Why Spanish Immersion

I am a parent of a child who is in Spanish Immersion. My goal is to share my experience with Spanish Immersion Programs in public schools. I will be writing about why I chose to send my children to a Spanish Immersion Program and share my insights and even my frustrations.


I am an avid believer in second language acquisition. I grew up in the South and remember the day I learned that there was a world outside of the United States, that there were languages other than English. I was so excited when my ninth grade class got to take Spanish. I practiced the alphabet and tried to get the sounds just right. I memorized the words and their meanings and tried to remember what nouns went with "la" and which went with "el".

It turned out that others in my class were not as excited as I was. I heard them say things like, "Why do we need to learn this? This is stupid." or "This is America, we need to speak English." One of the kids that did the most complaining was the principal's son. One day, after about six weeks of Spanish, our homeroom teacher informed the class that we were no longer going to take Spanish. They were putting us in typing instead. No explanation at all. But I guess I already knew why. I was frustrated at how close minded they were. I was frustrated that we were not given a choice.

I never took a Spanish class again. I read a few books and tried to learn on my own; however, I was not very successful. My fascination with foreign language never dwindled. That's why I was so excited when I heard about the full Spanish Immersion Program available in some public schools in the Washington, DC. area. My oldest started eight years ago. I currently have an eight year-old who is in the program. I will be posting about once a week.