Multilingual Mania

Linguistic Racism in the U.S.

August 24, 2011

A story out of Denver highlights a growing trend in the United States: linguistic racism. The tale, as reported by ABC 7, involved the arrest and detention of a number of legal immigrants by ICE. Their crime: the individuals arrested were all speaking Spanish. The Colorado American Civil Liberties Union called it racial profiling at [...]

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The Benefits of the Seal of Biliteracy

August 16, 2011

The Seal of Biliteracy is a special recognition that promotes and validates bilingualism and biliteracy in English and another language. The Seal of Biliteracy has been implemented by many school districts in California and is currently spreading to other districts throughout the nation. There are many benefits to implementing a Seal of Biliteracy in your [...]

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Giveaway: 32 Emergent Reader Books in Spanish

August 14, 2011

As bilingual educators, we know how hard it is to get your hands on multilingual materials and books. Luckily we are hosting a giveaway of a set of 32 emergent reader books in Spanish for educators as well as parents who are raising bilingual children. This set of 32 Spanish books consists of fiction and [...]

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My Love-Hate Relationship With Homework

August 8, 2011

I have had a complicated love-hate relationship with homework all of my life. As a child I hated completing it and when I would complete it, I just ended up losing it or throwing it away by accident. I was always the child whose mother or teacher would find her homework squished up in the [...]

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When Dual Immersion Programs Become Exclusionary

August 2, 2011

I wish that I could give you all the dirt on what a drama-filled day that I had at work today, but I can’t. I pride myself on being a professional who tries to stay above all the drama and tries to remain professional even during times of great conflict. I’m really angry and perturbed [...]

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Job Prospects During Immigration?

July 29, 2011

Here’s a story where multilingualism evolved into polylingualism… American travelers are quite comfortable filling out immigration forms, standing in line, and smiling at the officers manning immigration windows. I don’t mind this process myself, though I’ve had interesting experiences where it seemed I was the randomly elected tourist in the crowd to extend assistance in [...]

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The Power of Being Bilingual

July 19, 2011

For me it’s an honor to be bilingual. Ever since I was young I loved the idea of being able to speak two languages and communicate with other people. Being bilingual has not only helped me in my family, but also in my community as I performed my community service hours for the Community Service [...]

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El Poder de Ser Bilingüe

July 19, 2011

Para mí es una gran dicha el poder ser bilingüe. Desde que era pequeña, me encantaba la idea de poder hablar dos idiomas y el poder comunicarme con las demás personas. Ser bilingüe no solo me ayudó en mi familia, pero también en mi comunidad mientras hacía mis horas de servicio comunitario para el programa [...]

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The Linguistic Worlds of Technology

July 6, 2011

The World Wide Web and modern communication technologies have been connecting people around the globe, and technology is further changing how we interact. Languages seemingly play ever less of a role as we all come together in one global techno-culture, and gain ever more technological crutches to aid in communication. Some of these developments are [...]

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English Language Development (ELD) in a First Grade Dual Immersion Classroom

June 24, 2011

We wanted to share some pictures from a classroom demonstration that we recently conducted in a first grade Dual Immersion classroom. Although the students receive 80% of their instruction in Spanish, we modeled a Project GLAD Science unit during their English language development time in order to demonstrate for teachers how easy it is to [...]