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I'm not sure about immersion or mandatory... but a quality education in a second language should be offered- and at an earlier age, at least for the United States. Most students start learning a new language in high school- when it's generally hard than if one was in elementary school (my school offered a semester of spanish when I was 12 in 7th grade and spanish 1 for high school credit when I was in 8th grade or 13-14).

I can have basic conversations in spanish with a few other people at my level- but honestly, not that many others can after taking 3 years of a language in the American Education system. However, I have friends in other countries where english is not their first language and they are fluent- or almost so. I noticed that in many other countries, students also study more than just 1 foreign language for a period of time. In order to do that here, most of the time the 2 languages will have to be your only 'electives' (will be for me next year...).

The fact that in the United States few people learn to be bilingual (or almost) saddens me. This is actually one reason why I would consider moving to another country- for a better opportunity for any future kids to learn other languages. However, the spanish speaking population is growing in the US so hopefully Spanish would be taught at a younger age and more thoroughly AND at younger ages- that would be pretty awesome.

Language immersion definitely needs to play a bigger part in schools. There's a terrifying lack of it in American schools, as far as I've seen. The best time to learn is when you're young- it gets much more difficult later on. Many countries, such as Germany and Japan, have mandatory foreign language learning... And in most cases, they aren't just bi-lingual, but multi-lingual. I forgot how the system worked, but I'm pretty sure that German schools have their students learn atleast 2 other foreign languages.

I think it would be great! I would have loved to learn another language from the very start....much easier than doing it now...

It's an excellent idea to have immersion schools, but I think they should be optional. I also think that you should be able to learn a second language starting as soon a 1st grade though. With the way the human mind works, it seems that the older you are, the harder it is to learn new things, and language seems to be one of those. If we had the option of learning earlier, then people would be fluent more quickly and easily. 3nodding

You'd have to find people qualified to teach, first. I was in core French from grade 4 until graduation, and all but one of my teachers could barely speak any French at all.

Canada has two official languages, but only one province that's officially bilingual in French and English, and something like 80% of the country's population is unilingual. In larger centres, there are several options available when it comes to learning French; immersion programs, extended programs, and core programs. Extended is less in depth than immersion, but much more involved than core.

The problem is that even in these better programs, the teachers (and curiculuum) aren't always very good. I have friends who were in immersion for years but came out of school and were still only at a beginner level in the language. confused

My boyfriend is qualified to teach in French, and he can pretty much teach wherever he wants; that's how desperately these teachers are needed. Unfortunately, even in some Acadian regions where French is spoken fluently, the students often have little or no idea how to read and write in French. gonk

Others have argued that some people just aren't good at languages, and shouldn't be forced into language courses. Well, I've always struggled at math, but it was still mandatory for me, so I'm not sympathetic to that argument.

Even though it's really not even possible to require immersion in all schools at this point since there just aren't enough teachers, I would love to see something be done to ensure that the language education in schools is drastically improved. French is already mandatory here from grades 4 to 9; we might as well make sure they actually LEARN something during that time!

that is SO the best way to learn a language. I was in a spanish immersion school, and lemme tell ya, if you are dumped into a shark tank where the sharks speak only spnidsh, you pick it up really quick.