Which language to choose?

As a high school freshman, which language is better to choose these days? My son has done two years of Mandarin and one year of Latin. He doesn’t want to continue with Mandarin anymore and leaning towards Latin (other option is Spanish). While I respect and like his choice, I thought I will check with experienced parents which language makes most sense if there is no affinity towards a specific one in decision making process. Please share your thoughts and experience. Thank you so much !!

We just finished this convo in our household…DD is off to BS this fall and after Spanish since 1st grade and Latin through middle school has decided to go to French I. When I questioned her about the decision, since she likely would place into Spanish 3 or Latin 2, she said she had studied the course offerings and the study abroad/ internship opportunities at her school and was most interested in the things she could do if she went the French route…she did her research so I can’t fault her. She realizes it will mean that she takes a language for the next 3 years to satisfy grad requirements of a level III language but she is on board with that. I think interest should be the biggest consideration as it will drive the work ethic. My son stuck with what he knew and went with Spanish- he was very clear that his 2 years of Latin was plenty! Good to have options and may be worth considering the graduation requirements of your school- if language not a priority for your student and other electives are, perhaps choosing the language that he will place highest in is valuable because he will satisfy grad requir,mets sooner and move on to other areas of interest. If he wants something new, then he has the Spanish option!

My daughter took French through middle school, and I encouraged her to try something new at BS. I was hoping she’d take Mandarin… But she chose Latin. It has become a subject she really loves. I suppose one drawback to Latin is the lack of a language immersion study abroad possibility… If you have a kid who would really benefit from that kind of experience.

Mine is going with Latin. He has had Spanish since kindergarten, so he didn’t want to do anymore of that. His reasoning? He’s going to need to know Latin when he becomes Pope…

@Caringmom11 - Any particular reason he doesn’t want to continue with Mandarin? My daughter studied Mandarin from 6th-8th grade and contemplated switching in high school also - mainly due to the fact that learning the Chinese language is hard! She is current sophomore and received a scholarship this year from the Confucius Institute to travel to China over the summer. Honestly, I encouraged her to stick with it - as China’s economy grows, the importance of non-Chinese to understand the culture and language will be increasingly important.

@TheStig2 - would you mind telling me more about the scholarship your daughter got? My son is doing a travel program this summer in China too, and I thought I’d researched all the possibilities pretty carefully, but somehow the Confucius Institute never got on my radar screen.

My son’s school requires they take BOTH a modern and classic language. They have to take at least two years of classic and at least through the third year of the modern. Having both French and Latin has been a challenge!

@soxmom - Sure! Confucius Institute operates within two universities in our state. Both universities sponsored high school group trips to China this summer at different times for state residents. She wrote an essay - I’m not sure how many applied or how competitive the selection process was. We paid for airfare (fortunately, had FF miles!) - all travel within China, accommodations & meals are paid for by CI.

From the NYT. Nicholas Kristoff, whose wife is Chinese, and who has biracial kids, says do Spanish. With Mandarin, you’ll have very little to show for your effort. I agree.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2010/12/30/opinion/30kristof.html?referrer=&_r=0

We yanked S1 out of Mandarin in middle school and put him in Spanish. He maxed out the Spanish & segued to French.

My DD has been studying Mandarin in summer immersion programs for the past two years and did a local program here every week (2-3 hours). She will continue with her Mandarin, despite it being hard and taking a long time to master (her choice). However, she has been studying Spanish since 4th grade, in a very lackluster program. In order to beef it up, she will spend the whole summer at a Spanish immersion program overseas. Hopefully, this will get her to level 3 or so when she takes it up again as a 5th or 6th former.
An someone who has lived in several countries and worked internationally, Mandarin, Spanish, and Portuguese are where it is at for business, medicine, etc. If interested in politics or government work, Arabic, Mandarin, Farsi, Korean.

I love Latin. It’s a useful language, as it teaches grammar so well. It’s also the root language for all romance languages, so studying Latin would make studying Spanish, French, or Italian in the future easier.

I would think Latin would be useful for anyone who might follow a career in the sciences, or European history.

Actually, at least for business, English is the lingua franca.

But I agree with GMT, Spanish before Mandarin.

DD has studied French since middle school (and attended a French School for 2 years in Paris). She chose to continue that at BS, rather than start Spanish. I think that she wants the flexibility of completing her language graduation requirement early on, and was also interested in the advanced language classes (as opposed to going back to intro level). She will start Arabic this summer, and may continue with that outside of school. I wish that Latin was an option, to be taken concurrently with a “spoken” language.

Agreed, English is lingua franca. I was referring to OTHER languages. Spanish is easy to learn, but Mandarin takes a very long time to master or to even become proficient. But once proficient, opens a lot of doors.

When I worked in china, business was conducted in English.

Why do people still learn French?

Because it’s the most beautiful-sounding language?

And French people won’t answer questions in English even though they are fluent in English.

Not that taking French itself is bad, I’m just surprised how it’s a given at almost every school and how many people study it.

@catinthehat579 IDK.

@GMTplus7 Yes, we get that. I agree. We were talking about the study of foreign languages. English is the most important language in the world at THIS point, but who knows in 25 years?