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Why waste time with foreign languages? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| translator2 Senior Member United States Joined 6919 days ago 848 posts - 1862 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 28 23 April 2010 at 3:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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Why waste time learning foreign languages? Edited by translator2 on 23 April 2010 at 3:43pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| boon Diglot Groupie Ireland Joined 6159 days ago 91 posts - 177 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: German, Mandarin, Latin | Message 2 of 28 23 April 2010 at 6:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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Basically the message of that article is: "Schools teach foreign languages badly".
Language classes should be more about exposure to the language, and motivation (examine the benefits of learning) instead of constant testing and boring stuff about hobbies and sports etc. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6703 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3 of 28 23 April 2010 at 7:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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Another basic message is that you actually can survive in the USA without caring about any other language than English (at least until the Spanish speaking population becomes the majority over there). And pupils who can't see any reason for learning any other language than English can't be easy to teach.
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| Smart Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5339 days ago 352 posts - 398 votes Speaks: Spanish, English*, Latin, French Studies: German | Message 4 of 28 23 April 2010 at 10:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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Disappointing article.
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| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 5 of 28 23 April 2010 at 10:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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In other words, if something is hard to learn, it's better to give up and avoid situations where that knowledge would have been useful.
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| ManicGenius Senior Member United States Joined 5481 days ago 288 posts - 420 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Esperanto, French, Japanese | Message 6 of 28 23 April 2010 at 10:55pm | IP Logged | ||
This amigo, is the concept of most American schools right now. Oh poor baby, math is too hard? Oh ok then, here take this reduced class instead. Education in the states contually gets worse with each passing year. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 magister Pro Member United States Joined 6603 days ago 346 posts - 421 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Turkish, Irish Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 28 24 April 2010 at 12:38am | IP Logged | ||
If anyone cares to read more on this topic, a good place to start is The Conspiracy of Ignorance, in which author Martin Gross detailed a decade ago the how and the why behind the downward spiral in US schools. I just found some excerpts posted here which offer a taste of Gross' arguments. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Juаn Senior Member Colombia Joined 5345 days ago 727 posts - 1830 votes Speaks: Spanish* | Message 8 of 28 24 April 2010 at 1:19am | IP Logged | ||
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Just two observations:
* Forcing anything into a captive mind is the most effective way of instilling repulsion for said thing. * Americans are very practically-minded people. They need to see tangible benefits in order to assign worth. Culture is not something you can hold in your hands or numerically appraise. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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