Mandatory Foreign Language (Not Fair)

Great Debates
#1

In 1999 when my daughter graduated it was not required that she take a foreign language. Now my son currently entering in the tenth grade is required to take 2 years of foreign language in order to graduate. Should this be a requirement?

Back in 1999 it was an “elective” or rather was considered to be merely a liberal education to take a foreign language. It was automatically assumed that anyone studying foreign language as a major field was going to be either a teacher, an interpreter, or a translator.

It was also explained to me that some 4-Year colleges expect that you will have at least two years of foreign language under your belt before even applying to them.

I realize that learning a foreign language would be a benefit as we have increased activity in international business, increased internationalization, and an expanded awareness of the need to conduct not only business but also diplomatic relations in the language of the host country. But I think you should not be required to take a foreign language at all. I think it should
always remain as an elective.

What benefits does requiring a foreign language have? Is my thinking eskew? What are the Pros and Cons to making this mandatory?

#2

God forbid schools making math mandatory, or chemistry, or english, or history.

With your thinking, students should not attain a well rounded education. Instead, we should all go to two year technical colleges.

#3

Isabelle, I grew up in a small city in rural upstate New York State, and live in a rural area halfway between two metro areas in rural North Carolina.

Vacationers from la Belle Province would regularly take the 401 to the Thousand Islands Bridge, then Interstate 81 south through the States, stopping in my home town for meals, lodging, shopping, or whatever. Businesses felt no real obligation to have French-speaking staff – but those that did got the lion’s share of Quebec-origin traffic. (Yes, Canadians, I’m aware that Francophone does not equal Quebecois – but in this case, with extreme eastern Ontario Anglophone Loyalists, almost to a man in my childhood, and virtually no traffic from the Maritimes, it effectively does.)

In that city of 30,000 there were a sizeable number of families who spoke Greek or Italian within the home, and the Catholic church one block from my childhood home dropped their Mass with a homily in French (for the Francophone-immigrant families) the year I was born. We were 85 miles north and 90 miles south of Iroquois lands (Onondaga and Akwesasne, respectively) where English was standard but the tribal tongue was also preserved and used regularly.

Down here, I would guess that between 10% and 20% of the population in my immediate area – the “Five Counties” section where extremes of five counties meet – is of Mexican origin and uses Spanish as their in-home language. Many speak English either haltingly or not at all.

My experience with urban areas is many years in the past, aside from Raleigh, but they are traditionally cosmopolitan, with a variety of neighborhoods where languages other than English are spoken as a matter of course.

Fluency in a foreign language is valuable in academic careers, as you note – while probably 60% of technical papers and formal international publications in academic fields are today written in English, still a large part are written in French, German, and the authors’ national languages.

But even more significant is the fact that “the global village” is not merely some MacLuhanesque concept but a practical reality – I’ve tapped my halting Spanish more in the last five years, just to help folks in the grocery, place orders at bodegas, and so on, than I had in the previous thirty. Our church helped relocate Kosovar refugee families – and the one couple fluent in Shqipni had a workout. Ads for clerks, office staff, etc., regularly indicate that fluency in Spanish is a requirement or a plus towards hiring.

There are very practical reasons for children and youth being expected to learn a foreign language, and not merely for academic, college-prep reasons.

#4

When I was growing up in Upstate New York. I went to a Polish Catholic School. I was required to take either Latin or Slovak. Why I took Slovak I will never know. Of course I know the language (probably rusty) but I can tell you I have never used it!

I don’t think it should be a requirement either unless you are enrolled in a “pre-career” curriculum such as international relations, etc. However, with the ever increasing Spanish population and their refusal to speak the English language, it would be nice to know what they are saying when they are speaking amongst themselves and staring at me while using the word “Gringo”

#5

I’m not sure how you mean this, so I’ll assume the best. What you seem to be saying here is that these people are intruding on your right to eavesdrop on their conversation by speaking in a language you don’t understand. Shame on them.

#6

well, I’ve not got an aptitude for language, but went through about 6 years of it in my academic career- 2 junior high, 4 high school (7 if you count my abortive attempt at Arabic in college). Here’s what I think, based upon my experience with studying Spanish.

Pros: greater appreciation for Spanish culture (hell, considering before that, I knew nothing of it), entryway into other Romance languages (I’ve had to read manuscripts in Latin and Italian,as well as Spanish in my studies), and comes in handy professionally, given that Arkansas has had an explosion of immigration from Mexico.

Cons: it’s a hassle to learn if your heart isn’t in it.

It’s certainly worthwhile (in my opinion), but sucks if you don’t see the need for it. I certainly didn’t for a long time, and it made studying it very difficult. Now, I wish I’d done more, and will likely try my hand at another language in the future. But it makes as much sense to study as any other subject, especially since it’s not just language being studied- I’ve never heard of a language course that didn’t delve into culture, traditions, and history of the language being studied.

#7

My old Religion professor in college was fond of saying, “He who knows only one language, knows none.”

I didn’t know there were high schools where at least some foreign language wasn’t mandatory. Most colleges - at least for liberal arts types of degrees - will require it.

Benefits of learning a foreign language? Well, first there are the cultural benefits. Studying another language exposes you to countries, cultures and societies outside your own. It promotes a better understanding of the world. Usually it exposes you to things like the geography and history of other parts of the world. It helps you to understand how people from other places think when you know the language they use.

Then there are general language benefits. Most of what I know about how English works came not from my English classes (which mostly focused on literature) but from my foreign language classes. I learned about the subjunctive case (“I wish I were…” vs. “I wish I was…”) in Spanish. I learned about about noun cases in Greek. Many of the things I learned studying another language have helped me become a better writer in English.

Then there are literary benefits. The ability to read Cervantes or Moliere or Cicero or the New Testament. The exposure to clever idioms or proverbs that have no English correlation.

Practical benefits – as I said, most colleges prefer some kind of foreign language study in high school. It’s also an advantage in many career fields beyond those you mentioned. For example, doctors benefit from basic Latin in their studies, and will often run into patients who don’t speak English as a first language. My SIL is a nurse practitioner in rural Tennessee and she has many Spanish-speaking patients. Anyone who deals with the public – customer service, the police, mechanics, public relations, reporters – knowing a little bit of another language can be very helpful.

Anyway, if my kid’s school didn’t require her to take a foreign language, I’d probably require it from her.

#8

Skammer you have brought up some good points but I am still not convinced that it should be MANDATORY.

On another note I just had to pipe up about this and it ticks me off.

We have a relativly new phone number here at work. The old number apparently belonged to a dr. I get calls all the time from people THAT CAN"T SPEAK ENGLISH!!! They don’t even know enough English to understand they have the wrong number when I explain it over and over again!

This really ticks me off. If you are going to move to a foreign place then for cripes sake learn the language.

#9

Had I known that taking a foreign language was going to be Mandatory I may have strongly suggested my son take his first year (last year) Now his schedule is full and that leaves him to take the language his last two years. What if he struggles? Is he being put at risk of not graduating?

#10

As an aside to the main question (the usefulness of learning foreign language…though briefly, even if you have personnaly no professional use for them, and no interest in learning them as a communication tool, you could as well say it’s pointless to study history, or maths, etc…), I would point out that IMO, two years of mandatory foreign language is essentially pointless because it’s way too short to reach any significant level of ability to communicate in said language.

At best, assuming that the kids won’t totally forget everything they learnt during this two years (and most likely, they will), they perhaps will be able to use some basic tourist-speech (asking basic questions and being unable to understand the answer, essentially). Here, in high school, the second language is mandatory for 7 years, the third language for 5 years, and a random frenchman is unlikely to speak fluenty either of those.

The only actual advantage of these 2 years is IMO that maybe it allows some children to discover they’re interested in languages and lead them to study them more seriously latter. Of course, it usually also allows them to discover a little part of the culture, uses, history, etc… of a foreign country. But apart from that, making the study a foreign language for a mere two years seems quite futile to me.

#11

I’d like to retract the portion of my previous post where I gave you the benefit of the doubt.

You might want to consider some of the following points:

  1. Learning a new language is hard! But gee, I would guess that you already knew that.

  2. Crossing the border into the US does not magically endow immigrants with the ability to speak English, it actually takes work and time. Imagine that!

  3. New immigrants are working their asses off trying to make a living in a new country, many of them can not dedicate more than a little time to learning a new language.

  4. And finally, even if they learn the language they will likely have an accent, which someone on the phone, or even in person, might find hard to understand.

Of course all this might have been avoided if they’d taken a foreign language course in high school.

#12

1999??? That sounds to me as rather late, to establish a foreign-language requirement (as in, a requirement that you take X number of courses in ANY language, as opposed to actually directing you to one). Then again maybe I’m overexposed to major urban commmunities in the coasts.
(OTOH, I was required a period a day of one specific “foreign” language from grades 1 to 12, and that was just The Law and had been for generations just the way things were, and no injury resulted. So I would indeed be prejudiced towards a “so what?” reaction at foreign-language requirements.)

(And there is a difference between choosing language as a major, and having it be a required part of the curriculum.)

As you mention in your own post, some universities and colleges are expecting it already, so you might as well require it, lest the HS student get an unpleasant surprise .

Another valuable Pro of foreign-language instruction, is the mental exercise, specially in the sense of looking at concepts in a different way. This is very similar to how come everyone has to take Algebra and Trig and Geometry even though even people with non-science college degrees will at most use middle-school math in everyday life. Knowing a foreign etymology can help you figure out terms in your own language; dealing with the differences in such things as cases, genders, verb moods, can give you a broader perspective into how you assemble words to convey a meaning (and a greater appreciation for English’s highly streamlined grammar!).
… and of course helps you feel less uptight about being around conversations you don’t understand but fear to be something bad about you. Of course, if you learn Spanish and then a Macedonian couple moves next door you’re back at square one :wink:

#13

When in Rome…

I did learn some Spanish…enough to often get me by in a pinch. I learned from reading a woman in the nursing home the Psalms. She only spoke Spanish and was about 86 years old. It was the only way I could communicate to her. I knew the Bible was important to her because she surounded her bed in Bibles and slept in the middle of them on top of the covers.

Personally I would like to take a course in it because of where I am located. I think it would be valuable.

But I still don’t think it should be Mandatory to graduate from High School. Save it as a requirment until College.

#14

If you really believe that and believe that learning a foreign language is pointless, then you’re condemning yourself to never travel to any not english-speaking place in the world.
As for being not convinced that learning a foreign language should be mandatory, I would ask you : do you believe that studying history or maths (beyond basic calculus) should be mandatory and why, since very few people will have any use for history or maths in their future jobs? More generally, what, in your opinion should be mandatory at school, and once again, why? One can perfectly live a pleasant life without knowing anything about english or american litterature, without having practised any sport, without any knowledge of music, etc…so should everything except what is useful to everybody in everyday life (reading, writing, counting and a few other things) be electives?

My question about what you think should be mandatory and why is a real one, not a rethoric one. If you think you can state that a given domain of knowledge shouldn’t be necessary, you must have some idea about how to tell apart things which must necessarily be studied and things which aren’t worthy/useful enough to become mandatory.

#15

Schools in Sweden will make you study english for 6 to 9 years and if you like, you can study a third language for 3 to 6 years if you like (most common is french of german). I’ve always been proud of the fact that I’m fluent in two languages and that I have the basic skills in a third (I wasn’t the worlds most motivated wannabe-german :)). My view is that you should study many languages and start out as young as possible.

Considering how little effort I put into it, there shouldn’t be any problem learning three languages at the same time, as long as you don’t start out with them at the same time.

#16

*Originally posted by clairobscur *
If you really believe that and believe that learning a foreign language is pointless, then you’re condemning yourself to never travel to any not english-speaking place in the world.

-----No No No I am NOT saying that taking a foreign language is pointless. If I have somehow led you to think that I retract it.
I just want to say I don’t think it should be MANDATORY IN HIGH SCHOOL. Save it for College.

do you believe that studying history or maths (beyond basic calculus) should be mandatory and why, since very few people will have any use for history or maths in their future jobs?
-------Yes I think they should be mandatory and I disagree with you that very few people will have use for them outside of High School. If you just pick up the daily newspaper it would beneift you to know your history. And of course we all know history repeats itself.

As far as Math. Hmmm not sure about that one. I am not qualified to say. I can say personally I took what was required and only that. Algebra, Geometry and Trig. And today I do not know how to do any of it. I can not help my son do his AP Honors Math. But Math is a worthwhile subject. You do use it all the time. Want to buy a new carpet? You need to know how to figure the square footage. Painting a room? you need to know how many cans to buy in order to cover the job. You buy grocieres you need to calculate your budget. Sure these are “basic” questions. But my point is you do need Math - - to what extent I don’t know.

My question about what you think should be mandatory and why is a real one, not a rethoric one. If you think you can state that a given domain of knowledge shouldn’t be necessary, you must have some idea about how to tell apart things which must necessarily be studied and things which aren’t worthy/useful enough to become mandatory.
-----I think English, Math, Science, History and Life Classes (such as Economics) should be Mandatory.

I think the scope offered to the kids should be limited for electives. Meaning that electives should still prove to be important to life skills but let them choose more freely.

Perhaps instead of offering 3 different photography classes - offer Life Management or Foreign Culture.

#17

I agree with you in a way, OP, but for a different reason:

Once you hit 10 years of age, your ability to learn a foreign language decreases. By the time you hit 16 or so, it’s pretty much too late.

I’d be more in favor of elementary schools requiring a foreign language before I’d support it in a high school.

#18

this whole thing reminds me of a saying i once heard:

now, comments like these make me titter:

Isabelle, you do understand that there is no national language in the US, right? in a short time, it is likely that as many people will speak spanish as english. so what exactly is it that makes english “the language”?

to that, i add that as others have noted, you seem to be advocating that well-rounded curricula requirements are unfair. do you really believe that students should not be required to take things that some of them might never use again?

also, i think that only a person who knows how to communicate with others in different languages understands the value of being able to do that.

#19

this whole thing reminds me of a saying i once heard:

now, comments like these make me titter:

Isabelle, you do understand that there is no national language in the US, right? in a short time, it is likely that as many people will speak spanish as english. so what exactly is it that makes english “the language”?

to that, i add that as others have noted, you seem to be advocating that well-rounded curricula requirements are unfair. do you really believe that students should not be required to take things that some of them might never use again?

also, i think that only a person who knows how to communicate with others in different languages understands the value of being able to do that.

#20

A foreign language should be mandatory and hogh school is way too late to start and 2 years is not enough to even begin. Children who grow up bilingual learn a second language without effort. Before they hit their teens they have already acquired something which is as useful in life as anything they may study in college. They have a huge head start.