I’m planning on switching from Spanish to Mandarin for my sophomore year of high school. I just finished Spanish 2 (freshmen year) and want to take Mandarin 1 next year. I’m wondering whether it looks better to take a language consistently through level 5 or take one language for 2 years and switch to a more difficult language for 3 years.
The former.
Additionally, level 2 of Spanish plus level 3 of Mandarin means you will speak no foreign language well. If your college has a foreign language requirement for graduation, you’d be better served learning as much of the foreign language before college to minimize the course you need to take in college.
I wouldn’t recommend it unless you hate spanish/the spanish program at your school is bad/etc
I know people who switched languages in the middle of high school because the Chinese and German classes were discontinued and they didn’t want to take them online or at a community college. They weren’t hurt that badly, but ultimately your language skills will be stronger if you take the same language through high school
This NYT piece by Nicholas Kristoff nicely sums up the issue. Kristoff is married to a Chinese-American woman.
Why do you want to switch?
If you can add Mandarin to Spanish, I would consider it. Otherwise, stick with Spanish would be my advice.