I Fill This Small Space: The Writings of a Deaf Activist

Bilingual Education

52 Bilingual Education The column is relevant because it calls for more research about bilingual education in deaf classrooms during a time when none existed. Later, Newman would come full circle in a column for the NAD Monograph in 1992, in which he elegantly espouses the bilingual method. One often wonders how to break the cycle of classroom failure in the education of the deaf. Does the answer lie in bilingual teaching ? When I read two articles on bilingual education in the Sunday, June 25, 1972, issue of the Los Angeles Times I was struck by the similarities in problems faced by those involved in the education of the deaf with that of the Mexican-Americans. The Times article states that Mexican-Americans who have limited or no English-speaking ability have been expected to achieve academically in English. The article further states that the rationale for bilingual teaching is uncomplicated: A child’s first schooling should be in his mother tongue and he should be made literate in that language before attempting to learn another. An administrator of bilingual programs for Los Angeles schools, Mr. Ramiro Garcia, stated that “one of our failures has been taking for granted that a non-English speaking child would be able to learn English and (academic) concepts simultaneously and do it at the same rate and same speed as English speakers.” “What the latter approach in fact has too often produced,” adds Garcia, “is a child who falls behind academically as he struggles to learn English—at the same time losing ground in his native language—and who ends up barely functioning in either language.” ItwasalsomentionedintheTimesarticlethat“Bilingualteachingalsosets social and cultural goals for these children ranging from bolstering their selfimage to building new appreciation for and pride in their cultural roots.” One who is familiar with the persistent attempts to downgrade manual communication, with the failure to hire deaf teachers for the The Deaf American (May 1973) 53 early and critical learning period, with the feelings of parents, with the approach taken by teacher training centers, cannot help but be struck by parallel aspects related to Mexican-Americans in the following quotations taken from the same Times article: The barriers are usually several: finding qualified bilingual teachers, overcoming racial hostility, diverting funds into the purchase of bilingual materials and convincing a school board that teaching in a language other than English is not somehow un-American. Sometimes the opposition is from Mexican-American parents themselves , either because of feelings that Spanish is somehow inferior or because of fears that their children will not “make it” in the outside world without learning solely in English. Teacher training programs in colleges and universities have been slow to recognize the demand but there are a few now preparing bilingual teachers . . . . . . parents whose children are in the programs seemed pleased by their progress, and teachers with experience in bilingualism are usually enthusiastic salesmen for the approach. The move toward bilingualism in California has not been without its difficult moments, however. Some school systems have compromised on teaching by employing teachers only partially bilingual or not bilingual at all (assuming the presence of a bilingual teacher aide would make up for that shortcoming). Some systems have not lived up to the spirit of the program, instead rushing their children into nearly total use of English as fast as possible, virtually ignoring the two-language approach. [. . .] The first alphabet he learns will be in Spanish, he will learn to read and write first in Spanish, and he will listen as his teacher in Spanish introduces a new arithmetic concept for the first time. While this is going on, however, he will also be introduced to English as a second language in carefully paced steps: hearing and speaking it first, then reading and writing . . . much of the teaching is concurrent—the teacher immediately repeating in the second language what he or she has just said in the first language. “We find,” says Ramiro Garcia of Los Angeles city schools, “that children at an early age are very flexible with language learning. They don’t recognize the linguistic barriers that we set up as adults.” 54 One Los Angeles principal who has watched the progress of MexicanAmerican children in her school both before and after the arrival of bilingual instruction thinks the big difference is the pressure that is suddenly removed. She said she watched children grow frustrated...