Bilingual Foundations

            Historically, the public education system in America has adversely affected three language minority groups; American Indians, African Americans and Latinos. American Indians had many ways of educating their youth until the arrival of the Europeans. For 250 years Europeans forced Indians to follow the Anglo-American way of life through English-only teachings. Really young Indian children were taken from their parents and so-called “primitive” ways and sent to off-reservation boarding schools where they could learn the white man’s philosophy of life. Finally, in 1934 we begin to see sensitivity towards Indian cultural values. Strict military discipline is no longer used in boarding schools. Indian history, art and language was also presented in Indian schools. However, this was short lived. Then came The National Advisory Council on Indian Education of 1965. It was formed to discuss funding and administration of programs that wou...

What is intelligence? Intelligence is defined as the innate or acquired ability to learn, reason and understand.   IQ tests have been deemed unfair for various reasons.     First, IQ tests correlate to middle class, white, Western views of intelligence and are culturally limited (Baker, 2011).  According to Gardner (2003) there are different types of intelligences; logical-mathematical, verbal-linguistic, visual-spatial, musical-rhythmical, bodily-kinesthetic, naturalist, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and existentialist. Recent attention has also been given to emotional intelligence. It is, therefore, questionable to measure these intelligences by a simple pencil and paper IQ test which requires a single, acceptable, correct solution to each question.  In examining the relationship between intelligence and bilingualism, language was the second problem identified with IQ tests. Testing bilinguals in English (weaker language) will have unfavora...