Thank goodness Erik Zendejas is only 5. At least I'm better at tying my shoes.

        Erik is one of those children who moves easily between languages. He speaks English at school and Spanish at home with his immigrant parents.

        I get by in Spanish, but I wish I could wire my brain to be more like his — so open and unafraid.

        “Hey, lady! Senora!” Erik kept saying when I visited his after-school program at Heritage Hill Elementary in Sharonville. In the program, he and his buddies look at Spanish-language books while their parents study English.

        Erik also maintains a busy schedule of coloring, running around the gym and wrecking miniature cars. During snack time, he happily gnawed on a red, waxy object.

        “That doesn't look like food,” I said in Spanish.

        “Pero parece como dulce,” he answered — it looks like candy. Then he added, “It's, like, sticky.”

        Amazing. The child not only speaks English but also manages to sound like Britney Spears.

The right time

        Five is the perfect age to learn a second language. Young children easily mimic new sounds, and, after all, they learned their first without any instruction.

        Some parents want elementary schools to take advantage of the moment.

        “We had a tremendous outcry,” says Diana Stratton, principal of Woodfill Elementary in Fort Thomas. Out of 217 surveys returned by parents, 210 said yes to language instruction.

        “We had several say, "Where I work, if you can speak a foreign language, you're automatically hired.'”

        The PTA raised money for materials, and Ms. Stratton found a teacher. But with 15 years of experience, his government-set salary level was higher than the school board wanted to pay, so the program is on hold.

        In Fort Mitchell, Beechwood Elementary School started offering French after a push from the PTA two years ago. And in Anderson Township, parent Chris Gregg is trying to start after-school Spanish sessions at Sherwood Elementary.

        “We live in a global world,” Ms. Gregg said. “For my children, if they know Spanish, so much of the world is going to be open to them.”

English preferred

        The children of immigrants make it look easy. Studies have shown they not only learn English quickly, but often prefer it over their parents' tongues.

        This is one reason Heritage Hill offers Spanish tutoring to Spanish-speaking children — so they won't lose their bilingualism.

        Youngsters who study another language tend to excel in other subjects as well. In 1992, for instance, high-schoolers with four years of a foreign language scored higher on the verbal section of the Scholastic Aptitude Test than those with four years in any other subject.

        Erik Zendejas was a little behind when he started school, because he was still learning English. But he soon began catching up, and his teacher has several times named him student of the month, said his father, Redolso Zendejas.

        “So you speak English at school and Spanish at home?” I asked Erik in Spanish.

        He nodded. Then he cheerfully confided something else: “Yo hablo mucho.” I talk a lot.

        Yes, Erik, I have a feeling you do.

        Karen Samples is the Enquirer's Kentucky columnist. She can be reached at (859) 578-5584 or at ksamples@enquirer.com.

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