Anonymous wrote:I am white American, but I spent some early years of my life in Latin America. Moved back to the U.S. When I was 5ish. I had Spanish au pairs and when I got to high school, I took IB French, got a 5 on the exam, minored in French in college and studied abroad. I became completely fluent and most French speakers have no idea that I am not French. I managed to retain my excellent Spanish accent that I got when I was 4 and in a "total immersion setting". Just saying, it can definitely be done. If you learn Spanish and have a truely bilingual education and then learn another language later- you can definitely become trilingual like me. I don't think it's very hard. If you're rich enough to support the language (au pairs, foreign summer camps, vacations, tutors if necessary), you can have a Trilingual kid for sure.

Side note- not sure why people keep posting about wis. I was strongly considering it for my kids but declined to even apply for many reasons. No point in discussing them here because it's the PUBLIC schools forum, but it's a ton of money and it has its issues. Before everyone here automatically thinks WIS is the be all end all, do some research on the private school section.

Anonymous wrote:It's a private school rather than a charter school, but Washington International School (WIS) has multiple language tracks.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am white American, but I spent some early years of my life in Latin America. Moved back to the U.S. When I was 5ish. I had Spanish au pairs and when I got to high school, I took IB French, got a 5 on the exam, minored in French in college and studied abroad. I became completely fluent and most French speakers have no idea that I am not French. I managed to retain my excellent Spanish accent that I got when I was 4 and in a "total immersion setting". Just saying, it can definitely be done. If you learn Spanish and have a truely bilingual education and then learn another language later- you can definitely become trilingual like me. I don't think it's very hard. If you're rich enough to support the language (au pairs, foreign summer camps, vacations, tutors if necessary), you can have a Trilingual kid for sure.

Side note- not sure why people keep posting about wis. I was strongly considering it for my kids but declined to even apply for many reasons. No point in discussing them here because it's the PUBLIC schools forum, but it's a ton of money and it has its issues. Before everyone here automatically thinks WIS is the be all end all, do some research on the private school section.

PS. A 5 on IB French as you indicated is basically a B-. IB exams are on a scale from 1-7.

Anonymous wrote:I am white American, but I spent some early years of my life in Latin America. Moved back to the U.S. When I was 5ish. I had Spanish au pairs and when I got to high school, I took IB French, got a 5 on the exam, minored in French in college and studied abroad. I became completely fluent and most French speakers have no idea that I am not French. I managed to retain my excellent Spanish accent that I got when I was 4 and in a "total immersion setting". Just saying, it can definitely be done. If you learn Spanish and have a truely bilingual education and then learn another language later- you can definitely become trilingual like me. I don't think it's very hard. If you're rich enough to support the language (au pairs, foreign summer camps, vacations, tutors if necessary), you can have a Trilingual kid for sure.

Side note- not sure why people keep posting about wis. I was strongly considering it for my kids but declined to even apply for many reasons. No point in discussing them here because it's the PUBLIC schools forum, but it's a ton of money and it has its issues. Before everyone here automatically thinks WIS is the be all end all, do some research on the private school section.

Anonymous wrote:My kid is trilingual. Spanish nanny since birth then HRCS immersion. At three French tutoring and at four French immersion nanny. Monolingual English parents. All summer camps are immersion. It can be done, but isn't cheap and my kid doesn't like it. He'll thank me later, I hope.

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Anonymous wrote:If you do the whole Mundo Verde, Stokes, YY, LAMB, DCB track you will end with three languages. Or you could do what we do and put them in one of these feeder schools and go to our heritage language school on the weekend.

No, if your child goes from a feeder to DCI, they will get two languages (English plus the target language, and *maybe* exposure to a third language). DCI expects students to continue studying the target language that they started in the feeder. If your child is doing well in that language, they can start taking a class in another (beginner) language beginning in 6th grade.

Let's do some math.

One language at your elementary school (spanish, French, or chinese) plus one additional language at DCI, plus the English language equals... Three languages.

Yes, I know. It's immerion in two languages, plus exposure (maybe) to a third. Not all DCI students will take a third language at all.

Umm not true. You have your target language from the feeder, then the English language, and then a second foreign language. Trilingual.

At best, bilingual. Taking a class in a third language, starting in middle school, does NOT make one trilingual.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you do the whole Mundo Verde, Stokes, YY, LAMB, DCB track you will end with three languages. Or you could do what we do and put them in one of these feeder schools and go to our heritage language school on the weekend.

No, if your child goes from a feeder to DCI, they will get two languages (English plus the target language, and *maybe* exposure to a third language). DCI expects students to continue studying the target language that they started in the feeder. If your child is doing well in that language, they can start taking a class in another (beginner) language beginning in 6th grade.

Let's do some math.

One language at your elementary school (spanish, French, or chinese) plus one additional language at DCI, plus the English language equals... Three languages.

Yes, I know. It's immerion in two languages, plus exposure (maybe) to a third. Not all DCI students will take a third language at all.

Umm not true. You have your target language from the feeder, then the English language, and then a second foreign language. Trilingual.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you do the whole Mundo Verde, Stokes, YY, LAMB, DCB track you will end with three languages. Or you could do what we do and put them in one of these feeder schools and go to our heritage language school on the weekend.

No, if your child goes from a feeder to DCI, they will get two languages (English plus the target language, and *maybe* exposure to a third language). DCI expects students to continue studying the target language that they started in the feeder. If your child is doing well in that language, they can start taking a class in another (beginner) language beginning in 6th grade.

Let's do some math.

One language at your elementary school (spanish, French, or chinese) plus one additional language at DCI, plus the English language equals... Three languages.

Yes, I know. It's immerion in two languages, plus exposure (maybe) to a third. Not all DCI students will take a third language at all.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a private school rather than a charter school, but Washington International School (WIS) has multiple language tracks.

Do your research- this is not quite accurate.

WIS has French or Spanish in elementary and you pick one or the other, not both, and stay on that track through high school. Additional weekly afterschool classes are offered in Spanish, French, Chinese and Arabic in elementary school, but that's only 1 hour per week. Starting in middle school, you can take Chinese as an elective.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you do the whole Mundo Verde, Stokes, YY, LAMB, DCB track you will end with three languages. Or you could do what we do and put them in one of these feeder schools and go to our heritage language school on the weekend.

No, if your child goes from a feeder to DCI, they will get two languages (English plus the target language, and *maybe* exposure to a third language). DCI expects students to continue studying the target language that they started in the feeder. If your child is doing well in that language, they can start taking a class in another (beginner) language beginning in 6th grade.

Let's do some math.

One language at your elementary school (spanish, French, or chinese) plus one additional language at DCI, plus the English language equals... Three languages.