1sexsmith

This was in Torrevieja. My son did it in Primary but dropped it in secondary - you can do this but many carry on as it gives extra points.

snikpoh

I think that may be true in Alicante province but certainly not around here (Valencia province)

DLC

None of the regional languages in Spain are dialects, they're not close enough to Spanish.

Check this list of languages ordered by speakers, would this mean, say, nobody should think about going to live in a Nordic country except Sweden because their language isn't international enough as it has fewer speakers than Catalan?

astera

Even worse then... and even less useful. More reason to choose the right school (and right place to live in Spain) for your child's education, where subjects are taught in SPANISH.

If you go to Sweden, you'll learn Swedish and it can be used across the entire country. If you go to Norway, learn Norwegian and you'll be able to use it across all of Norway. In fact the languages are quite similar so learning one makes it easier to function in a neighbouring country.

Learn Catalan... oh my... and it's only use in the world... is not even in all of Spain... but only in the region of Catalonia.

What. A. Waste. Of. Time. And. Effort.

1sexsmith

The only issue with local languages is that if you you and your family intend to live in a Communidad where these languages operate you nearly always need them for public sector work. All funcionarios in Valencia need Valenciano even if they will seldom use( although sometimes they will- in Santa Pola near Alicante the guardia actually use Valenciano amongst themselves). Also universities in Catalonia require Catalan at basic level as entry requirements. So regional languages are important if you are young and wish to work in public sector jobs.

Pollyana

Visiting my friend in Galicia a lot, I've found that all his friends switch often between Galician/Galego and Spanish. When out in the evenings its quite often only Galego thats spoken - to his annoyance, as he is trying to master Spanish! He's sent me a lot of official documents to keep for him, and almost all are in Galego. That and Spanish are both official languages there, and its certainly not a dialect, at times its a very different language.

DLC

Firstly Catalan is also useful in Valencia and the Balearic islands (and vice-versa) and secondly it's not as if children aren't taught Spanish at school or don't speak to each other in Spanish at school. They'll end up speaking both languages.

You seem to think Catalonia is a Spanish-free zone but there's too much Spanish media available so it couldn't be. It's bilingual unless you really go out into the sticks.

In our house we speak Spanish, English, and Catalan and to be honest it's difficult to imagine otherwise now.

astera

It all sounds similar to the whole promoting Welsh as the main language in schools in Wales (instead of English) which they are trying to increase nowadays.

Fair enough for those who cherish their local dialects or languages, but at the end of the day your education should be in English in the UK and Spanish in Spain. Everything else just seems like a wonderful waste of time... and I would NEVER put my kids in a local school in Spain where Spanish was not the main language.

Just like I cannot imagine a family from abroad moving to the UK, ending up in Wales (Cardiff is a great city!), but putting their kids into a school taught in Welsh instead of English.

Anyway, I'm in the Canary Islands so NONE of that bs affects me whatsoever. Feel sorry for those that it does though, especially if they have kids who they want to send to a local school and think that moving to Barcelona is a good idea. OUCH.

Hodeja

Thank you for your input everyone and all very thought provoking. For me, the benefit of a second or third language is the way it changes a child's brain to be more open minded and able to problem solve from different angles... it's not so much about the actual language learnt. It might be considered naive by some, but to me Catalan seems useful in being both similar to Spanish and french. Maybe in the future Catalan exposure would help the children pick up either language in detail much more quickly. It seems much less useless than, for instance, tribal languages of Africa that have very little relation to widely spoken languages. Anything based on Latin I feel would be useful for picking up other of the Latin languages.
Maybe again I am naive because I grew up in a monolingual country, but I've read that children are incredibly adaptable and resilient at a young age and three or five languages in their surrounds makes little different, so long as they have regular exposure to native speakers if them. The schooling is an issue if the teacher mistakes lack of aptitude in the language for laziness and punishes them for it... this is my only fear. I'm hearing teachers in Portugal can be quite strict and unreasonable in this way. Could the same be expected in northern Spain? Is the teaching considered more traditional (perhaps even backwards) or more progressive in their acceptance of different children's requirements in diversity of learning? Not sure I'll be able to have this answered here, but can't harm asking the question.
Thanks again to all for your input 🙏
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1sexsmith

I would take the idea of children learning multiple languages as modifying or enhancing cognitive abilities with a pinch of salt- there is nothing definitive to suggest this is the case. As a teacher the only thing I can say is that some children are more academically suited than others and no amount of teaching really changes that. It is really more about personality and you can't really create that. As far as education goes in Spain it really is not at all progressive in the way it is in Scandavian. It is very traditional. Basically it is all about memorization and short regular testing then a averaging results for final marks. If you want something different you will need to probably find a private institution. Also as a parent you have very limited access to your child's teacher. They basically keep parents at a good arms length.

Pollyana

Have you spent much time in Wales lately? Since returning to the UK I'm up in mid-Wales for at least a wee every couple of months I was really surprised how much the language is used these days. When we used to visit as kids it was hardly noticeable unless your relatives spoke it. But now its quite common to go into a pub or a shop and hear people switching between English and Welsh depending on who they are speaking to. Its not just a langage taught in schools, its active and alive. I really wish I'd bothered to learn it when I thought about it years ago

growinspain

How many people live in Wales? Insignificant compared to the rest of the world... It probably the same as speaking Navajo or Valenciano....
It is nice that it is being kept alive but worthless for a kid who will move away when they are 18.

astera

I think you need to think of your childrens' education not only in the younger years but also as they progress into adulthood.

If Catalan is the MAIN language they're taught in (+reading/writing/taking exams/delivering essays/etc.) then that only means one thing: their SPANISH won't be nearly as good as a result of that.

My advice would be to forget about Catalonia and find a place where you can provide an education for your kids in Spanish or another language (English-speaking schools, perhaps a French school?).

At a young age kids soak up language learning as a sponge, but as you mentioned that doesn't necessarily roll over in terms of cognitive abilities in the future.

This is good to hear as a large part of me says that every language should be preserved and maintained for future generations.

The question at hand though is what to do as an expat that doesn't want to be caught in the regional-language trap in terms of their kids' education...

That's exactly the issue at hand. As expats we tend to move around and would prefer that our kids learn a language that is most beneficial to them and used globally. It's their future after all...

brits1

Hi, I think it all depends on which part of wales you visit, North and Mid Wales mainly speak Welsh but the more south you go Welsh is spoken less as a first language. I have Welsh family and nowadays they would like to not have “Welshness” pushed on them it should be a choice and the money used for everything involved with “Welsh” should be spent in more more urgent matters, as my Grandad use to say “I know I am Welsh” I do not need to be told I am” and a lot more lol

1sexsmith

Not against you... but I wish people would stop saying children suck up languages like sponges. It is very misleading As a language teacher 25 years of teaching- a family of multiple language speakers plus a reader of lots of stuff on second language learning- I can assure you kids no more suck up languages than adults. It's just adults make a demarcation between active study and other activities. A child learns a language quite slowly in fact. But what they do is a lot of interaction - hours and hours of it. Language acquisition is proportional to input and output. My son came to Spain at 10 with no Spanish. It took at least 3 years before he could participate in any meaningful way in school and even then it was limited. By 16 he was able to do well in class but only by coming home and covering stuff done in class by using YouTube tutorials in English. This year he has done an A level in Spanish where he should get an A grade but not the higher* which native speakers would get. He can of course speak Spanish very well but will still make mistakes and will struggle with more specific colloquial stuff. But the point is he had to learn all this. It was all active not passive which the sponge metaphor suggests. If you add up the number of hours at school over 8 years it is thousands of hours where the brain receives the language input- and that only works if the child is acting on the input. Many simply switch off. Many British kids born in Spain who attend Spanish schools have very poor Spanish by leaving age.