Hola: 79 enrolled in MSSU’s Spanish Language Village

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July 13, 2009

Anonymous The Joplin Globe Mon Jul 13, 2009, 08:59 PM CDT

By Melissa Dunson

mdunson@joplinglobe.com

Levi Grant is only 13, but the Carl Junction resident already has seen the benefits of learning a foreign language.

Grant said he started learning Spanish after he heard his father talk about his difficulty communicating with patients at his job at a local hospital.

And Grant said he is so glad to have a Spanish-language foundation now because his future high school recently started requiring all students to take two semesters of a foreign language.

“I’m getting ahead,” Grant said.

Grant is one of 79 students enrolled in the 14th annual Spanish Language Village summer camp at Missouri Southern State University that started Sunday and runs through Friday.

Leslie Parker, director of the International Language Resource Center at MSSU, said learning a foreign language doesn’t just help students communicate better, it can open their minds to other subjects and parts of the world.

“This helps with critical thinking and math skills; there’s research to show that,” Parker said. “And it can also build a tolerance for differences and develop the ability to adapt.”

While the debate over illegal immigration rages on, Parker said the local reaction to the Spanish-speaking camp has been mostly positive.

“People do recognize the importance of it,” Parker said.

A lower price, early advertising and revised curriculum resulted in the camp’s record setting enrollment, Parker said.

The program that immerses students eight to 14 years old in the Spanish language through games, crafts, song and dance only had 54 students last year.

“I was thrilled, and surprised,” Parker said, about the jump in enrollment. “Especially with the economy the way it is, this is great.”

MSSU dropped the price of the camp by $100 this year, and offered scholarships to financially eligible families.

The students, both day camp and residential, came from as far away as California and Michigan, and nearly half of this year’s attendees were new to the program.

The camp’s curriculum was revised for this year and extended the age range to include 14-year-olds, Parker said.

The new curriculum starts with vocabulary and skills that are very student-centered in the beginning, expanding out in subject matter as the students grow.

“For the little kids, we deal with items in the home and family, it’s very ‘me’ centered,” Parker said. “As they progress both in learning and in maturity, we extend those themes of traveling and shopping, the whole time keeping in mind how language learners and how kids develop.”

‘Almost too late’

Parker said the goal of the new curriculum is for the students who come back to the camp year after year to be able to enter high school and potentially test out of Spanish 1.

“They will have seen everything in a Spanish 1 class here,” she said.

The camp is the only opportunity for many area students to study a foreign language before entering high school. Area elementary schools don’t offer foreign-language courses, and courses at the middle-school and junior-high levels are rare.

“By age 12, that door is closed, so when you start teaching it at the junior-high and high-school level, it’s almost too late,” Parker said. “By a certain age, your native language is settled.”

Parker said having those language skills help students in high school, college and eventually the workplace.

Camper Abby Elmer, 14, of Kansas City, has been coming to the Spanish Language Village for seven years and said she doesn’t know how she will use her language skills when she gets older, but said it helps keep her engaged in school for the time being.

“I really like it,” she said. “It’s one of my more interesting classes in school.”

Finale

The campers’ closing program of singing and dancing is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Friday in Corley Auditorium in Webster Hall at MSSU. The dates for next year’s Spanish Language Village are July 11 through 16.