Text from South Bay Daily Breeze article Friday, Oct. 9, 1998

ENGLISH AS A SINGING LANGUAGE
Educational method hits high note with South Bay elementary students.
By Lauren Shaftel, staff writer

They may not win any Grammy Awards, but some catchy tunes that put to music grammar rules and history lessons are helping local Latino students learn English.

At Meyler Street Elementary School just east of Carson, a predominantly Latino group of third, forth and fifth graders crooned their way through the Louisiana Purchase in Room 10 on Thursday.

Afterward, when quizzed orally by teacher Scheri DuBon, they had no problem recalling that Thomas Jefferson and Napoleon were at the center of the story.

"The history song is my favorite" said 8-year old Thomas Preciado, a precocious third-grader who speaks Spanish at home with his family. "I like the sound effects, like the gun and the train."

The learn-by-singing method has helped smooth the transition to rules ushered in by Proposition 227 at Meyler Street, giving teachers an interactive way to teach Spanish-speaking students in an English-only classroom.

This is the first year in a 22-year career with the Los Angeles Unified School District that DuBon has not given any instruction in Spanish. And the songs seem to work. There wasn't a silent student in Room 10, and most were swaying with the music or tapping their feet.

Between the rhymes and sound effects, the songs are packed with lessons. "Not only are they learning English and learning to read" DuBon said, "but they're reading to learn."

DuBon has relied on the songs, part of a series called Audio Memory, for the past eight years. Before that she used the program at another LAUSD school.

"Singing and chanting is a wonderful way to teach English as a second language," she said. The students' improvement shows in the books they wrote documenting Lewis and Clark's journey West. They were hung proudly on the wall.

Audio Memory was launched 14 years ago by Kathy and Larry Troxel of Newport Beach.

Thursday's in-house demonstration was designed to spotlight students' progress using the series.

"I was teaching tenth-grade English," said Kathy Troxel, "and the students didn't know the basic rules of grammar. But they would come into class singing all the jingles from the radio. The first song we did was the rules of commas to the tune of 'California Girls.'"

She has personally experienced Audio Memory's motto "You Never Forget What You Sing." "I can remember songs from when I was a 3-year old living in Switzerland," she said. "I don't know any German, but I remember those songs."

Song kits include audiocassettes and illustrated songbooks that cover grammar, geography, states and capitals, mathematics and history.

"It lets you learn English more," said 8-year old Alicia Galindo, a wide eyed third-grader in pigtails whose reading lessons were conducted in Spanish until this year.