Hacker News Reader

Comment by jmathai | Hacker News Reader

As a California resident, I'm surprised there's no mention of % of ESL (english as a second language) students. There's a very large population of ESL students in California that drag down these statistics as the students catch up.

If english isn't your primary language, learning math that is taught in english will also be more difficult.

View on HN

This is BS. My good friend moved to California from Taiwan during high school. She struggled in all her classes (because she barely spoke english ("struggle" means she actually had to put in effort to get an "A")), but she excelled in math. She told me that she was an average student in Taiwan, but when she moved to the US, she suddenly became a math genius. She was in the highest level math class the school offered, and it was a breeze for her. So, nope, she didn't "drag down" the statistics - in fact, just the opposite.

Stop the presses, this guy's "good friend" is the only data point we need!

Naxalt.

We get lots of immigrants from rural central America where the schools aren't amazing.

> If english isn't your primary language, learning math that is taught in english will also be more difficult.

Having been in a German school for several months where I did not know German, the only subject I did well in was math. I'm not so sure your assertion is correct.

Surely you would have had an easier time if the teacher taught in German.

At the glacial pace classes move, there's plenty of time to learn einz, zwei, drei, vier, etc. Learning arithmetic doesn't require language fluency.

I've traveled in many countries where I didn't know a word of their language. It isn't hard to communicate with people for basic things. Besides, I often will spend a few minutes to learn the words for one...ten just so I can engage in commerce. It's not rocket science.

Something can be harder but still possible.

If you're saying that the language which math is taught in has no bearing on learning - then we disagree.

So why not teach them in their primary language? It is not like big groups are too small... And there is no official language. So mandating that selected number of schools including universities receiving public funding must have sufficient classes and courses in some other language should be entirely possible.

There are a lot of Spanish immersion schools especially at the lower grade levels to help bridge the gap into bilingual learning.

There was a push to make all schools in California teach in both Spanish and English back in the eighties. The backlash was so great that it was made illegal for public schools to teach in anything but English.

Probably because it creates problems. You need math teachers who speak that language for one. Then you divide the student body, probably along racial lines for the most part, which isn't a good thing. And then lastly, it will only hinder the language development of the ESL group which will come back to bite them later in life.

California does have an official language (English). English is the official language in over half the states.

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...

No. California does not have a large Black immigrant population. The Black population speaks English and does worse than the average (including ESL students). Language alone doesn't explain the gap. Particularly since immigrant Asian groups are above average.

That's a "yes and", not a "no".

In California, ESL students are primarily from Mexico. The sum of all other immigrants combined is not even close to this number. 40% of the CA population is Hispanic and Latino. I think that is what the parent was speaking about.

Is that still true? I thought the mix had changed over the Trump years. My wife's prepandemic immigrant students were primarily from south of Mexico- Guatemala, El Salvador, even Peru.

let me help you here - "black" is a particularly tragic demographic classification.. since a very large part of the world population live closer to the Equator, and have darker skin, than the people who wrote those English category names; add to that the particular unique form of slavery in Agricultural USA.

The fact that the President of the United States for two terms, a Harvard Law School graduate, is as demographically "black" as Haitians with loud and proud, violent anti-literacy every day.. says to me that actually.. you cannot lump together people by skin color in this day and age.

Math is language independent. Shouldn't ESL students be able to use workbooks in their native language?

Math teachers speak English.

You'd think so, but I've taught ESL math. Good luck getting them to understand what's even going on without speaking their language. Especially if some, like my students, come in at high school having only really had five years of formal schooling.

You need the language to teach the math, basically. Also, not all of the kids I had were literate in their first language (A Mayan language, so most weren't) or even their second (often another Mayan language) or third (Spanish usually), so you can't just say 'Give them a workbook'

I'd sure hate to be taught math from a workbook alone.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com