Bilingual Education Provides Contextual Knowledge for Native and Second Languages.

Many English only advocates believe that bilingual Education sends the message to immigrants that they can live without learning the language. But this is not true; this argument is based on ignorance about bilingual education, its different programs, and how hard it is to acquire a new language.

Some common believes state that "bilingualism confuses the mind". But this is not true on the contrary, when both languages are well developed; these seem to provide cognitive advantages.

Another popular belief is that "children will pick up a second language rapidly, if they are totally immersed". This belief caused an "educational neglect" on minority students, when they were assigned to regular classrooms without providing them special accomodations, and or English as a Second Language (ESL) classes. These caused a lot of students to fail, and as a consequence to drop out of school. As a result, this type of Education was ruled illegal by the US Supreme Court (Law V. Nichols, 1974).

ESL programs were established in schools. Through experience it has been learned that Natural situations are usually the best ones used to teach ESL instead of the tiring repetitions of grammar and vocabulary. This is the most usual approach in education.

Another common belief is that if you keep on teaching students on their native language, they will never learn English, but through research it has been found that this untrue, on the contrary it provides contextual knowledge in their native language and it aids understanding; making English comprehensible. For example if students know something about the cell, the lesson in English on the same subject will make more sense. The same applies to Reading. According to Krashery in 1996, the more the students learn to read (making sense) in their native language, the easier it will be for them to read in English. Since, reading is an ability that transfers across languages.

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