<p>So I have AP'd out of calc, CS 110/121, chem, physics and some GEs...leaving me with lots of opportunities to explore interesting stuff ffreshman year.
I'm in SCS...</p>
<p>I was thinking about learning Chinese or Japanese or Arabic....is this insane? How much extra work will be required over a regular 9 unit GE...and will it get in the way of my math and cs homework ?</p>
<p>Also, Physical Ed classes are P/F right....? So if I was too tired to get there one day- it would be fine to skip...</p>
<p>Why not ? Take another new language is always a plus. It helps when you get into job world.</p>
<p>When we visited CMU this spring, the tour guide told us CMU students can take language courses at Pitt which CMU doesn’t offer. As I know, Pitt’s language course is good.</p>
<p>Thanks Garage…but in reality I did well in everything in HS BUT language…got B, B+ in Spanish in 9th and 10th grade…and decided-- I had enough! I sucked at Spanish! And I actually hated it! (And my parents and grandparents speak Spanish…so most embarrassing!)</p>
<p>But I’ve wanted to learn one of these three languages…think it would be valuable </p>
<p>Any current students can comment on the workload of an Intro Language?
My parents think it will be too much work and I’ll end up with a C!</p>
<p>This is NOT crazy! I know because I did this.</p>
<p>As a CIT student, I took Elementary Japanese I my first semester. The language courses are heavily attendance, homework, and quiz based (or at least the Japanese department is). Just showing up to every class and completing every assignment will ensure that you get a decent grade. Unfortunately I didn’t do about 8% of the HW’s and I finished with an 89.2 my first semester, which was a cold hard B (we don’t get +'s and -'s at CMU). I really wish I just did a teeny bit more work…</p>
<p>Anyway, the point is, I didn’t really need to devote too much attention to my language course and I still almost came out with an A – and none of this was at the cost of my other grades. It’s just not THAT much work.</p>
<p>DD is a Japanese major at Pitt. For the first two years, each semester you take one five-credit class that has seven contact hours (two lecture and five recitation). She is extremely good at languages and enjoys Japanese, but it is time consuming. Pitt also offers a summer language institute where you can complete a year of language credits in the summer.</p>
<p>Might also point this out - languages at Pitt are considered easier. But unless there is a dire scheduling conflict (IE you need credits to graduate and Japanese is at the same time as that class) you cannot take a language at Pitt that is offered at CMU. </p>
<p>So you could take Latin at Pitt, but not Chinese, for example.</p>
<p>Japanese at Pitt is considered a top ten program. I have no idea about the other languages. My point was a response to Olympian saying how easy the Japanese was at CMU. And for someone who says that he stuggled with Spanish, jumping into an Asian language is probably not wise.</p>
<p>I definitely agree… Japanese comes with three other character sets on top of new vocabulary and structure. Maybe another romance language would be easier to pick up, CMUGUY? Something like Latin, Italian or French?</p>
<p>No more romance languages-- Europe is not where’s high technology sector is expanding.</p>
<p>Most people agree growth in economies and technology is occuring in the Far East or Middle East…so Arabic, Chinese or Japanese make most sense if I ever have to work/study abroad.
(Not to mention it be cool to speak these-- …)</p>
<p>Just trying to figure out if the workload is comparable to the workload of a math or science problem set or less…? If similar, I cannot take it on…already too much in the way of other courses.</p>
<p>CMUGUY, you’re in SCS right? You’re required to have a minor, anyway so you might as well make a foreign language your minor. It’s not at all uncommon. I’m doing a double-minor on top of the CS major, myself. </p>
<p>I am 99% sure when I say that the workload of a foreign language course will not nearly be as difficult as that of a CS/Math/science course. You can quote me on that.</p>
<p>Workload depends to some extent on your facility with languages. The languages on your list are all more difficult than Spanish, so they will take more work, and therefore more time, than you spent on your Spanish class. Sure, they would be nice to know, and you could probably learn them, but maybe not right now.</p>
<p>Japanese isn’t too difficult of a language to learn but once you get past the basics it does take quite a lot of work. The three character sets don’t cause too much problems. The first two are easily memorized within a week or two. The last and most infamous (Kanji) will take quite some devotion to get into however. I placed into Intermediate II with my AP credit and thinking of double majoring in Japanese. I’m mostly self taught though… so I’ll see how it goes.</p>
<p>Thanks BCO…Chinese is my actually first choice, Arabic second. I want something new and something I think I can use if assigned to the Far East or Middle East.</p>
<p>Did your roommate start from scratch or was he already studying or speaking the language?</p>
<p>Define “easy”…as in less work than another GE class, or “easy” relative to CS classes? (Which I guess that would be all classes!)
What’s the work load like in these intro language classes… it meets 4x a week- is there homework daily and a quiz every day?</p>