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What languages did you study in school? | ||
Tags: School Education | Foreign Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| kidshomestunner Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6405 days ago 239 posts - 285 votes  Speaks: Japanese | Message 9 of 94 09 August 2010 at 1:13am | IP Logged |
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I entered education at sixteen and did French and A level Spanish. FOrm what I can remember of earlier I did taster courses in various languages at school.
I did a taster course in Japanese at sixth form and studied hard to study it a Uni only to find I was instead jumping through hoops and writing essays. I must say that I think that my A level courses were less "box ticking" orientated than my degree course. I also did taster courses in Indonesian (!) and Welsh at college which I really enjoyed. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Lexii Senior Member United States Joined 5222 days ago 162 posts - 194 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese | Message 10 of 94 09 August 2010 at 1:46am | IP Logged |
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I can't say with any certainty what languages are offered in schools in the US. It depends on the type of school (public, independent or religious-oriented) and the city in which the school is located. I can only comment on my personal experience and that of my son.
For me, I attended independent, non-religious schools. I took French in elementary school, German in high school and Spanish in college. I did miserably in all three, although I remember more French than I do German or Spanish. Perhaps that's because, as a 7- to 10-year-old, I was still in that open-to-language-acquisition brain mode and because my French teacher made learning far more fun than did my stuffy Spanish and German instructors. My son attended independent, non-religious schools from Kindergarten through 12th grade. He was offered Spanish and French throughout. He took Spanish. He's in college now, so there are more language offerings. I'm not sure what he plans to take. Perhaps Japanese! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| aarontp Groupie United States Joined 5267 days ago 94 posts - 139 votes | Message 11 of 94 09 August 2010 at 1:52am | IP Logged |
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I studied Spanish in High School and French in college. I got a decent introduction to
both languages, but a horrible value in terms of time spent. Three years of Spanish to barely crack beginner level? I wish I had to taken language study into my own hands earlier and used the class as supplement. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| ReneeMona Diglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 5335 days ago 864 posts - 1274 votes Speaks: Dutch*, EnglishC2 Studies: French | Message 12 of 94 09 August 2010 at 2:18am | IP Logged |
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I started English in elementary school and took English, French, German, Latin and Ancient Greek in high school. These are pretty much the standard languages pupils need to take for a Gymnasium diploma but I know there are other schools in the Netherlands that offer Spanish, Arabic or Russian and in the province of Friesland, which is bilingual, Frisian is a mandatory subject as well.
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| Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6949 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish | Message 13 of 94 09 August 2010 at 2:21am | IP Logged |
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I'm from Southern California, and every school seems to offer Spanish and French, and maybe half of the schools German. Some schools have also been offering Japanese for a while.
My public high school offered Spanish, French, and German. Probably 80-90% of students elected to take Spanish, because it's widely spoken by immigrants here and because of its reputation for being easier than the other two. The students who took French and German (I took German) were seen as quirky overachievers. My university offers 67 languages, but I went with German, Japanese (modern and classical), and a year each in Mandarin and Dutch. I wish I had taken the opportunity to learn something more exotic and otherwise inaccessible - my university had great Quechua, Hausa, Old Norse, and Tagalog programs! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| dagojr Groupie United States Joined 5589 days ago 56 posts - 131 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian | Message 14 of 94 09 August 2010 at 3:20am | IP Logged |
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I studied Spanish in high school and French in college. I cannot speak either language at all. Says something about language education if you ask me. ;)
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| Michael K. Senior Member United States Joined 5729 days ago 568 posts - 886 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto | Message 15 of 94 09 August 2010 at 3:29am | IP Logged |
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I studied Spanish for my first 2 years in high school and French for my junior and senior year. I actually transferred to a private high school a few days after starting my freshman year. At the public school I was enrolled in French but the private school I was enrolled in only offered 2 years of Spanish so I took Spanish instead. I then transferred back to the public school and took French.
In college I took two Elementary Spanish classes as electives. If you're wondering what was offered at the public school, there were 3 languages taught in the school and one language offered at a nearby high school. The three languages were Spanish, French, and German. The language at a nearby school was Latin. Things have changed somewhat, and they are offering the first year of a language to 8th graders (which was why there were Freshman in my French II class) and they are offering Chinese. At university they were offering Spanish, French (both languages are majors), German (ended the major in 2000), Italian, and Russian (which appears to only have one class offered and that class was cancelled for lack of interest, so its future seems bleak), and Japanese. They have also offered up to junior or senior level studies in Arabic and Chinese, with a Confucius Institute established. In the summer of 2009 they also announced they would offer Hebrew, Swahili, and Portuguese. For classical languages, the university offers Latin, ancient Greek, and Akkadian. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Quabazaa Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5609 days ago 414 posts - 543 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German, French Studies: Japanese, Korean, Maori, Scottish Gaelic, Arabic (Levantine), Arabic (Egyptian), Arabic (Written) | Message 16 of 94 09 August 2010 at 5:51am | IP Logged |
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I'm from New Zealand and at school I did..
In primary school: Māori Secondary school: French, Japanese, and a little German It used to be very common for NZ schools to always offer French and German. These days you see way more Chinese and Japanese, Māori obviously (there are Māori immersion schools) and Spanish has also gained popularity while German is on the out. Although some schools do have other languages, those are the main ones! My friends who were in Australia I remember that they did languages like Indonesian ^^ 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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