The experience of growing up bilingual is a unique one for many students, some of whom struggled once to speak English.
In Andy Bishop’s fourth grade class at Jefferson Elementary School, students spoke about their experiences.
“My sister and my cousin spoke English and I didn’t understand a word,” said 10-year-old Jizlinn Martinez-Cruz. “It was hard pronouncing the words.”
Jizlinn and other students in the Mount Vernon School District learned to communicate in English and also in Spanish,
“When you grow up you could get a better job (if you speak more than one language),” said ten year old Kimberly Madera. She speaks English and Spanish, and also Mixteco, an indigenous language from southern Mexico.
These students and others in Bishop’s class made a video, sharing what it is like to be bilingual and grow up within two cultures.
The diversity of the bilingual students is what Bishop wanted to highlight through the video.
“There’s a lot of kids that are bilingual that are actually kind of embarrassed about it,” Bishop said. “I always try to tell them to be proud of it. I try to empower them.”
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