It’s not every day students get an art lesson from Frida Kahlo, but in College Park Elementary School’s Spanish immersion class, that’s just a typical Wednesday.
The brain child of Carla Hogue, first grade teacher and the class’s Frida Kahlo for the day, the dual language immersion program is new to not only College Park Elementary but to all of Berkeley County.
As a dual language immersion class, 50 percent of the students are native English speakers and the other half of the class speaks a different language, in CPE’s case Spanish. Throughout the school day, Hogue teaches the students in both English and Spanish. Math is taught entirely in Spanish while reading, writing and other general concepts are taught equally in both languages.
“Our final goal is to produce global learners who are both bi-literate and bilingual,” Hogue said.
Near the end of last school year, Hogue held a presentation on the dual language immersion class for prospective first grade parents to sign up their children and pilot the program.
“In that first night, we were able to sign up a whole class,” Hogue said. “Now, as the program continues to grow, there’s already interest. I’ve already had parents who have kids in other classes this year ask me what do I do to get my kids into this program.”
Currently, Hogue’s class is the only one of its kind at CPE, but school administration and Berkeley County School District administrators are working to expand it.
Robert Guthro, K-12 ESOL Coordinator for BCSD, said the hope is to advance this program to include a second grade class next year and a third grade class the following year, with the current class of first-graders sticking together all through their elementary experience.
“The whole time, they will have had the cultural opportunity to engage on an equal footing with students of the other language group,” Gouthro said. “It changes…the students’ perspective on language and education.”
Previously a high school Spanish teacher, Hogue said she’s impressed by how much Spanish her students have already grasped.
“The amount of language they can absorb at this age is unreal,” Hogue said. “It took me a week to teach colors in high school, whereas it took me one day to teach colors in first grade.”
Hogue continued, saying her students have also mastered counting to 100 in Spanish, using Spanish question words, and talking about themselves and their families in Spanish. Additionally, she’s seen tremendous growth in her English Language Learner students' English-speaking abilities.
“The beautiful thing about the dual language process is that it expands your mind to accept language and with that comes the English language,” Hogue said. “One doesn’t outdo the other at all.”
Throughout the school, Hogue’s students have been known to brag about being bilingual. It’s a specific point of pride for all of them.
“I just really want our community, BCSD, Berkeley County to know that this program is out there,” Hogue said. “This program is working, it’s thriving.”