What languages did you do at school?

[OneUmberJoker]

Spanish for me

Same here, all of them at O level. Then French and German at A Level.
I did several years of Dutch then several years of Spanish at night school later on.

French, plus 3 years of Latin. I hated Latin with a passion at the time because it was so dry, but now, many, many years later, I still find it useful for the reasons others have said and I think it's a shame that it's not so widely taught these days

For all I have used French since leaving school, I don't think has been as useful as Latin.

Welsh, Spanish and French

How come most people on here did multiple languages? I was only offered to do one.

We did the one term sampler languages with the theory they would then offer them at GCSE.
Unfortunately the teachers who taught those extra languages all left and the only extra language (beyond French or German) offered was Spanish.
The way the timetable worked you could do two as an option if you wanted.

I did the maximum number of languages on offer at O level, but no practical subjects. I only did one science too - only Biology was compulsory.

French, German and Latin also. At my first secondary school all three were compulsory in lower school. At my second, you started with one and then could pick the other two up higher in the school.

We had to do French, from the first form of secondary school. Then when it came to the fourth form (the year before GCEs - I’m an old git!) we could do another language to GCE which, for me, was German. Then I did Latin in the 6th form.

My school was very big so I suppose there was more opportunity.
I had almost 300 in my year group.
My friend at the Catholic school next door had about 90 in her year group. I think they just did French.

French and German. But I always wished I could do Spanish. They had a weird rule at my school that if you were in the top set in maths then you had to do German. Such a waste of time.

French and German. Spanish was also taught, but in Yr8, half the year did Spanish and half German, so I took German as one of my options. French was all the year groups from Yr7.

I got a B in French and C in German. Was happy with that.

Can barely remember any of it now though.

French; Latin and German at school.

Continued German to degree level. I'm autistic and it was my special interest for about a decade, starting at age 14. Germans used to realise I wasn't from tbeir local area but they thought I must be from another part of Germany.

Learnt to speak Spanish fluently in my 20s.

Wow 😮

Welsh & French GCSE. Our form tutor also ran a lunchtime Italian club.

French, Latin, Ancient Greek. The last two to A level.

German and French

I now live in a country where they speak French and can testify that I am crap at it

I was far better at German

German to GCSE and randomly one year of French in year 9.

Same! This was back in the '70s for me - a Fife state secondary school. My alma mater no longer offers this range, unfortunately.

French & Latin to A-level.

German &Spanish to AS-level at evening classes.

Currently doing Welsh at evening classes (well, I will be in a month's time when term starts again.)

My whole life trajectory ended up being shaped by my language-learning choices.

German at first, as it was the only one on offer.

But I then started learning Mandarin at a weekend course, and switched schools to the only school that specialised in languages, and took both Mandarin and German in my final year.

Then Mandarin, German, French and Japanese at university - I had to run this past a course advisor who told me it was too many courses, it was a terrible idea and that I would almost certainly fail. Hah, I didn't.

Married a French guy and taught French and Mandarin at high school for a few years.

Then left him, because he was a right bastard, and moved in succession to China and then Japan, where I met my Indian now-husband as a fellow student. Then India, living with his family for several years so also learning Hindi along the way.

Study-wise ultimately doing a PhD where I needed Mandarin and Japanese and finally now living in Germany where I make a living translating from Japanese into English.

French to GCSE (compulsory) and German in year 9.
Would have preferred to do German at GCSE but could only do it as a 2nd language and didn't have enough options.
Languages are not my thing, I'm a STEM person!

Ours did the same! I wonder if we went to the same school!?

I did Welsh, French and German (and Italian). Peter have picked up Spanish.

Sorry that should be later picked up Spanish!

Good on your daughter!
I started learning Esperanto from Duolingo a couple of years ago.
In my opinion it's probably the only language - due to its simplicity - that you actually can learn properly via Duolingo.
Having finished the course I fairly gingerly went along to an Esperanto meet up (that I was amazed to learn it had actually been occurring regularly within walking distance of where I lived), and was surprised by
(a) the fact that I could actually use it to communicate after learning what was really only about a year
(b) how friendly and encouraging the people were (to tell the truth, I was actually expecting zealots and/or weirdos)
(c) how many people are actually around who speak it. Meet ups can vary between 3 to 50 or so people and the form of those meet ups varies from simply chatting, eating out, a group that is into giving lectures on various things, a walking and cycling group, and a group that plays board games
(d) how varied the backgrounds are of the people I meet there. I've met people that I just would never have met otherwise, such as a former ambassador, a psychiatrist, a retired forester, etc.
(e) the opportunity to chat with people who I really wouldn't have been talk to otherwise. Esperanto is quite popular in quite a few countries where English is not the default second language or, if it is, people don't usually learn it to a level where they can converse. So I've met people from Poland who are of an age where only Russian was the second language one learnt at school, people from Cuba, Korea, Brazil, and so on.

In addition to that, there are a lot of free resources on the Internet, from a language course called Lernu that has more grammar explanations than Duolingo, as well as articles, books, etc. All free.

And if one is into travel, there is long-standing scheme allowing one to organise stays in other Esperanto speakers' homes for free.
In addition it's pretty standard to arrange to meet up with Esperanto speaking locals in other countries where they will show you around their city for free if that is what you're interested in.

Sorry, I'll get off my soap box now.

@ohdrearydrearyme I've just remembered we did her get a couple of novels in Esperanto.
One was The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime.
The other was a classic novel but I forget which one - possibly a Dickens.
Her interest fizzled out unfortunately so I'm not sure how good she got.
She did Gaelic for a while too.
Can you do Klingon on Duolingo? She's possibly did some of that too 😂