Spanish and Mandarin Chinese classes will be offered to fourth-grade students at the Upper Elementary School next year as part of the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District’s world-languages program.
By: Gwen Runkle, Staff Writer www.princetonpacket.com
The school board Tuesday defeated an earlier motion by member Hemant Marathe to delay the implementation of the Chinese classes by a 5-2 vote.
Mr. Marathe, who was not present at Tuesday’s meeting, wanted to delay introduction of Chinese until concerns with elementary school configuration and homeroom diversity were addressed.
The board had reopened discussion of a kindergarten-through-fifth-grade elementary configuration along with the current K-3, 4-5 configuration at its June 12 meeting and scheduled a July 17 meeting to tackle the issue.
No board members at Tuesday’s meeting brought up concerns about elementary school configuration, but they did continue to raise questions about homeroom diversity.
Gary Reece, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, presented a multiple homeroom delivery model aimed at alleviating their concerns.
Currently, Spanish is offered districtwide in second and third grades. A Spanish teacher travels to each classroom four times a week and teaches for 20 minutes. Mandarin Chinese is offered to second- and third-graders at the Wicoff Elementary School.
Mr. Reece explained that with the multiple homeroom model, the 48 students who have signed up for Chinese next year would be split into six homerooms. The homerooms would be paired near each other so that when the Spanish and Chinese language teachers arrived, the Chinese language students from the two classrooms would move to a common area or media center for their lesson and return to class after their 20-minute lessons.
Upper Elementary School Principal Kevin Brennan added that leaving the classroom will not take much time from the students’ lesson time.
"Once a routine is established, it will only cost about four minutes on either side," he said.
"This method resolves the lack of diversity within the classroom," district spokeswoman Gerri Hutner said. "One-third of each class would be Chinese (class) students and about one-third of the population in the community is Asian, so (the classrooms) mirror the population in the community."
Board Member Diane Hasling, who voted in favor of delaying Chinese, questioned whether taking students out of the classroom would disengage language learning from the rest of the curriculum.
Mr. Reece responded that the language and classroom teachers would continue to work to intertwine their curricula no matter where students are learning.
Board Member Michele Epstein questioned how this model would work next year, with roughly the same number of students in two separate schools.
Next year, in a K-3, 4-5 configuration after the completion of the Town Center Elementary School in 2002, the Village School is planned to become a fourth- and fifth-grade school.
Mr. Reece said the multiple homeroom model is elastic and would be able to work in two separate schools as long as the homerooms remained paired together.
The only additional cost to the district would be if a part-time Chinese language teacher would be needed. A part-time teacher would cost $24,000, Mr. Reece said. Two Spanish teachers and one Chinese teacher have already been figured into the budget, Ms. Hutner said.