I first lived in China between 1994 and 1995, 700 miles north of Beijing, closer to the North Korean border than any other Chinese city. Most of the population would have left school without learning a foreign language; the more educated minority had learnt Russian. Foreigners were very much a novelty; pre-internet, any contact with the outside world was a rarity.
I had no choice but to learn Chinese. No-one but my students was going to talk to me in English, and there was nothing written in English to suggest what the mysterious characters on menus and signs may mean. Over the course of that year, I learnt more Chinese than I had learnt French after six years at school. I learnt it despite being ‘bad’ at languages. I learnt it because it was the only way I could connect with the society I was living in.
In UK schools, foreign languages are viewed as a challenging subject; in some, less academic students are not expected to study them at all, but to devote themselves to more attainable pursuits. But there are places - small countries especially - where bilingualism is the norm across the full ability range. Thinking mathematically has to be formally taught, but the tools to communicate with the people around us is intrinsic to being human.
English speakers can feel the world doesn’t require any more of them than their native language, and perhaps, now, google translate on their phones. But learning another language is, as Charlemagne said, ‘to grow another soul.’ It goes beyond transposing one set of sounds for another; it requires you to experience a whole new framing of the world.
At ISA, we want students to learn languages deeply, not just to brush up against a few phrases useful for the airport or the hotel when your phone battery is running low. We want them to become independent users, to know enough to experience another culture from the inside. Part of this is to create meaningful contexts. So next week our Grade 5s are going to a French or Spanish restaurant to interact in the language they are learning. It is one of many experiences that ISA creates to make language learning authentic.
Cafe Andulez earlier this year when Grade 10s visited
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