Rosalinda Nava de Espinosa Bilingual Education

            The first teacher I interviewed was Ms. Norma Garcia, she has been working in the early education field for twenty years in El Hogar del Nino day care.  As I started my interview I thanked her for letting me conduct my observation hours in her classroom.  I informed her about my internship class and I shared that for this class I had an assignment which will need 10 hours of field experience.  I also shared that although there will be many things happening in the classroom my focus was going to be in the area of bilingual education.  My question to her was to share her thoughts on bilingual education.  She said that today we are living in a world filled with diversity and as caregivers/teachers, we play an important role in helping children learn to communicate with others in their home language; and at the same time the children can learn another language little by little.  Ms. Garcia mentioned that it is also very important for the teacher’s to communicate with the families in their native language. Ms. Garcia informed me that the classroom has labels both in English and Spanish.  There are also bilingual books and they sing bilingual songs.  Ms. Garcia feels that as long as she is in the field she will advocate for bilingual education and promises to always respect her student’s home language.

            The second person that I interviewed was Ms. Yolanda Salazar, she is a Kindergarten teacher.  She has been a teacher for 16 years.  I also started by thanking her for the opportunity to interview her and I explain the reason for my presence.  I shared with her about my research on bilingual education and I proceeded by asking her thoughts about bilingual education.  Ms. Salazar believes that the first years of school are the most important for the children to receive services in their native language.  She believes that with such support the children will learn more and interact with more consistency during class.  Ms. Salazar believes that children that know more than one language are wiser and can eventually learn more than two languages.  She shared with me that she has a student whose mother is Mexican and his father is Greek.  Being only six years old, this child speaks Greek, Spanish and English.  She is amazed of the capacity of this child.  Over all she feels that bilingual education is very important and feels that she will advocate for her children to receive services in their home language.  She will motivate and encourage families to help their children learn a second language.  Her only worry is the funding cuts.  Ms. Salazar is worried that these funds will affect the bilingual students and will not receive the education that they deserve.

                        Overall I enjoyed talking to both teachers’.  I learned that even though they are in different settings they both are aware on the importance of bilingual education.  I enjoyed seeing their passion and respect for diversity. As I proceed with this research I hope to continue to find more benefits on why it is important to continue advocating for bilingual services.