WOODBURY — Looking back on past years, high school students reflect on their foreign language skills, wishing they were doing more than greetings and weather in their high school courses when they easily could have done it in elementary school.
Region 14 took a step in the right direction by giving fifth-grade and middle-school students the opportunity to embrace foreign cultures.
Many students at Nonnewaug currently did not have this opportunity, however this will benefit the future of the world languages department.
Language is a vast piece of culture around the world, which makes it an asset for growing learners. Along with this, beginning at a young age will help students become more proficient in a language while their brain is still developing. If students are introduced to world language when they are still young, it can have cognitive benefits.
“Young learners have more receptive brains,” says Dawn Manogue, a world language teacher at Woodbury Middle School, “making it easier for them to acquire pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar naturally.”
Tania Fernandez, who is the sixth- and seventh-grade world language teacher at WMS, sees those same benefits vs. people who start to learn languages later.
“As a former elementary school teacher, I have witnessed firsthand that children absorb languages more naturally through immersion and repetition, whereas adults tend to rely more on memorization,” Fernandez said.
Not only does learning a world language have cognitive benefits, but this new addition will help students further understand cultures from other countries. Region 14 students not only learn more about foreign culture, but they will be better suited for harder classes when they go to high school.
Due to the fact that many students come to Nonnewaug from out of district, some are more advanced than others. Allowing Region 14 students to have a better understanding of a language prior to high school will “help to level the playing field,” says Fernandez.
I began learning a new language in eighth grade. Coming into Nonnewaug, a lot of the students that I was in a class with were a lot more proficient than I was because they began learning back in elementary school. If my peers and I were more comfortable with the subject, we would be more successful in the class.
I have found that many teachers and students share my thought and believe that Region 14 is moving a step in the right direction both in terms of offering the language earlier and in emphasizing bilingualism’s importance.
“Learning a second (or third or fourth) language, fosters cultural awareness and global-mindedness, preparing students for future educational and career opportunities,” Manogue said.
This is the opinion of Anna Walkup, a freshman reporter for the Chief Advocate.
