School Board Discusses Future of Spanish Immersion Program

As students in District 833’s Spanish immersion program near high school, school officials are working to determine what type of classes they will take in the future.

In a Nov. 3 workshop, the South Washington County School Board discussed the program as a whole and how Spanish classes may look at the high school and middle school levels.

Current seventh-grade Spanish immersion students will continue the program in high school level stating in 2013, which presents some opportunities and challenges for district officials, Linda Plante, principal, said at the meeting.

Plante said the high school Spanish program will need to be expanded because the fluency level of the immersion students coming into high school will far exceed the ability of previous students.

The formation of an array of new Spanish classes is being considered, starting with tweaking classes offered before high school.

For grades 6-8, social studies and Spanish language culture would be taught and require a capstone activity at the end of the eighth-grade year. In grades nine and 10, social studies and language arts would be taught in Spanish.

Students would learn social studies and high-level Spanish language culture class in 11th grade.

Grade 12 would be a capstone class with a service component—humanities would emphasize authentic communication in Spanish related to the various Spanish and Latin American literature and other texts.  Students would write text analysis; interior monologues and journals related to project based experience, according to information from the district.

The need for additional Spanish training for teachers and purchasing more advanced Spanish books was also brought up during the meeting.

Plante said some residents might be leery of enrolling their students in an immersion program because of the idea they could fall behind their English-only counterparts academically.

That concern isn’t valid, she said.

“Research bears out that they (immersion students) are at or above their counterparts,” she said. “There’s also research that shows there are cogitative benefits—there is better cognitive flexibility and better non-verbal problem-solving skills, which helps with the ACT and SAT tests.

Elise Block, Cottage Grove Middle School Principal, said the program has been a success at her school, and she echoed Plante’s sentiment about Spanish immersion.

“We know the benefits far outweigh the challenges,” she said. “At least in our eyes they do.

She added: “Students who are in an immersion program too outperform, and the research speaks to that very clearly.”

The next steps for the program include district officials working with teachers at all levels to develop a K-12 immersion continuum.

The school board has also identified a need for the development of a curriculum framework for staff. The registration process for this year’s immersion students is expected to begin in December.

Last year, the first set of sixth-grade Spanish immersion students in the district’s “Nuevas Fronteras” program began at Cottage Grove Middle School.

Nuevas Fronteras currently has three kindergarten, three first -grade, three second-grade, three third-grade and two fourth-grade classrooms. The program, which has been in existence since 2004, shares school facilities with Crestview Elementary School in Cottage Grove.

Last year District 833 was .

Many residents had criticized the plans because one option would have closed a district elementary school—Crestview, Armstrong, or —if the program got its own building.