d.tech Language Education: Helpful or Hinderance?

Here at d.tech, language education is a vital part of our schedules. Students either take Spanish with Joe Schneider and Mariela Gonzales-Orta or choose to spend time on a different language outside of school. But around the halls, many people are well-versed at a wide variety of languages from across the world – from Cantonese to Hebrew, Hindi, and many more.

Art by Mackenzie Chan

“All of my relatives and a lot of my friends speak [Chinese]. Speaking Chinese forms a bond with them,” Sophomore Cal Chang says. They speak both English and Chinese and believe that speaking multiple languages can benefit both oneself and one’s experiences in life. Along with them, Junior Kaelan Yim speaks Cantonese and English and he explains his enjoyment of Etymology, the study of deconstructing words to find its roots, and how speaking more than one language helps in the understanding of how words and phrases work together in different languages. 

“Especially with Spanish and English… there are some words that we learned last cycle, like ‘amistad,’ which means friendship. It doesn’t directly correlate to friendship, though… but what ‘amistad’ is is the Spanish translation of the word ‘ami’, which means ‘to be friends with.’” Yim says that Etymology should be something the language courses should focus on teaching more instead of just memorizing words from Spanish to English and vice versa.

Not everybody in the school speaks a different language, though, and despite believing that language education can connect others and be beneficial to learners, Freshmen Alisha Eldershaw and Skye Leinbach say there is still room for improvement around d.tech and the Bay Area.

“Here at d.tech, I think that… it’s kind of lacking,” Leinbach states. “It, of course, is going over common verbs and all that, but at my old school, I already learned that.” She questions the levels in which Spanish language education at d.tech is distanced. Leinbach says if she were to move up further, she feels she would fall behind, but knows too much in her current level. “Maybe if they had a Spanish 1.5!” she jokes.

Eldershaw has a few ideas of how the language education could improve as well and mentions “including some ideas from [language apps] into their instruction,” mainly featuring an addition of the popular language learning apps such as Duolingo, Rosetta Stone, Babbel, and more into curriculum to give a bit more diversity in how students learn languages. She also spoke about starting early, as in elementary school, and immersing children in language learning from a young age. “It would be awesome if we had language classes in elementary school, since they pick up languages faster and this would give students free time to choose classes in high school.”