Report on aftermath of California Proposition 227 initiative to dismantle bilingual education; clips of Richard Riley, Peter Skerry; debate moderated by Ben Wattenberg, with Mark Lopez of Maryland, Stephen Krashen of USC, Ron Unz of English for the Children.
Libraries offer keys to success (part 3)
For many children of poverty, libraries are the only source of reading material. California's school and public libraries consistently rank at or near the bottom of the country. Investing in libraries will give language minority and other low-income children a chance to develop a reading habit, a necessity for attaining high levels of English language competence.
— Stephen Krashen, Malibu
Professor emeritus at the USC Rossier School of Education
benikomason2386 1 month ago
Libraries offer keys to success (part 2)
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Bilingual education is not enough, however. As noted, language minority children are very often children of poverty. Children from high-poverty areas have little access to books at home, at schools and in the community. This means less reading, and less reading means less literacy development.
benikomason2386 1 month ago
This letter was published in the Daily Breeze, Torrance, CA Dec 28, 2011
Libraries offer keys to success
Bilingual education works. Children in bilingual programs consistently do better than children in English-only programs on tests of English reading. Also, studies have shown that the dismantling of bilingual programs in California after Proposition 227 did not lead to better English language development....
Krashen writes more about the importance of access to books in this letter.
benikomason2386 1 month ago