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Adventures in Foreign Languages It could reasonably be argued that, for those of us who live in the USA and speak English as our native tongue, there is very little motivation to learn a foreign language. We can travel for thousands of miles and still be surrounded by native English speakers. We can easily spend our entire lives without having any real need to speak another language. It is even possible to comfortably visit many tourist destinations around the globe, speaking only English. Clearly, learning a foreign language is a non-essential skill in our society. Benefits in learning a foreign language Nevertheless, learning a foreign language offers several possible benefits. Some of the commonly stated benefits are: ●Fosters a feeling of international community, by promoting an awareness of other cultures and countries. ●Enriches our understanding of our own language, by bringing grammatical structures and word roots into sharper focus. This may be especially true when studying languages that share linguistic elements with English. ●The study of linguistics, and learning to think and speak in another language, offers its own intrinsic pleasures and rewards. Language can be fun. ●Opens up the possibilities of reading non-English literature. ●Expands global travel opportunities. Linguistic adventure I think these are good reasons, so I wanted to provide my children with some exposure to foreign languages. But what language should I teach What language am I qualified to teach I took four years of French in high school (and got straight A’’s), but I never reached any real level of fluency, and I have retained very little of the small amount of French I once knew. Is there any language that I could realistically learn/teach alongside my children I’’d like to tell you about our linguistic adventures, and where we ended up. After a bit of research, I settled on Spanish for our first foray into foreign languages. But how should I teach it, given that I don’’t know Spanish myself I know of one family who hired a full-time Spanish nanny to communicate to the children only in Spanish. It worked very effectively for them, but this was not an option for my family. Another option would be to take my children once a week to a private instructor. Many families find this to be the most practical way to learn a foreign language. Yet I have also heard many families complain that their children have learned surprisingly little from such classes. Perhaps they have learned a bit of vocabulary (colors, parts of the body, numbers, etc.), but they are still unable to express themselves in the second language, or construct any sentences beyond a few drilled-in, rehearsed phrases. Deciding on Esperanto So I went back to the drawing board and did some more web research, looking for a language or method that would allow us to discover some of the joy that can come from learning a foreign language. By sheer luck, I stumbled across a little-known language, and within just a few hours of reading about it, I knew it was exactly what I was looking for! The language was Esperanto. When I tell people that we’’re learning Esperanto, I usually get some strange looks. But that’’s okay. When I tell people we home school, I often get strange looks as well; I’’m used to doing things that are outside of the mainstream. And as with home schooling, it can be very difficult to sum up in a couple of sentences all the reasons why it’’s so worth while, particularly to someone who may already have preconceptions to the contrary. Why is Esperanto unique So for those of you who know very little about Esperanto, I hope you’’ll indulge me for a moment. I would like to explain some of the features that make it such a unique language, and elaborate on why I think it is such a wonderful pedagogical tool for exploring foreign languages. Esperanto was invented in 1887 by L. L. Zamenhof, a Polish physician. Invented Yes, that’’s right, Esperanto was invented. Zamenhof’’s vision was that Esperanto would become the world’’s second tongue, breaking down language barriers in Europe and throughout the world. Obviously, Esperanto has not (yet) become the world’’s common language, so in this respect, Esperanto did not live up to the dream of its creator. Because of this, many people, if they have even heard of Esperanto at all, are only vaguely aware of it as some sort of "failed" experiment in creating a common language. Nevertheless, the reality is that Esperanto has flourished, and only 120 years after it’’s conception, is now studied and spoken by people all over the globe. It lives and evolves just like other languages, and it can be used to express all facets of human thought and emotion. Yet a majority of these Esperanto speakers learned the language through self-directed study or correspondence courses! Although all languages require effort to learn, Esperanto is astonishingly simple when compared to a native language. The key to its simplicity is its consistency and regularity. For example, each letter has exactly one phonetic sound, no exceptions. Each word has the accent on the second-to-last syllable, no exceptions. All words ending in "o" are nouns. All words ending in "a" are adjectives. All words ending in "e" are adverbs. Unlike many foreign languages, inanimate nouns are not categorized as "masculine" or "feminine". Verb conjugation is very straightforward, and there are no irregular verbs. Another key facet of Esperanto is that it has a powerful system of word building, making it easy to form new words out of roots and affixes you already know. Since a large part of learning a language involves accumulating vocabulary, this word-building system means that in Esperanto you need to learn only, say, a tenth as many word roots to ex press the same number of concepts as you would in another language. But simplicity is not reason enough to learn a language. So let’’s take a look at how Esperanto measures up in achieving the benefits of a foreign language program. Looking back at the list from the beginning of the article, let’’s consider those issues point by point. Esperanto is an international language Belonging to no particular country, Esperanto is truly an international language. Within two months of beginning Esperanto, my kids were exchanging postcards in Esperanto with children from Russia, France, Sweden, Poland, and Uzbekistan. I am delighted that they have had this opportunity to feel connected to people from all over the globe. My children don’’t expect everyone to learn English; nor do they expect to learn every other language. But they are eager to communicate with anyone willing to meet them halfway. Most of the Esperanto word roots are derived from Latin. This means that you can en joy very similar English vocabulary-building benefits by learning Esperanto, with a small fraction of the effort. Furthermore, Esperanto uses grammar-coded word endings to make the parts of speech and grammatical structure of each sentence exceptionally clear. Since Esperanto is only a century old, there is not a huge body of Esperanto-only literature. Nevertheless, there are over a hundred original Esperanto novels and collections of poetry, as well as many outstanding translations of works from other countries. Esperanto magazines report current events from the perspectives of people all over the world. By learning Esperanto, you become part of an international "club" of people genuinely interested in meeting and communicating with people from other lands. There are lists you can obtain of Esperantists from countries around the world, eager to host visitors, and give them an insider’’s look at their culture and community. I know several Esperantists who have used these lists to travel the world inexpensively, making new friends, and seeing the world in a decidedly non-touristy way. I can hear some of you thinking, "It sounds interesting, but 1 really, really want my kids to learn Spanish (or French, or Japanese, or whatever). We don’’t have time to spend on Esperanto." Amazingly, study after study has shown that learning Esperanto has no cost! For example, in one study, a control group of high school students took four years of French, while the experimental group took one year of Esperanto followed by three years of French. At the end of high school, the experimental group had greater fluency in French! In other words, the benefits they gained from studying Esperanto more than offset the time lost from studying another language. Most Americans, like the writer, learn French at high school.