I’m not particularly looking for the answer to this question, but do wonder if anyone can help with information on how to get TCFL accreditation, as many of my students in China are hopeful of one day entering this field.

In the first part of this summary from the National Center for Education Statistics, of high school grads in 2004, 15.5% had no foreign language, 16.1% had one year or less, and 33.9% had two years. Just shy of two-thirds, with two years or less.

On the other end of the scale, 5.4% of grads had advance placement levels in foreign language.

(Tangentially, a report in the New York Times earlier this week told about many states having inflated their graduation rates, which may be as low as 70% nationwide.)

This in the Fairfax, Virginia public schools, regarded as one of the best overall systems in the U.S.

Ironically, the previous summer, he’d gotten the language bug on his own. He and I picked out a beginner’s book for Latin (his idea), and within two weeks, he was able to translate an entire page in the (presumably fictionalized) life of young Horatius.

Taking a highly engaging approach, the book told of the boy’s world, including his troubles with the bully Decimus, who unwisely mouthed off to the teacher. Decimus durus est, sed stultus — Decimus is strong, but dumb.

I think that age definitely impacts learning and certainly language learning. Generally speaking, the earlier you start a second language the better, though there is much disagreement on how and when that effect really works. I hadn’t realized that before high school, most American kids get little language education. That would indeed explain a lot!

Ken

I’ve been reading a lot about the brain and the neural processes that occur prior to, say, age 10 or 15. There’s still not that much language instruction in the U.S. prior to high school (ages 14 – 18), which means even for western languages with structure similar to English, students are starting with something of a handicap.

There has to be something very intrinsic to the lesson that makes learning compelling. Fun works. Wanting to please an adult work can work. Making friends in the language works. Singing works. Being successful and getting praise works. Playing games work.

Telling young kids that they need to learn a foreign language because they will get better jobs goes over like a lead balloon with most young kids. Going into the classroom with that understanding of motivation results in exactly what you observed; an attitude on the part of the teachers that the students are lazy and the parents are uncommitted.

I’d recommend that this teacher watch the movie Patch Adams and report back.

But I really feel bad for those students who start out with boring traditional methods and learn to be afraid of Chinese instead of chilling out and having fun with it first.

Also the example above was derived from the context of talking to Westerners I have never yet felt like telling a Chinese person that traditional methods are useless (I don’t feel that would be advisable most of the time). I have spoken recently to some younger Chinese though that have different attitudes for example agreeing that initially it is pointless for Westerners to learn to handwrite Hanzi (one, an engineer admitted that she sometimes struggles to handwrite after using a computer for so long).

These days if I meet a Chinese person I am invariably asked how long I lived in China. Either that or they casually talk to me for a little while in Chinese before suddenly registering surprise.