Elementary
through high school age children are exposed to many different subjects during
their school-aged years; mathematics, history, English, home economics,
chemistry, biology and many other sciences, and that is only to name a few.
Even though the children sit in the classroom for about eight hours a day and
learn all these subjects they never really get the opportunity to explore
anything new or different; they do not ever venture out into the world. The
classroom is their cage, and many children sit at their desk and stare out of
the window of their classroom peering into a world they wish they could be a
real part of. Sure, history and geography class teach us about the world, but
most school-aged children still do not even realize that there is a whole other
world outside of their classroom, school bus and home. These children do not
realize that there are billions and billions of people outside of America.
Foreign language classes would help free these children, in kindergarten
through high school, from their naïve bubble and show them a world of
experiences they never knew they could have.
Kindergarten
through high school is the time to provide students with the tools they will
need to succeed in the real world. These school years are the best time for
kids to learn about themselves and what it is they are capable of. Students
should be challenged and given opportunities to discover the things about
themselves they never knew. School aged children should be given opportunities
to branch out and experience new things that can provide them with the
confidence they need to succeed in whatever is it they desire. Learning a
second or even third language can build that confidence within each student,
and provide him or her with the buoyancy they need to succeed.
Children actually learn faster and retain more of language than do adults and
being bilingual even builds brainpower that is why it is very important to
teach new language during the school age years. Students who attain a second
language in school often perform better on tests than those that do not learn a
second language. Studying a foreign language also provides students with better
verbal skills and problem-solving abilities; tools they will need later in
life.
Between birth
and puberty when children are in the elementary and middle school ages they can
learn multiple languages and echo accents easily. Studies have shown that
children have an innate ability to hear differences in languages. The young
human brain is designed in a way that allows children to pick up language
naturally, however as we age our ability to soak up language diminishes therefore
starting to learn multiple languages early in life at the elementary age is
beneficial to children. In our fast paced and ever shrinking world and with our
ever increasingly global economy, we should be raising the kindergarten through
high school kids to be global citizens. It is predicted that by 2025 China will
be the world’s leading economy, the future leaders of our country need to be
able to communicate with people from other countries, without that ability the
world’s economy will fail and our children will be left behind without the
tools to fix the problems. Learning early how to communicate with multiple
cultures of people is beneficial and can give a young student pride and
confidence to be able to branch out to communicate with new people and even
experience new cultures. Success in all of the majour subject areas is
important to a child’s future just as much as learning new language is. Learning
a foreign language can assist a student to be successful in the other subject
areas like English, math, and the sciences. Understanding the structure and use
of another language can even build a better understanding of the students’ own
language as well. The ability to describe something in more than one way
provides for better creativity and flexibility in thought patterns, which is
useful in problem solving areas such as mathematics and also many sciences.
Students who succeed in foreign language studies are more susceptible to acquire
high grades in all of the other subject areas that they study in school.
Extra
curricular activities such as sports, band, and art clubs are very important to
help students gain confidence and other tools they'll need in life. These extra
curricular activities are important ways of allowing a student to express
themselves, but learning a new language should not be optional like the extra
curricular activities are; it should be a mandatory part of the core curriculum
throughout the elementary and high school years. Each student should have to
have a passing grade in a certain number of language credits in order to even
graduate. Many schools do not enforce learning a new language, which is very
important in the Kindergarten through high school times of their lives. The
students who are in a school district that does not provide foreign language
studies tend to struggle later in life with finding a job or succeeding to
their full potential in their chosen career field. Taking a foreign language
class should be the norm and standard for every high school across our entire
nation. My stepsons are in 6th and 7th grade, learning a language is not
required of them, it is very strange and frustrating to me that they are not
being taught a foreign language and are not being given the opportunity to
learn to communicate with other people around the world. The United States of
America is a very diverse nation and there are many non-English speaking people
living in American cities and towns. Language barriers in America are frequent
causes of confusion and misunderstanding amoung people living in a community
together. In my primary education in New York, from elementary school through
high school graduation, I had no choice but to learn a new language. I was able
to choose which language, but I had to choose one nonetheless. Having a second
language had always helped me succeed in my other classes and it also helped me
succeed later in life when I was able to apply for jobs that required
bilingualism, and when I was able to communicate with the Spanish-speaking
people in my community.
There are over
thirty five million people in America who speak Spanish as their first
language, but today only fifteen percent of public elementary schools teach a
foreign language. As global events change so too do the patterns of learning a
new language. Marisa Cohen from Parents Magazine writes, “For instance, Russian
lessons spiked during the Cold War, while Japanese became popular in the 1980s
as Japan became a global business leader. Now Mandarin is becoming the
must-learn foreign language, a nod to the fact that experts predict China will
become the world's number-one economy by the time our preschoolers finish
college.” Her description explains just how important the attainment of a
foreign language is. Martha Abbott, the executive director of education on the
American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages also argues in support of
learning foreign language, she says, "In many cultures, business doesn't
get done in the conference room -- it happens at social events, and in these
settings you can't always rely on an interpreter being there." Her
statement makes an argument supporting the teaching of foreign language to grade
school children. Abbott mentions the reliance on an interpreter; if American
children were being taught foreign language they could actually be the
interpreter for someone else instead of needing an interpreter for themselves.
The interpreter had to learn both languages to be able to do his or her job.
Attaining a foreign language just makes sense, and schools across the nation
need to implement a foreign language program into the everyday core curriculum.
*http://www.cal.org
*Parents Magazine
*http://www.cal.org
*Parents Magazine
