<p>Please re-read post 10. Mandarin and other hieroglyphic languages, especially those with multiple tones can be VERY challenging. </p>
<p>My S has always cruised through school but found Mandarin harder than ALL his other APs put together–he got 5s in most of the 13 AP tests he took (he’s graduating this spring as an EE). He’s a gifted trumpet player and speaks Mandarin well with good pronunciation, but he found it very tough to get all the different parts you need to be good at a language. When he was in Taiwan for a month, he could understand but not speak as well as he would like, after 3 years of HS Mandarin and many summers of grade schoo Mandarin.</p>
<p>I know many folks who have switched from Mandarin to Spanish & my D to German & found the “romance” languages SO much easier & more intuitive than Mandarin. </p>
<p>Other folks, on the other hand seem to have a great aptitude for these languages. If you are one of the latter, more power to you & I’m sure you’ll figure out some way to capitalize on this skill. My cousin was very talented with languages and married an Egyptian. They have raised their kids to be bilingual, so I’m sure they will have a considerable advantage when they learn additional languages. She is now teaching tax prep at H&R Block, but enjoyed worldwide travel before they started their family. Another friend was very fluent in multiple languages & worked his way through college & law school interpreting things for the HI ballots, so needed info & measures could be written in multiple languages.</p>