Racing Against Time: A Report on the Leupp Navajo Immersion Project

is designed to help students become proficient speakers, readers, and writers of Navajo while enhancing their English language skills and preparing them to meet state academic standards. The program com-bines Navajo immersion with ESL inclusion, literacy initiatives, shel-tered English/Navajo, parental involvement, and take-home technol-ogy. Academic content and state standards are initially presented from a Navajo perspective via four global themes with a unifying concept of hozho or “peace, beauty, and harmony. ” This paper (1) presents the need for the program and how it was developed with staff, parental, and community involvement, (2) presents a program overview, (3) discribes the Navajo-specific curriculum, and (4) discusses some of the inherent challenges in developing and sustaining a language pres-ervation program based upon a Navajo-specific curriculum in the En-glish-only era of high stakes testing. Díí binahjª niha’á¬chíní bil£™j• ’ hózh≠ – doo, bikééd§§