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I have some friends whose kids attend a public Spanish immersion program and they really like it. Anyone have experience with these programs? What do you think?

It works for us (French). I think the crucial element is the fact that neither of my kids are "language" kids (they're mathy - is that a word? lol) ...so they're constantly challenged (although my DD10's dictee scores this year have been excellent). My DS8 has a language processing disorder thrown in the mix as well.

What I love about language immersion is that the families tend to be very education focused. You can talk about after-schooling your child and no one thinks you're strange. Also, I'm constantly hearing "she's reading novels" etc etc about the really young kids, so there's common ground as far as cognitive precocity is concerned.

And the kids are amazing. My kids' schoolmates are kind hearted, fun, clever, creative, dynamic, sometimes quirky and overall very happy. They're just... wonderful.

It's not the best choice for all families, but it works for us.

My kids attended/attend a French immersion program at a private school. All started in Pre-K, eldest went through 4th grade, middle kid through 2nd grade, and youngest is currently in 3rd.

Like CCN, we have found a lot a bright kids with education focused parents. However, that may be in part due to our location (affluent, educated area, many 4-year colleges nearby). My older two are now in HS. Eldest is fluent and took the French AP test after 10th grade. My middle kid, who only went through 2nd, is not fluent but finds HS French and Spanish to be easy.

I recall hearing about a few public school immersion programs around here back when my older two were young, but I don't think they are still in operation. I don't know if those programs turned out fluent kids. If it is done right, it can be a great experience.

When I was growing up in Canada, I was in a French immersion program and I was rarely bored. Our immersion program was 100% French until grade 6, 50% French for grades 7 & 8 and then 25% through high school. I now live in the US and am considering immersion programs for my son. However, my concern with the immersion programs that I've encountered here is that they're only full immersion for a few years. For instance, one school is only full immersion up to 2nd grade, largely due to the testing required for No Child Left Behind (I'm told it used to go up to 4th grade). So, I imagine it would only be challenging for a few years. Perhaps others can provide some insight on this?

Immersion programs are great, in general. However (and I say this having taught in an immersion school), it can be difficult to accommodate grade-skipping or subject-area acceleration in that context, depending on the nature of the program.

Since the aim is language acquisition, many programs are hesitant to accelerate students through because the goal is to give them exposure to as much of the target language as possible. In smaller programs, scheduling can be pretty tight (we shared teachers across grade levels in my program, meaning that acceleration for math or English reading was not a possibility without cutting the student's time in the target language... which was a big no-no given the school's mission for target language acquisition).

BUT, bigger, differently-staffed, or differently-organized programs may not have these issues. I had a great experience teaching in an immersion program, and the mother of the gifted kid in my class thought well of the experience. While her kid was not as challenged in English (I taught her at her level, but she was kind of an island and often opted to participate with the class even if it was pretty boring for her) as may have been the case in an English-only school, she spent half her day (third grade and up... K-2 was target-language-only) learning a language and culture that very few white kids get to experience.

So... you know... look into policies. And look at the kiddo in question. Like any other type of school, things that are great for one kid won't be great for another, even if those two kids look similar on paper. Some gifted kids (I'm like this) think of language as a delicious puzzle to be figured out. Others (my husband) are just beyond frustrated at not being able to communicate or understand high-level information.

I'm not a fan of immersion programs for language acquisition in and of itself. Many others have mentioned the benefits of self-selection bias in a public school setting as beneficial, which I don't deny.

However, I speak 3 languages fluently and another 2 at a basic level, and everything I learned was acquired in a language setting without subject extensions. From my personal experience, fluency is largely a function of practice over one's lifetime, which includes the ability to converse with native speakers.

A phased out immersion program seems problematic if the parents don't speak the immersion language themselves. The child could risk losing the language and have to relearn subject specific language in later years. Take me as an example-- my non-fluent languages are the ones that I didn't study into adulthood!

ETA: smacca's point about individual preferences over decoding vs. expressing complex thought is apt. My opinion is biased by my preference for the latter.

I have one son in a Spanish immersion program. All programs are set up differently. Our program half the class has Spanish as a first language and half has English as a first language (and the child can be Hispanic and be part of the English half of the class because sometimes several generations in after moving to our state the children are not fluent and the parents want them to be). There are a few odd children that have neither Spanish nor English as a first language and they will be learning English and Spanish as the second and third language for the child.

Half their day is taught in English and half in Spanish. I think if there weren't high stakes testing starting in third grade they would run it a bit differently but they feel they have to work both languages at the same time equally. They claim my son will be biliterate and bilingual by the end of 5th grade.

I will say that as a gifted child in elementary school learning a second language is the first time he has had to exert any effort at all to actually flex his learning muscles. Luckily he isn't a perfectionist because sometimes he gets it (say on a Spanish test or worksheet) and sometimes he has absolutely no clue what is being asked of him. He just plugs along giving it his best shot on those types of things (i.e. takes a wild guess). There have been a few bumps (tears) along the way as far as encountering things that are HARD (looking at you Spanish book report) but that is exactly why I wanted him in this program, so that he encounters HARD now and not freshman year of college.