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Original poster

Which language to choose

36 replies

happygardening · 09/06/2011 10:57

Which would you choose my DS (year 9 now) starts his senior school in September and has to choose now between Ancient Greek, Spanish, Mandarin or German. He will be doing French and Latin and is exceptionally good at Latin, has a little experience of the Greek and no expeience of the others. I favour the Spanish my hubsband the Ancient Greek.

OP posts:
notcitrus · 10/06/2011 09:01

Whichever he wants - German gives excellent grounding in grammar useful for other languages later (really useful for me learning Arabic atm), and is a less-common EU language much in demand.

Motivation is vital for language learning.

cory · 10/06/2011 08:29

I'd favour German: if he does French and Latin he will find Spanish easy to pick up anyway. Like your husband, I have found Spanish and Italian easy to pick up after doing Latin.

German very useful, not least for future university studies.

Original poster
happygardening · 09/06/2011 14:15

I favour the modern foreigh language, my DS favours Ancient Greek because he loves latin and currently thinks he's going to do it at Pre U (A level) but this is because he's had a fantastic Latin teacher and he's only just 13. He also thinks he's not that good at French (untrue if you look at his exam entrance exam marks) and therefore modern languages in general but this is because he's had a rubbish French teacher.
My husband thinks if you do Latin and ancient Greek for three years then you will find it easy to pick up Spanish or Italian at any stage in your life. This is what he's done.

OP posts:
sue52 · 09/06/2011 12:35

I did Latin and ancient Greek many years ago. I wish I had studied a modern foreign language instead, it would have been more useful. Unless he wishes to take classics at university, I would go for a European language, I don't think 2 years would be long enough to develop any degree of fluency in Mandarin.

Lilymaid · 09/06/2011 11:13

Spanish is very easy to pick up if you have already studied French and Latin. If he would like a challenge, he should take Mandarin, which will be a very important language in his future.

midnightexpress · 09/06/2011 11:12

And yy to letting your DS choose which he's interested in. IMO, the more languages you learn the easier it is to pick up new ones, so any language he enjoys will be better than none and he can add another new one later (eg at uni) if he is so inclined.

slipshodsibyl · 09/06/2011 11:11

It's harder to get a top grade in Mandarin than in other languages. This shouldn't stop him if he wants to do it. Nice to do a Classic language but unless it looks as though he wants to be a classicist I'd say Spanish. Ultimately, he's doing the work - which does he like?

BearBehavingBadly · 09/06/2011 11:10

Which language would your son like to learn?
If you enjoy something you usually do well in it.
Agree with Shesparkles re Spanish or Mandarin though.

midnightexpress · 09/06/2011 11:07

I agree with shesparkles. I think Spanish or Mandarin would be most useful. With Mandarin, if he has a flair for it, I think that adding another Chinese language such as Cantonese, or even Japanese would be easier with an understanding of Mandarin. Spanish the most useful European language in terms of future emplyment.

Bethanne · 09/06/2011 11:00

Spanish is a very widely spoken language in the world, and German a very important business language.

shesparkles · 09/06/2011 10:59

What's your ds's preference? Depending on any future plans, I'd say Spanish or Mandarin would probably be the more useful languages

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