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Talking the Talk
By Jane Goodwin | February 22, 2007
It’s true that English is spoken in almost every country nowadays. It is also true that most Americans speak nothing BUT English.
Wherever we might travel, we can usually be accommodated, language-wise, by someone who speaks English.
But wouldn’t it be better if those of us who travel frequently, or live for a period of time in another country, learned enough of its language to hold a simple conversation or ask directions and understand them?
We will naturally ‘pick up’ the basics of a language simply by listening to people speak all around us; that’s how we learned to speak English, you know.
While we are waiting for a language to become familiar to us, we really should strive to actively learn at least a little of it.
Now, there are many very good programs that will teach us to speak, and if you just google French, or Spanish, or whatever, you’ll get some good suggestions.
The one I found tonight was this one, and I like it very much. You have to order the cd’s to get the whole thing, but the sample taught me an amazing lot about Spanish.
The United States is the only large nation that doesn’t require its schoolchildren to learn several languages in the lower elementary grades. This is a shame, because young children learn languages easily, without a trace of an accent, whereas once a person is over 12 or so, there will be an accent.
Let’s get busy and learn at least a few basic phrases.
Sphere It