Sylvia is out of town, so I'll step in an offer another question of the day....
My school offers Mandarin Chinese, German, Spanish, French, and Latin. With the exception of Latin, kids started taking a foreign language class (now called world languages, I think) in third grade. US students seem to lag behind other countries in terms of acquiring other languages, so I'm happy that we offer this program. We have a beautiful new language lab, and I'll try and post a picture of it if I can find one later today.
For the next question of the day, I am tagging Westley Field from Australia to post. Westley, give us a question by Monday!
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I think your absolutely right about US schools lagging behind in foreign language. The problem is even worse for less commonly taught languages like Arabic, Japanese, Russian, and Farsi. Its both difficult and expensive to find specialist teachers to teach these subjects.
A great solution is to use video conference teachers. My company, Critical Language Service, offer Arabic instruction in this manner. Our teachers are all native speakers of Arabic who live and work from the Middle East, and thanks to video conference technology they teach classrooms of students in the US. Its just like a normal classroom, but with a high tech twist, the teacher is on a screen. Schools can choose to have as many or as few classes as they require.
This year we are only offering Arabic but in the near future we hope to offer more languages. Our program is so much more than just a video conference teacher. We are on the cutting edge of foreign language instruction. To learn more visit our website at: www.criticallanguageservice.com
For any schools that don't teach a foreign language at present, or who are not entirely happy with their current program, could I recommend our presentation?
We'll show you how you can give your students the gift of confident bilingualism and a global perspective in about 100 hours of instruction, without a specialist teacher.
That level of competence takes 600 hours in Italian and 2200 in Mandarin, but you can take more than100 hours off that by using the Apprenticeship Language Learning (ALL) effect, which just means that you learn a hard language faster if you already learned an easy one.
As an international school, we really have to offer foreign languages - we have Mandarin, Spanish and French at all grade levels. There are private mother tongue courses for everything from Swedish to Japanese and IB students have a wider variety, but I'm not sure exactly what.
The odd thing, I think, is that we do not offer the host country language - Bahasa Malaysia. In my previous international school, all students were required to study Germany (the school was in Munich), but here, students can go through the entire system and never study Bahasa... I think the government may soon mandate that it must be offered, as, in my opinion, they should.
Our school has begun a "language experience" starting in first grade and is closely tied to the social studies program. In first grade there is an emphasis on China and so one of our Academy Chinese teachers visits each classroom once a cycle (every 6 days) and provides lessons in conversational Mandarin, games and cultures. In second grade they are exposed to Japanese (also related to social studies - study of islands) and 3rd grade - it is Hawaiian - related to our study of the Hawaiian culture and early history. In seventh grade they begin - official language instrutction - where the child selects a course of study. The gap for 4,5,6, is still being debated - right now the lower elementary experience is being funded through our international center. It truly is amazing what these kids can pick-up - and with very little effort.
Penelope Vos > Judy BeaverOctober 31, 2012 at 8:14pm
Hi Judy,
That sounds lovely for giving them a more balanced overview of world cultures.
If you were to use some of your language teaching time to teach the children Esperanto, they could actually converse with children in China and Japan.. maybe not Hawaii? but add Brazil and Burundi and Hungary and Indonesia and France and any of dozens more.
And they would have the lifelong cognitive benefits and confidence of being genuinely bilingual.
I teach at a Pre-K - 6 private elementary school. All ages learn Spanish. In 5th & 6th grade, Spanish turns from a Resource class into an academic subject (with grades). In addition, there is a Chinese Language after-school class offered and a German Summercamp.
Hi there, Lucy. Yes our school offers foreign language. We're a small independent school in Maryland, USA. We offer Spanish K-5 (non-elective, it's a subject area). Then in sixth grade (eleven years old) we offer a choice of Spanish, French, Latin and next year we begin a Chinese program.
Replies
I think your absolutely right about US schools lagging behind in foreign language. The problem is even worse for less commonly taught languages like Arabic, Japanese, Russian, and Farsi. Its both difficult and expensive to find specialist teachers to teach these subjects.
A great solution is to use video conference teachers. My company, Critical Language Service, offer Arabic instruction in this manner. Our teachers are all native speakers of Arabic who live and work from the Middle East, and thanks to video conference technology they teach classrooms of students in the US. Its just like a normal classroom, but with a high tech twist, the teacher is on a screen. Schools can choose to have as many or as few classes as they require.
This year we are only offering Arabic but in the near future we hope to offer more languages. Our program is so much more than just a video conference teacher. We are on the cutting edge of foreign language instruction. To learn more visit our website at: www.criticallanguageservice.com
For any schools that don't teach a foreign language at present, or who are not entirely happy with their current program, could I recommend our presentation?
We'll show you how you can give your students the gift of confident bilingualism and a global perspective in about 100 hours of instruction, without a specialist teacher.
That level of competence takes 600 hours in Italian and 2200 in Mandarin, but you can take more than100 hours off that by using the Apprenticeship Language Learning (ALL) effect, which just means that you learn a hard language faster if you already learned an easy one.
Come and talk to us about it at:
http://www.globaleducationconference.com/forum/topics/esperanto-the...
The odd thing, I think, is that we do not offer the host country language - Bahasa Malaysia. In my previous international school, all students were required to study Germany (the school was in Munich), but here, students can go through the entire system and never study Bahasa... I think the government may soon mandate that it must be offered, as, in my opinion, they should.
Hi Judy,
That sounds lovely for giving them a more balanced overview of world cultures.
If you were to use some of your language teaching time to teach the children Esperanto, they could actually converse with children in China and Japan.. maybe not Hawaii? but add Brazil and Burundi and Hungary and Indonesia and France and any of dozens more.
And they would have the lifelong cognitive benefits and confidence of being genuinely bilingual.
All the best in what you do,
Penny