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Bilingual Education

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Many Americans claim that bilingual education defies the traditional mindset of America being a “Melting Pot” of cultures—including that of speaking our “native tongue”. But I believe that the benefits of a student being bilingual far exceed the concerns some other Americans have.
It has been proven that children who learn to speak a second language at a younger age will be able to grasp the concepts of grammar, vocabulary etc. better than the average child trying to learn a foreign language. In fact, it has been said that such children can easily move on to learning other languages with much more ease. A child who starts out bilingual, due to early education in the English language in addition to their native tongue, is much more likely to become trilingual, or beyond. I have met people who speak more than seven languages and I admire them so much. These individuals started out bilingual. All students should be exposed to other languages and cultures—and they should be as early as possible, by my way of thinking.

Some argue that even if bilingual education has its advantages it is still a bad idea for the country because bilingualism threatens to sap our sense of national identity and divide us along ethnic lines. This claim is outrageous. Yes, Americans want to be unified—but I believe that Americans with deep roots in other cultures should do their best to preserve that culture—not eliminate it. Our students should be learning about cultures other than their own anyway—not only those that exist outside American boarders.
It has been proven that multiple language skills do not confuse the mind. Quite the contrary: when well-developed, they have major cognitive advantages.

Not to provide bilingual education to non-English speaking students is educational neglect. By assigning minority students to regular classrooms and providing no special help for them in crossing language barriers, many children have been left out, whereas if the school utilizes bilingual education, the children can learn to their full potential. Not providing bilingual education has caused students to drop out or give up—when they most likely had enough intelligence to succeed.

Bilingual education is not only an issue concerning children who speak the languages of other cultures and require bilingual education to adjust to American schools, it is also something to consider for children who speak only English.

Bilingual education, i.e. (for this example) lessons in foreign languages should be provided at younger ages. There are many students who move on to study languages and cultures in college as their majors, and having a basic background in bilingual education will make the road a lot smoother for these students. Successfully mastering a particular language is much easier to do when the student is already bilingual.

I believe the goal should not be to “melt” together in America, but to live peacefully among each other in America, and to learn as much about other cultures as we can—language being an important part of that learning. Bilingual education in my opinion is a good and even essential thing for students today.

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