SLLIS on Ahora San Luis tonight

Tune in to Ahora San Luis at 7:30pm Friday, City TV 10, for a segment on The Spanish School.  Gilberto Pinela interviews kindergarten teacher Maríbel Martinez en español about the school, curriculum and value of immersion instruction for native and non-native speakers.  If you miss it this Friday, check the STL-TV schedule, this segment will air for the next six weeks.  If you’re not sure how to find this channel on your tv, you can always view it streaming live.

Only 20 spots left in The Spanish School!

You heard it here first folks.  We have 20 more spaces for founding families to join The Spanish School.  If you’ve been planning to enroll and haven’t gotten your packet in yet, IT IS TIME!  We have many outreach events planned over the next few weeks (see next post) and know that these 20 spots will fill quickly.  You can mail, fax or walk your information to the office: 634 N. Grand Blvd, Suite 10A, St. Louis, MO 63103.  Call the office and schedule your enrollment appointment today: (314)289-1520.

¡Bienvenida Arlene Galve Salgado!

Welcome Arlene Galve Salgado, Assistant Head of The Spanish School

I am a native from Mexico City. I have been married for 19 years with a Computer Engineer, and I am mother of two boys, my oldest son is 18 and my youngest son is 13 years old. I came two years ago to Columbia Missouri to get a Masters degree in teaching at Columbia College. In Mexico City I earned. a Special Degree in Public Administration, a Special Degree in Family Counseling, a Special Degree in Health Administration, and a Bachelor in Science with a major in Psychology. I have been teaching since 1993. My teaching experience includes pre-school through adult. I was a supervisor of kindergarten and preschool at national level.  I participated in curriculum development for kindergarten and preschool in a national project. For six years I was the principal of a Preschool and kindergarten for 480 children between 65 days of born to 6 years old. I have been training and updating teachers, medical and administrative staff. I worked as Vice president in a General Hospital named “General. José María Morelos y Pavón”. I worked also as a Human Resources manager. During the school year 2008-2009 I worked for Columbia Public Schools in Columbia, Missouri as a Spanish teacher with teenagers in a junior high school. I am committed to a career of life-long teaching and learning, and with successfulness of minors in the society. For me is a great honor to be part of a challenge as an SLLIS founder.

Yo soy nativa de la Ciudad de México. Estoy casada desde hace 19 años con un Ingeniero en Sistemas y soy madre de dos varones, uno de 18 y otro de 13 años. Vine en el año 2007 a Columbia Missouri  a estudiar una Maestría en Enseñanza en Columbia College. En México obtuve un Diplomado en Administración Pública, un Diplomado en Asesoría Familiar, un Diplomado en Administración de Salud, y una Licenciatura en Psicología. He trabajado en el área de enseñanza desde 1993. Mi experiencia  en enseñanza ha sido desde preescolar hasta  edad adulta. Fui supervisora de instituciones educativas de kindergarten y preescolar a nivel nacional. Participé en un proyecto educativo de desarrollo curricular  implementado a nivel nacional. Por seis años fui directora de un centro educativo para 480 niños desde 65 días de nacidos hasta 6 años de edad. He impartido cursos de capacitación y entrenamiento a personal de áreas educativas, administrativas y médicas. Trabajé como Subdirectora Administrativa en el Hospital General “Gral. José María Morelos y Pavón” en la Ciudad de México. También he sido Jefe de Departamento de Recursos Humanos. Durante el ciclo escolar 2008-2009 trabajé para Columbia Public Schools en Columbia, Missouri como  maestra de español con adolescentes. Estoy comprometida con una carrera de enseñanza-aprendizaje, y  el éxito de los menores en la sociedad. Es un honor ser parte del reto educativo como fundadora de SLLIS.

Nuestra escuela es una semilla

Conrad is in Minnesota this week visiting a few language immersion elementary schools.  Keep reading for more of his dispatched observations.

Today the faculty from The Spanish School and I drove to Beardstown, IL, to visit the two way immersion dual-language Spanish-English program at Gard Elementary.  Dual language immersion programs strive to enroll 50% native speakers of each language in mixed classes.  The students then spend half of their instructional time in each language.  Beardstown is in rural IL and has a significant Spanish-speaking population.

Our 4+ hours in the minivan led to a series of rich, intellectual and funny conversations in Spanish and English.  At Gard we observed kindergarten and first grade classes and a Spanish music class.  One of our teachers observed that some classes seemed to have many more native Spanish-speakers than native English-speakers.  Apparantly there is a negative perception of Spanish by some English-dominant families and the staff works diligently to educate Anglo families about the benefits of English+.  In some classes the social student language was English and in others it was Spanish.

We learned and sang a number of transition songs, shadowed a class in the greenhouse and observed individual trimester assessments.We concluded with an overview of their internal student assessments in English and Spanish. How appropriate that the first grade classes were working on growing seeds.  I can’t think of anything more symbolic for our first professional development experience!

¡Bienvenida Debra Cole! Head of The Spanish School

Welcome Debra Cole, Head of The Spanish School

Debra is a 25 year veteran language educator who founded the Spanish-English dual-immersion elemenary program in Beardstown, IL, successfully recruiting 50% Spanish-dominant families and 50% English-dominant families to participate.  Debra is a true instructional leader with a strong commitment to parent engagement and shared leadereship and will be an amazing asset for our community-building. Debra is currently writing our federal Foreign Language Acquisitoin Program grant and transitioning with the final new hires for The Spanish School.  Tuesday, the local teachers for The Spanish School will spend the day in Beardstown observing their kindergarten and 1st grade classes.  Sunday, April 26th Debra and the founding staff of The Spanish School will host a face painting and sock puppet table at St. Cecilia’s Día del niño event.  Join us if you can, the festival lasts from 1pm-5pm.

¡Bienvenido a Alicia Rodriguez Bower!

Join us in welcoming Alicia Rodriguez Bower as Founding Head of School for The Spanish School.  For Alicia’s professional bio, read our website.  Here she is, in her own words.

I have been a proponent of foreign language education all of my life.  I have realized over the years how much communicating in other languages enhances anyone’s quality of life.  Not only does language learning help students understand and appreciate other cultures by knowing their language, it also adds so much to a student’s knowledge of his/her own native language.

I was immersed in English when I came to this country as an 11 year old who spoke no English.  My family that came from Cuba settled in Indiana and none of us knew English except my dad.  Because we were surrounded by English, it didn’t take long to learn the language well.  My parents made sure, though, that we also spoke our native language, Spanish, at home as well as learned to read it and write it in order to be fully bilingual.

Because of my personal background and my experiences in foreign language education and the immersion system, I truly believe this program offers a magical education for students that will prepare them to the world that we live in which becomes smaller and smaller every day.  I am looking forward to the wonderful success of The Spanish School in St. Louis and know that working together we will make this dream become a reality.

Alicia Rodriguez Bower
Head of School
The Spanish School

Interpreter pause

Wednesday evening Lisa Dorner accompanied me to a parent meeting at SSDN.  This was the first outreach meeting that we’ve done where

1. half of the families were Spanish-speaking and half were English-speaking, and
2. we had a simultaneous interpreter!

Lisa could have easily interpreted for the Spanish-speaking families, but SSDN always has a bilingual staffer/interpreter available for their parent meetings.  It was reassuring and delightful to hear how excited both groups of families are about our schools.  And the presentation reminded me to practice my interpreter pause!

At last night’s school project group meeting families generated a list of new marketing/outreach ideas for this winter.  Hopefully we’ll get the list posted soon along with other notes and bright ideas.

Parents respond

Our community outreach is well underway and I wanted to share a few of the positive responses that we’ve received from families.

–

You came at just the right time. Since my son was 6 months I have been thinking about where he was going to kindergarten. Just last week after much research, I had narrowed it down to a charter school and I wanted him to learn French and German.
I visited your website on this past Saturday.
I am so excited about the school and this opportunity for my son.
I told my in-laws and my family about Brysen’s new school.
Everyone is excited. My in-laws live in St. Thomas, Missouri (a small town, population 1,000 where they are the only blacks in town and unrelated to anyone else).
St. Thomas, Missouri is talking about the school.
My family back home in New Orleans is talking about the school.
I was at a birthday party this week with my neighbors ( I live in Benton Park West) and was talking about the school.
I will be at a sorority event next week and will talk about Brysen’s future.

–

Other language immersion schools in the US

The Center for Applied Linguistics’ Directory of Foreign Language Immersion Schools includes 263 language immersion schools, 181 of which are elementary schools. The CAL directory focuses on public schools (traditional or charter), which means that when you consider the private and parochial schools with language immersion programs, there are over 300 such schools in the country. This doesn’t include two-way immersion and bilingual programs that target native and heritage speakers of a language. Here are few other language immersion schools inpo:

Traditional Public

Milwaukee German Immersion School (MGIS) Milwaukee, WI (German)

L’étoile du Nord, St. Paul, MN (French)

Montgomery County Public Schools, Maryland (Mandarin, French, Spanish)

Post Oak Elementary, Lansing, MI (Mandarin)

District Magnet

Smith Academy, Charlotte, NC (French, Spanish, German, Mandarin)

Inter-American Magnet School, Chicago, IL (Spanish)

Horace Mann Dual Language Magnet, Wichita, KS (Spanish)

Public Charter

Académie Lafayette, KCMO (French)

Albert Einstein Academies, San Diego, CA (German & Spanish)

Lakes International Language Academy, Forest Lake, MN (Spanish)

International School of Louisiana, New Orleans, LA (French & Spanish)

Yu Ying Charter School, Washington D.C. (Mandarin)

The French School and The Spanish School enrolling kindergarten and 1st grade students for 2009

Parents, enroll your children today in this tuition-free, public elementary school.  We provide free transportation for city residents, and free before and after school programs. The enrollment deadline is July 31st for the 0910 school year.  Call now: (314)533-0975.