Tyler Morning Telegraph – Betty Waters
“Early Steps Bilingual Academy is a new preschool in Tyler that teaches young children Spanish through the Spanish immersion approach, as well as subjects commonly taught in other preschools…“One might think mostly Latino families send their children to Spanish immersion schools. This is not the case,” said owner Mireya A. Hicks. “It’s really geared for kids that don’t speak Spanish and want to learn Spanish. There is a higher demand from non-Spanish speaking families for this type of school because parents understand the importance of children becoming bilingual at an early age…Children that speak two languages are more creative, more effective problem solvers, more capable of handling multi-tasks, have longer attention spans and have positive attitudes toward other cultures. They score higher on standardized tests in English and attain higher levels of academic achievement…Language immersion is the fastest and most effective way to achieve fluency in a language, especially if it starts at an early age.””(more)