanish is a great way to connect with more people in the community and this program is a great way for people to learn this language at a young age.  

 

https://www.sandiegocountyschools.com/dual-language 

 

Part 1

Research the linguistic situation in your chosen region: e.g. what languages are spoken (used) there and by how many speakers? What is the dominant language in the region? If there are more than 10 languages, provide basic demographic data for the top 5 (e.g. this depends on the information in your sources. At the very least, provide the number of speakers, and other relevant information that you find, such as ethnicity, age ranges of the speakers) and enumerate the next five with numbers of speakers (like the Languages in San Diego assignment – how many speakers of each language).

   There is a plethora amount of languages spoken in San Diego. The dominant language spoken is English, however Spanish is the second most common language in the region. The top 10 languages that are spoken in the region include English, Spanish, Persian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Tagalog, Arabic, and French. There are 1,972,390 people in San Diego who speak only English. There is 730,892 people who speak Spanish. There is 82,467 people who speak Tagalog. There is 45,215 people who speak Chinese. There is 38,500 people who speak Vietnamese There is 32,314 people who speak Arabic. There is 17,776 people who speak Persian. There is 16,163 people who speak Korean. There is 13,592 people who speak Japanese. Finally, there is 12,185 people who speak French. There are many other languages spoken however these are the top 10, in order. What was an interesting number in the data was that 21% of the population in the county is bilingual and that 14% of the population speaks Spanish. As for ethnicity 58% are White, 38% are Latino, 17% are Asian, and 10%  identify as two or more races.

 

Are there any official languages, and if so which one(s)? Are there official or de facto [not official, but in practice] language policies? What language(s) are used in public schools?

The US has no official language. English is pretty much the dominant language of San Diego County with more than 52% of the people who speak English. But Spanish is also one of the dominant languages spoken in San Diego, around 34% of the San Diego population speak Spanish. (U.S. Census Bureau; 2013-2017 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, Table C16001.)

Spanish is becoming a very common language in the San Diego area in the last few years and is the second most spoken language. English is the dominant language of instruction in San Diego. But Spanish is the second language instruction in San Diego County. There are several bilingual programs in San Diego County. The Dual language is one of them, which is an immersion program in the San Diego unified school districts. They implement different types of teaching such as: 

·      Two-Way Developmental: composed of balanced (or nearly balanced) numbers of English-fluent speakers and English learners of the targeted second language. 

·      One-Way Developmental: serving a population of mostly English learners with a common home language.

·      One-Way FL: serving a population of mostly fluent English speaker’s students who are all learning the second language. 

With different types of models. In a 90:10 model the amount of the target language, starting 90% of the time in kindergarten, decreases yearly as English increases until there is a 50:50 balance of the languages generally in grades four through six. A 50:50 model uses English and the target language for 50 percent of the time throughout the duration of the program. (San Diego County Dual Language Directory, Office of Education, 2020)

 

https://data.sandiegocounty.gov/Demographics/2017-San-Diego-County-Demographics-Language-Spoken/b7iq-x9dz

 

https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1634677092/sdcoenet/jdgcd1omdjqskaesg5yx/2020_11_30_DL_School_Directory.pdf

 

 

Provide a summary paragraph of the language programs that you have found, and decide which one you will focus on in-depth for the next part of the project. 
Tips for searching for programs: 
use the resources I gave you as a starting point
search for “[name of language] school in [name of region]” or variations of this 

 

 

Project Part 1

 

Heading (of your writing/research)

Language Policies and Practices in School 

 

According to the US Census, the top five languages spoken in San Diego are Spanish, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Chinese, and Arabic. The speakers of these native languages vary in their ability to speak English.  In the 19th century, bilingual and minority-language schools arose due to a large number of immigrants. The purpose and aim of these language schools fluctuated depending on the discriminatory and political temperature of the time. 

 

The Califonia Non-English Languages Allowed in the Public Education Act also known as Proposition 58 does not require English-only in schools anymore. It is now allowing schools to use bilingual education programs. This proposition no longer requires parent waivers to take non-English classes. Another piece of legislation that establishes a path for multilingual education is the World Languages Standards for California Public Schools, Kindergarten Through Grade Twelve(WL Standards) promotes the intercultural competence of children through world language programs. These initiatives provide a path for Califonia’s Seal of Biliteracy. The WL Standards will support language learning in early education, offer a variety of world languages and track the progression of language acquisition from kindergarten to high school. Policies and legislation directly affect how and what teachers use instruction time on. 

 

There have been times in our history when legislation has contributed to the loss of language. A proposition that directly affected that was Prop.277, English for the Children banned bilingual education in California classrooms. The purpose of this proposition was to mainstream all children to use English only, by only allowing one year of a structured immersion program. Another legislation that affected language acquisition of students throughout the nation was 2001 No Child Left Behind. NCLB did not directly state English only however, they did stress the importance of English proficiency. Which incentivised and funded schools to the mainstream students to enter all-English classrooms as soon as possible, stressing proficiency in state testing. Fortunately, Proposition 58 as stated above reveres the effects of Proposition 277, which banned bilingual education. The twenty-first century now acknowledges the cultural and human capital of multicultural education. Legislation is now shifting towards the participation of communication, understanding, and awareness across cultures. Nonetheless, the fact that legislation is tethered to economic and political pressures will always put multilingual education at risk. Every year English-only propositions are introduced in Congress. 

 

***** Add a new paragraph here of the summary of the findings above***** 

 

Resources 

https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_58,_Non-English_Languages_Allowed_in_Public_Education_(2016) 

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Vksph4XbRIlYynvZazJEgQsgfu7ei53j/view