St. Petersburg Times, FL
01-02-07
In class, it's Greek that they speak
Athenian Academy offers a curriculum that its students love to talk about.
By GINA PACE
NEW PORT RICHEY - Kelly Oliver can already see it on her resume: second
language, Greek.
Kelly is a fifth-grader at Athenian Academy, where, in the midst of history and
language arts, students spend 45 minutes a day in Greek class.
And although she's only 11, Kelly is looking ahead.
"It's easier to get job offers if you speak Greek," she said, "especially if someone
who worked there was from Greece."
Athenian Academy is the only school with a Greek program in Pasco County.
Greek isn't exactly the standard foreign language fare, like Spanish, German or
French taught in American schools. And while the charter school has strong ties
to the area's Greek community, only about 10 percent of its students come from
Greek families, said Manuel Goncalves, who heads the school.
But organizers, parents and students say creating a school that focuses on the
language of a faraway southeastern European country has its benefits. Mainly,
the techniques involved with learning Greek help in learning other subjects,
Goncalves said.
Need a pencil in Eleftheria Gerakiou's class? Better be able to ask for it in Greek.
Gerakiou teaches Greek language, history and culture, using a teaching style
called "immersion."
She'll show pictures and say the Greek words, or maybe pantomime a gesture.
But she avoids English. She said it keeps the students thinking in Greek.
"It makes us remember it more," Kelly said. "If we can't pronounce something,
she'll let us try and try until we get it right."
Kelly's mother, Tonya Oliver, said she now has to tell her daughter to stop
speaking Greek to Greek friends of the family so Mom can understand what they
are talking about.
"They are all impressed, with her not being Greek, with how far she's come in
such a short period of time," Oliver said.
Immersion foreign language instruction are programs in which students spend
part of their school day learning different subjects - from math to social studies in a foreign language.
When Athenian Academy was proposed, school leaders wanted to spend half of
the academic day teaching in Greek. But Greek teachers slated to come to the
United States to teach at the school had problems obtaining visas, and the
school opened without a Greek teacher and offered Spanish instead.
The school is modeled after a charter school in Dunedin, also called Athenian
Academy, that has taught Greek since 2000. That school also had to cut back on
the amount of Greek offered every day, said school leader Darlene Pugnali.
The Pasco school hired a substitute Greek teacher in September and a
permanent teacher in November, Goncalves said. Now, students have Greek
and Spanish classes every day.
But after discussions with the Pasco County school district, the school is no
longer advertising itself as an "immersion" school because not enough of the
focus is on Greek to meet that standard. Officials now emphasize that it teaches
language in the "immersion style," said Alicia Rodriguez-Bower from the Leona
Group, the management company that runs Athenian Academy.
While the research is not conclusive, studies do show that studying a foreign
language improves academic performance in other areas, such as math and
English, said Marcia Harmon Rosenbusch, director of the National K-12
Foreign Language Resource Center at Iowa State University.
Also, young minds are more receptive to the "odd sounds and vocalization of
other languages," said Steve Ackley, communications director for the American
Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages in Alexandria, Va.
"This is the best time of their life to learn language," said Goncalves, who speaks
five languages. "They are like sponges. They learn everything."
Whether learning Greek will really give Athenian's students an edge in the job
market in years to come is up for debate.
"No one can guarantee these kids will need Greek in the future," Rosenbusch
said. "But if they need to study Chinese, Arabic or Russian, this experience is
going to be very positive for them."
Taylor Sowa, 9, plans on doing just that. "I really like Greek," Taylor said. "They
will let you into so many colleges if you know three languages."
Times researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. Gina Pace can be
reached at 352 521-6518 or gpace@sptimes.com.