No matter which acronym you use, the number of U.S. students who don’t speak English as their first language is on the rise. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the number of U.S. public school children who spoke a language other than English at home jumped from 3.8 to 10.8 million between 1979 and 2007. That means that more than 20% of students nationwide between the ages of 5 and 17 are learning English as a foreign language. Unlike several decades ago, students learning English aren’t confined to urban school districts, either. In our bucolic suburb, for example, my second grader’s school services students speaking 17 different languages other than English, while another K-3 elementary school in town contends with 24 different languages.
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