Time to Emphasize Language Learning

[Unkotare]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

 

[Manonthestreet]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

We'll be lucky if kids in school now can do a basic job besides learning a language they are so far behind

 

[mudwhistle]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

I think the emphasis should be on learning the GD language that is predominantly spoken in the GD country you're living in. It's rude to expect everyone to learn your motherf*cking language, because that would mean that we all have to learn over 150 GD languages to not leave anyone out.

 

[Unkotare]

We'll be lucky if kids in school now can do a basic job besides learning a language they are so far behind

I give kids today more credit than that.

 

[Unkotare]

... It's rude to expect everyone to learn your motherf*cking language, because that would mean that we all have to learn over 150 GD languages to not leave anyone out.

Good thing we don't do that.

 

[leftwinger]

After they can read English and do basic math. If you had $100 and you spent $27 on Gas. What percentage of your original $100 do you have left?

 

[mudwhistle]

After they can read English and do basic math. If you had $100 and you spent $27 on Gas. What percentage of your original $100 do you have left?

Is this a trick question?

 

[MisterBeale]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

The problem I find?

Is it is a waste of time and resources. . . . in the end. In most cases? My friends and family have forgotten much of what they had learned too. . .

I had three years of Spanish, by sister had four, my mother then took it at the community college for two years.

For years, my folks would go to Texas every other year, the very tip and do the border thing. Back in the eighties when it wasn't so chaotic. They used a bit of it, but not much, too unsure of her fluency to attempt to use it. Added to that, the Mexican population in the border towns knew more English, than Americans who had a year or two.


Fast forward a few decades? I only remember a few things.

¿Dónde está el baño?

 

[leftwinger]

Is this a trick question?

no. But I wonder if many 7th graders could answere it and show their work. not just a guess.

 

[mudwhistle]

no. But I wonder if many 7th graders could answere it and show their work. not just a guess.

I wonder if many Harvard grads could answer it.

 

[Anomalism]

These kids can barely read and write in their first language. We have a long way to go.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

Overloaded With Uselessness

Instead, English should be learned more thoroughly. Grammar and spelling should be studied all through high school. College English courses should be strictly about grammar, writing, and speaking. But they're all about Literature, so that decadent escapist professors can pontificate about the latest dreary drivel. These academentians themselves are defective in grammar, including the New-Age Grammar they make up, which is ignorant, unstructured, and dysfunctional.

The reason I did so well in Latin is that I had thorough training in English during grade school, which, significantly, used to be called "grammar school." Not any more. It's now called "groomer school."

There's no way of predicting which foreign language a graduate will use, so there's no point in learning a particular one. He's not even going to pick a job in which he can use the language he was forced to learn by Education Nazis.

 

[Manonthestreet]

I give kids today more credit than that.

Too bad tests scores don't back it up and I don't relish saying that

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

The problem I find?

Is it is a waste of time and resources. . . . in the end. In most cases? My friends and family have forgotten much of what they had learned too. . .

I had three years of Spanish, by sister had four, my mother then took it at the community college for two years.

For years, my folks would go to Texas every other year, the very tip and do the border thing. Back in the eighties when it wasn't so chaotic. They used a bit of it, but not much, too unsure of her fluency to attempt to use it. Added to that, the Mexican population in the border towns knew more English, than Americans who had a year or two.


Fast forward a few decades? I only remember a few things.

¿Dónde está el baño?

Mexico Es Todo Un Baño

 

[iamwhatiseem]

The Amazing Rise of Bilingualism in the United States

The United States has long been seen as a mostly monolingual country. Things have changed rapidly in 40 years, however, and now well over a fifth of the population is bilingual.

www.psychologytoday.com

The world's not getting smaller, but it is becoming more interconnected. Beyond that, within the US more businesses are catering to more specific groups of customers. This requires more and more specialized skills. Education should reflect this to the economic benefit of the country.

No
Universal English makes a lot more sense than the host having to learn the language of the guest

 

[mudwhistle]

The problem I find?

Is it is a waste of time and resources. . . . in the end. In most cases? My friends and family have forgotten much of what they had learned too. . .

I had three years of Spanish, by sister had four, my mother then took it at the community college for two years.

For years, my folks would go to Texas every other year, the very tip and do the border thing. Back in the eighties when it wasn't so chaotic. They used a bit of it, but not much, too unsure of her fluency to attempt to use it. Added to that, the Mexican population in the border towns knew more English, than Americans who had a year or two.


Fast forward a few decades? I only remember a few things.

¿Dónde está el baño?

I took classic Spanish....the type they speak in Spain.
That's not what they're speaking in most of these countries.
Some of my teammates when I was in college were Hispanic and I didn't understand most of what they were saying, and they told me they were speaking slang Spanish. Of course I wouldn't understand some if not most of it.

 

[Unkotare]

No
Universal English makes a lot more sense than the host having to learn the language of the guest

Talking about what private companies are looking for in job applicants.

 

[iamwhatiseem]

Talking about what private companies are looking for in job applicants.

....As a result of not teaching English in an English speaking country.

 

[DGS49]

To illustrate a point: I worked for a company based in Luxembourg, having offices in twenty-six countries around the world. All major meetings were conducted in English. It was the only language that everyone could work with. The chances that any job applicant today would lose out on a significant employment opportunity due to not speaking any foreign language is slight.

The people who worked for the parent company could at least speak Luxembourgish, German, French, and English, but almost all of them had one or two more languages. (They wouldn't give language instruction to anyone over 35 y.o.).

I have never met any American who, with nothing more than many years of school language instruction, could hold their own in a conversation in the target language. The exception was when they had the opportunity to spend at least 4-6 months in a country where the language proficiency was necessary.

While I learned quite a bit in my studies of Spanish, German, and Italian, it was not enough to actually speak the languages. It gave me a much better understanding of English grammar.

 

[Unkotare]

... The chances that any job applicant today would lose out on a significant employment opportunity due to not speaking any foreign language is slight.

....

Not slight. Significant and growing.