Job Discussion Forums

[nomadder]

I was wondering what second language(if any) you learned in your home country while in school. In Canada we study French and when I was in school it started in grade 2 but I think that's changed. It was good for listening skills and developing a better accent but I found it too repetitive which was too bad. In Junior High we could drop it and not study any second language. In High School we could also study Spanish and German. I studied more French and the pace by then was pretty good. I think it made it easier to study other languages later on.

[J-Pop]

Most schools offer Spanish, in the USA.

However, there is great variety on this point. The U.S. educational system (as you may know?) can & does contain tremendous variations from one state to another. Sometimes, there exists great variation within a given state: California versus Wyoming versus Tennessee, for example.

That is, the educational system here is not centralized at the highest (federal government) levels. There is some movement toward this, but overall the US system (especially compared to most European countries, & Japan, for example) is a de-centralized sytem. (This is written for those with minimal, or no knowledge of the USA system. It seems obvious, "how could it be otherwise? to most Americans).

I think many (the majority?) of U.S.A. students can graduate from high school with minimal--or no--exposure to any foreign language.

Thus, Spanish is not always offered (or required) till many students reach high school. Other school systems offer a foreign language at an earlier time.

Most students, I believe, who attend a college or uni. where a foreign language is required, still probably opt for Spanish.

However, there is a wide variation in what languages are offered at any given school. I think most schools (colleges) would offer French, German & Japanese--in addition to Spanish.

Other larger, or better schools, would also offer a fairly large selection of other languages (ones other than what I already mentioned).

I believe (could be wrong on this), in colleges (higher education)--the most popular languages will be:

1. Spanish.
2. French (or German).
3. Japanese.
4. Others (Chinese, Arabic, Romanian, Korean, Swahili, Hebrew, Russian, & even more.)

--Some years ago, I'm sure "Russian" actually was ranked right behind Spanish. But, I heard--with the break-up of the USSR, reunification of Germany, et cetera--demand for Russian has now diminished, greatly.

--I'm "winging it," so to speak at the moment. So:
Corrections, disagreements, clarifications are welcome, of course

P.S.: nomadder, could this question be a candidate for an accompanying poll? Might be fun.

[Jess_Laoshi]

In high school usually there's Spanish, French, German and sometimes Japanese. I took Spanish until they ran out of classes for me to take, and then one year of Japanese. In college I took a semester of Japanese and then switched to Chinese. Most larger US universities (like mine -- 60,000 students and counting) will offer a really wide variety of languages (UT offers at least 5 different Indian languages!). Spanish is by far the most popular in Texas, obviously, with French coming in second.

[Capergirl]

In my elementary school, French classes started in grade primary. Some elementary schools didn't start French classes until third grade. We continued to study French until ninth grade. In high school, it was an optional course. There was a regular French class and an "honours" French class. Oddly enough, all of the people in my honours French class had attended the same elementary school as I. There's something to be said for an early introduction to languages.

[dyak]

Apathy reigns supreme here (England), at least it did when I was at school. French is (or was) compulsory from 11-16, though you could take Spanish and German at some schools too. I remember my entire class just resenting the fact that we had to do French, and this was in the early 90s when there was a big swing here towards the arts and languages. I loved French though and chose to continue at �A-Level� for 2 more years where it suddenly got really hard (think lower intermediate to Cambridge FCE).

I would bet Spanish is becoming more popular now though� es muy a la mode.

[Wolf]

In elemenatry school (Nova Scotia) we studied French starting from grade 2. We had to continue French until grade 10, but I took it until grade 12. The only other langauge I studied in school was Latin, from grades 10 - 12.

My unversity offered Latin, Greek, Celtic (horay for the dead language brigade), French and Spanish. I had wanted to take a French class or two but never had time.

[Corey]

I studied French as a second language for grade 2 to grade 13. Back then there were no options in the district for Spanish or anything else.

The teaching methodology was terrible and most people (including myself) hated it.

[denise]

My junior high (in the States--California) had Spanish & French. Given that I lived a mere half an hour from Mexico, I opted for Spanish.

My high school had quite a variety of languages--Spanish, French, German, Russian, Japanese, Latin, and Hebrew. (This at a school that specialized in "math, science, and computer technology"--three subjects about which I know absolutely nothing!) After a third year of Spanish, I switched to Latin.

My university of course had loads more options, but I went back to Spanish.

The requirements are somewhat of a joke--I think two years to graduate from high school, three for your college applications to "look good." It is possible to actually learn something and be able to speak the language--I did fairly well with Spanish--but I think the mentality is still geared towards checking off requirements on a transcript.

I also heard that Japanese and Chinese were becoming more and more popular in high schools, at least in California--the whole Pacific Rim thing. German is on its way down in the rankings. I don't know about French.

d

[nomadder]

Sounds like the US is much more into Japanese than Canada. Probably Western Canada has more Japanese options. Anyone know? My university only offered French, German, Spanish and Russian. I studied 3 out of 4.

[J-Pop]

My high school, in southern California, was similar to Denise's. Along with my classmates, we "studied" Spanish, I think for 2 years. Our motivation was (in terms of learning Spanish), not at a very high level!

But, much later, upon returning to grad school, it was a different story, mainly because I was in a unique situation: loads of extra time for electives, enough $, & motivation. I ended up doing, most terms, two languages simultaneously: Hebrew, Spanish, Latin, Korean, Chinese.

[J-Pop]

[nomadder]

You got it J-Pop though last summer in Bulgaria I sort of learned the cyrillic alphabet in 2 days. Not so difficult really.

[dduck]

In Scotland (different education system from England) my secondary school taught French only, for the less gifted; German for the brighter students. I studied French, from the age of 12 to 16. Our school streamed students according to ability and I found myself in with the terminally insane crowd - I was good at Physics not French. So our French French teacher spent most of the time shouting at us, to STOP TALKING, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP! All in English of course!

Somehow, I managed to pass the course. Alas, nowadays, I hardly speak a word of that language. Now German, that's another story.
Iain

[R]

It is no longer compulsory to learn French in the UK from 15-16, I don't know about earlier. (t least I didn't have to do French for GCSE, ten years ago). I did a bit of French, German and Spanish at school. The only one that stuck was German, but I had additional private tuition in that, as well as a residential course in Germany that ended in a hilarious 'accidental hospitalisation' incident...

[scot47]

The Kingdom may be United but there is no unitary education system.

Scotland has a separate education system which does not have much in common with what goes on South of Solway and Tweed.

Of course our Southern neighbours completely misundestand the distinction between United KIngdom, Britain and England !!!!