Before I moved to Western New York, I lived in Pennsylvania in a town not too far from the city of Pittsburgh. At that school, they offered students two languages: French and Spanish. Coming from a German family, I was a little disappointed, but didn't think much of it at the time. After moving to my second high school, however, I was more than disappointed when I discovered the only two languages offered at that school were also French and Spanish.
I ended up taking French and it was an enjoyable class, yet after taking the French Regents in tenth grade, they didn't require any more years of that language, which seemed weird to me. I went on to fill my junior and senior years of high school with college classes, having no room for more French. Now, I can't remember much French at all. So what was the point of all that?
Language is a form of unity between different peoples, and that unity has changed from knowing several languages to everyone going by the English language and this baffles me. Before I knew English, I was taught German. My whole family comes from Germany and my parents moved here from Germany before I was born. I don't remember learning German, but I still know the language, therefore making me bilingual. It is sad to say that after living in the United States for eighteen years, I have never met someone who knew more than just English (other than family and my language teachers, of course).
Maybe it's easier if everyone just knew English, but I think people are just getting lazy. They don't have the time to learn a language or simply don't hold any interest in learning one. I had the fortune of learning at a very young age, but I would most certainly pursue another language, even now with college and adulthood fast approaching.
After talking with several teachers, parents, and professors, each person came to agree that teaching languages is dying in schools. Once the language teacher retires, that language disappears from the system, making some schools only have Spanish or French as the language, and that seems very boring. On top of that, they only require a few years of teaching it. What's the point in that? Schools state that they teach their students languages, but go ahead and ask graduates from those schools to say something in Spanish or French. Chances are, they won't remember much.
Over the years, I have traveled with my family to several different European countries, a few being Germany, Austria, and Italy. About 95% of the people I came across spoke English well enough for me to understand them. Now, this isn't true for all countries, but most have a basic understanding of the language.
The experience of learning languages is different over there too. A few friends of mine in Germany who are about the same age as me tell me what they have to do in order to learn a language. They learn the same language for almost their entire high school career and perhaps even onto higher leveled schools, but the key is this: THEY START LEARNING AT A YOUNG AGE.
Young minds are able to learn the language faster, and when I say young, I mean elementary school. With that being said, schools in Western New York and frankly all across America should look to start using this method. Children will most likely find it more interesting as well, so the earlier the better. Language is an important factor to humanity, and if a higher percent of the American population knew more than one language, more minds would have a better insight of the different cultures of the world, including their own.
