IS German the 'best' MFL for a mild dyslexic??

[ProperLush]

Because 2 people at work told me so yesterday!

DS2 is in Y6 and gets the 'opportunity' to state a preference for which MFL he will study in Y7 in secondary. These dictate which tutor group you go into as well. The options are French (5 classes), Spanish (3) and German (2).

He has 'done' some French in primary but it has been cursory and badly taught and has caused him to say he doesn't want to do it in Secondary.

DS2 isn't very academic and I strongly suspect has dyslexic tendencies but I cannot get the otherwise 'good' primary school interested in a proper test and cannot afford the £400 needed privately. He does do English with a private tutor as otherwise he may not 'pass' his KS2 SAT in it.

He, in his sweet innocence, decided he wanted to do German 'because it's different'. DH and I looked at each other in horror! (Though the German teacher at the Open Day at the secondary was delighted...)

Briefly: I have an 'O' level in French though I am no linguist; I can speak a bit of colloquial German having au paired there for 8 months at 17. I know no Spanish.
DH did German at school but claims to remember nothing; he is apparently quite good at (South American) Spanish having undergone a crash course and 4 months there. He knows no French.

DS1 (Y8) does Spanish in secondary and is reasonably clever.

The ishoo is DH has no patience so I could imagine the ructions that would ensue if DH was called upon to 'help' DS2 with Spanish; I could help with French, but I'm not sure either of us would be much use with German! I am more than prepared to try but I suspect my 'help' energy will be better utilised towards getting something down in English and Maths, not a MFL as I actually doubt he'd pass a GCSE in it (school is big on it, however!).

I had 'dismissed' German (I know some will say 'But it's his 'choice''- to which I'd say 'Yes, but it's MY sanity!' and I am a grown up who knows that MFL for the non-linguist is difficult) but in discussing this at work, 2 women said that they felt German might suit DS2 better due to its 'logic' and being 'more like English'!

What do you think?

If you already know French, OP, then it will be much easier for you to learn Spanish than German; the grammar rules are similar and half the words are partial cognates. There are only 3-4 sounds in Spanish I can think of that don't really exist in English, whereas in the others.... (shudder). Especially the German vowels, umlats and that.

Good reasons to do German

He wants to

It is phoneticly simpler than english.
The sentence structure (used by beginner students) is straightforward and regular.

Lots of first german looks or sounds a bit like english.

I am dyslexic but was capable of playing hockey in German before I had any lessons ( Recht and right are similar, ditto Hoch/ high linea/ line . I had classes as an adult because I wanted to get more out of my hockey playing trips to Germany. I had WANTED to study german as my MFL age 12 but was assigned to Spanish, which I loathed , didn't understand, couldn't remember and dropped out off.

"Also, and much more importantly, think of all the fab places he could visit if he learned Spanish - Mexico, Guatamala, Costa Rica, Spain, Chile etc..... Think of the food. Think of flamenco. The beaches."

But other than Spain (which imo is overrated and too touristy in my opinion) the other countries are all far away in South America...

...whereas German helps you enjoy the beautiful Swiss, Austrian or German Alps, both in summer and winter, the Oktoberfest in Munich, the lakes in Bavaria, the lovely Christmas markets, Berlin, Vienna, etc etc... .

Speaking German, French and English myself I agree that German is the most logical and phonetic language. Our children our growing up bilingually and are finding reading and writing in German much more intuitive than English (which has so many exceptions). The words, as others have mentioned, are also very logical (e.g. Kühlschrank = cold cabinet = refrigerator ). Yes, the grammer may be a little more tricky, but again it follows strict rules, which once learnt, should be easy to follow.

And I also agree about German being useful for great skiing holidays in Austria or Switzerland .

I started a thread ages ago about the exact same dilemma, componded by the fact that I did very well in French at school but don't know German.

We plumped for German in the end and DS1 has been studying it for 1 1/2 years now;

He has coped with the spelling and pronunciation.

Grammar is tricky, I have struggled to help with this at times and homework can be a strain.

Almost all boys in class and accent is less "gay" (according to DS, sorry but we are Scottish so quite good at guttural noises!) therefore less embarrassing for shy DS.

He is keeping his head above water so far.

The best MFL for him to take is the one your family can help him gain fluency in. As your DH and DS1 do Spanish, and you already speak French (an easy jump to Spanish), I'd go with Spanish. That way you can all watch Spanish language tv shows, listen to Spanish language radio in the morning, speak to each in a bit of Spanish, and perhaps even go on holiday in Spain if money allows. (Or indeed Costa Rica if money allows!)

There's nothing more depressing than studying a MFL for years and only "kinda" speaking it. Choose the one you're best placed to support him in as a family.

My exh taught in a special school for dyslexics. They taught Italian, as the spelling is phonetic and there are no issues with word order - which there are in German (I think Spanish spelling is not entirely straightforward). I am an ex-MFL teacher (French and German) and can confirm that very dyslexic students do struggle with the word order and punctuation issues in German. I realise that this bit of info is not very helpful as most mainstream schools do not even offer Italian. But anyway...

To see how a language works, then German, Latin (or Irish) would be your choices due to the different cases, eclipsis and aspiration.

I did German, French and Irish in school -- Irish and German complemented each other because of the grammar, phonetic spelling, and regularity of rules, while French and English seemed to 'go together' better ime as the writing and translating didn't require the drilling and grasp of grammar the others did.

DS took Latin and I was able to help him understand the grammar concepts despite never taking it myself, all thanks to Irish (and German) grammar.

Spanish is the easiest.

@ notcitrus
There are more than 3 tenses in German and I assure you a strong English accent does not sound North German!