What does 4 years of a language mean?

mathmom
Mon, 13 Oct 2014 14:15:18 +0000

Harvard allows it, but they also believe in achieving fluency in a language. (And I can tell you as an architect who works a lot with Spanish immigrants I wish it were Spanish I could speak well instead of French and German.) Here’s the language which used to be on the Harvard website, I think it’s good advice, not for getting into Harvard in particular, but for how to think about why we learn foreign languages at all (I’m surprised they got rid of it.):



Foreign Language
You should leave secondary school knowing at least one foreign language well enough to read it easily and pronounce it acceptably. Knowing a foreign language enables you to enter another culture and to understand its ideas and its values. A fundamental aspect of language-learning must be a grasp of vocabulary and syntax that allows you to read novels, plays, poems, and magazines, with as much of a native speaker’s comprehension as possible. We have found that students who have mastered a foreign language before they come to Harvard take more language courses here than those who have not. Indeed, these students often embark on the study of languages not commonly taught in American secondary schools.

Many secondary school students take a smattering of several languages – for example, Latin for two years, French for a year, and Spanish for a year. When it is too late, they realize that they cannot read or speak any of these languages well. We urge you to try to study at least one foreign language and its literature for four years. Continuity of study is important, too, because a “year off” from a language can be a real setback. Once you are comfortably fluent, you will possess that language – and better appreciate the culture it has shaped – for the rest of your life.



I found this at Foreign Language Requirements? - #4 by gibby - Harvard University - College Confidential Forums; and is exactly the language I remembered from the site last year.

Now they just say four years. If you took a course labeled “Spanish 4” you can consider yourself to have taken 4 years. I’d still recommend taking the AP, but if your school is stretching it out over two years, I understand your reluctance, is there any way you could take a community college course so that you don’t forget what you’ve learned?