The Growing Place, a pre-school in Miami Lakes, has added Mandarin and Spanish to its pre-school curriculum. In recent years, the value of possessing bi-lingual or multi-lingual skills has become extremely important as students begin to make their way through a world that has become smaller and where cultures have become more integrated.
As it turns out, The Growing Place, located at Miami Lakes Congregational Church, embarked on this journey at the right time. Miami-Dade County, with the leadership of The Beacon Council and other community organizations, recently re-launched the One Community One Goal initiative, which targets select industries for future growth.
The program’s mission is to identify and prioritize those industries that offer the highest potential for creating new jobs. Central to this effort is the need for the education community to provide the training required to support the growth of these industries.
While China is on the rise as a key economic player in the world and expands business relationships throughout the western hemisphere and Miami-Dade County continues to forge ahead as the gateway to both North and South America and the Caribbean, a natural and unique relationship will inevitably develop between China and Miami-Dade County.
The Growing Place is working to ensure its students get a solid start towards acquiring the language skills necessary to be personally successful as well as to help make Miami-Dade County successful.
Moreover, as a recent TIME Magazine article confirmed, Multi-lingual persons work faster, expend less energy doing so and, as they age, retain their cognitive faculties longer. Increasingly, scientists suggest that the bi-lingual brain is wired differently, with more connections and greater capacity to make connections as well. This translates into enhanced ability to multi-task, to say nothing of conserving energy (i.e., reducing stress) in the process.
With the present and future surge in demand for bi-lingual and multi-lingual employees, pre-schools like The Growing Place of Miami Lakes are well positioned to respond to changes and demands in our local economy. For more information about The Growing Place, contact the pre-school office at 305-822-4313.