How many Foreign Language classes did you take? How much do you remember? Me? Losing

[Beachguy]

How many foreign language classes did you take in school? Write your sequence.

This was mine and it was minimal in school

High School: Spanish 1

College: Spanish 1, Spanish 2

I also did a few years of self study to get me beyond Spanish 3.

Big problem? I'm losing it and won't really be in any situations to use it. I don't live where it is used at all.

So, how many classes did you take in Foreign Language and how much do you remember? Did you get stuck having to take up to class 4 in your sequence for college? I know that is kind of needed now for a lot of people.

[HyperRealist]

The only class I ever didn't pass in my life was Spanish in high school. I got kicked out with 2 weeks left. I don't remember any of it.

[Johnny Vinyl]

I was born in The Netherlands and starting in Grade 4 or 5 (it was almost 50 years ago, so I'm not entirely sure) we had to take 4 language courses.

Dutch (naturally)
English
German
French

Some years later we moved to Montreal, Quebec, Canada, so the few years of English and French helped a bit. Within 3 months I was fairly fluent in both.

The little German I took has all but been forgotten, although Dutch is part of the Germanic languages, so I can understand some of it.

[nefilim]

Originally Posted by Johnny Vinyl

I was born in The Netherlands and starting in Grade 4 or 5 (it was almost 50 years ago, so I'm not entirely sure) we had to take 4 language courses.

Dutch (naturally)
English
German
French

Some years later we moved to Montreal, Quebec, Canada, so the few years of English and French helped a bit. Within 3 months I was fairly fluent in both.

The little German I took has all but been forgotten, although Dutch is part of the Germanic languages, so I can understand some of it.

I am really surprised !

me :

English
Swedish
German
French

and Finnish as mother tongue !

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by nefilim

I am really surprised !

me :

English
Swedish
German
French

and Finnish as mother tongue !

Hmmm...I thought you knew! Oh well.....

So do you speak all of them fluently or conversationally?

[RandyK]

I took 4 years of Spanish in high school (the only language we had) and I forget some of it. I have to take three semesters of a language here in college and I'm more than likely going to take German.

[Sodslaw]

English
Greek
Mandarin (well I'm trying at least)
Did Latin for a few years at school

[fatediesel]

I took two years of Spanish in high school and one semester in college and remember virtually nothing.

[kpkelley]

3 Years of Spanish in High School. Enough to get by as a tourist, but not conversational.

"Yo soy Fiesta!"

[sk33tr]

i only speak 2 languages, english and bad english.

[Jasonic]

I took German for 4 years in High School, and I don't remember any of it. To be fair though, my teacher was horrible at teaching it. He was an awesome teacher, my favorite, but the learning in that class was minimal.

Classroom environment, but not school. I learned Portuguese for three months straight. That was the complete opposite, it was hardcore learning for like 8 hours a day. I still sucked at it though. Got pushed right into society of Brazil after two months. Had such a hard time that I eventually gave up. Nearly 4 years later, and once again don't remember any of it.

Learning a language is really difficult. If there isn't motivation for it, it's hard to get anywhere. Even still, I have lots of motivation to learn Korean right now, but I'm still too lazy to keep myself dedicated to learning. Maybe if my college offered a beginner course, but they don't, it's only advanced classes.

[ScarredLungs]

High School - 3 years Spanish and I remember very little.

[Random Collector]

I took four years of Spanish and barely remember any of it. I'd love to learn Japanese but I can barely get this whole English thing down.

[Astro Zombie]

Took 2 years of Spanish in high school, but I already knew Spanish so I passed easily

[Blu-Benny]

2 years of French in High School.....i can still ask to go to the bathroom and i can introduce myself to other people.

Esche chapu ale dans la toilet??

Je m'appelle Benny.

[jsteinhauer]

4 years of high school German. I recall a few random words and phrases. I can say "death to America" in Persian and Arabic. And I know "Eigo hanashimasuka?" which is more than my wife who lived in Japan for a year remembers.

[Moviefan2k4]

I took a week of French in junior high; it was part of a multi-subject social studies class. I don't remember much, sadly.

[Michael24]

In high school, we were required to take at least two years of a foreign language. I didn't really want to, so I put it off until my junior and senior years. When the time I came to choose between French, Spanish and German, I took German.

All my friends were taking either French or Spanish (which are probably the most popular language classes to take in high school) and thought I was crazy, but I found German to be very easy to learn. A lot of it is very similar to English, so while some of my friends were struggling with their French or Spanish, I was almost breezing through German. Haha!

Our teacher was great, too, a really wonderful little old lady who made the class a lot of fun and often told us many stories about growing up in Germany during WWII. I ended up wishing I had taken it all four years. I even still have my workbooks from both years.

Foreign language was never required when I went to college, so I didn't stay up on it, but I can still remember some of the basics. My brother took German from the same teacher as well when he got to high school, and so to this day we still often blurt out random German to each other from time to time.

[Moviefan2k4]

I never had much of a desire to learn another language, to be honest. I'm 34 years old now, and in that time, I've only left the state of Texas three times. I live in the northern half, which means I'm not close to the Tex-Mex border...so I never felt any necessity to learn Spanish. Call me what you will, but I was never very interested in other countries or cultures, probably because I'm still so unfamiliar with my own. I know about some of the landmarks like Liberty Island, Mount Rushmore, and the White House, but I haven't seen any of them in person yet. One of my dreams is to attend a fireworks show for July 4th in New York City; seeing all those colors outside a TV screen will be truly amazing.

[Donat96]

Technically, Spanish is my mother tongue. However, I was fluent in English by the time I began pre-K so it really doesn't matter. 95% of what I read/write/speak on the daily is English and I have a better handle on it than my native language.
I took two years of Spanish in high school for an easy A, and I've learned a bit of German and ASL on my own. I can't hold a conversation in either, though.