I live in a fairly small community about 30 miles north of SLC (olympic resorts are 20 minutes away on the other hand :-), ethnic diversity is non existent here, apart for the Spanish community. My kids already have Spanish lessons every day of the week at school - school has a lot of native speakers and sometimes other instructions, like science for example, are given in Spanish. My kids are already fluent in another foreign language so learning Spanish came easily (don't they say that first foreign language is the most difficult to learn?)I have been supplementing with some conversational classes with a local high school student last year but not recently. Will have to look back into it. I do not speak Spanish so I can't easily check their progress or make them become more vocal. What online lessons are you talking about Cym? I will have to check out Interlocken, as suggested by Trinity.
This week my two kids and I are starting a Chinese-Mandarin class. It took quite a while for this to become a reality so I am extremely excited about it. The teacher is a native speaker but at the same time certified high school teacher in the USA. Will let you know how it is going after a few weeks. Anyone out there learning Mandarin. Can you suggest any resources? Any books that would introduce my kids to the culture?
Learning languages is so important. I have a friend who lived with her parents in Austria for a few years (learned German), moved to Australia (English) and studied Spanish and French for her B.A. and Masters. She knows five languages and makes a wonderful career out of it, travelling all around the globe.
Ania
