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 J Reprinted from the Modern Language Journal, Vol. IV, Xo. i, 
 /O October, 1919 
 
 
 r 
 
 5:5 
 
 HAS THE WAR PROVED THAT OUR METHODS OF 
 TEACHING MODERN LANGUAGES IN • 
 THE COLLEGES ARE WRONG? 
 A SYMPOSIUM* 
 
 By E. C. Hills 
 
 IN the Educational Review of January, 1919, President Nicholas 
 Murray Butler of Columbia University made the following 
 statement: 
 
 "Intelligent youths who have spent three, four and five years 
 on the study of one or both of these languages, can neither speak 
 them easily nor understand them readily nor write them cor- 
 rectly. Here, too, as in the case of the natural sciences, the 
 reason is to be found in wrong methods of teaching. It is a sorry 
 commentary as to what is going on in our secondary schools and 
 colleges in this respect to learn on the best authority that there 
 are now in France at least 200,000 American young men, who, 
 after six months of military activity in France and three or four 
 hours of instruction a week in the French language, can carry on a 
 comfortable conversation under ordinary conditions and circum- 
 stances with the mastery of a vocabulary of at least a thousand 
 words. On the other hand, many an American college graduate 
 who has studied French for years is as awkward and as nonplussed 
 in a Paris drawing room as he would be in the driver's seat of an 
 airplane." 
 
 In a letter (May 2d, 1919) Dr. Butler added: 
 
 "What I want modern language teachers to do is to teach 
 American boys and giils how to read, write, speak and understand 
 the particular foreign language in which they are giving instruc- 
 tion, and through that attainment to have some comprehension of 
 the people :. ad the civilization which the foreign language reflects, 
 
 *A paper read at the General Session of the Association of Modern Language 
 Teachers of the Central West and South, at Chicago, May 10th, 1919. 
 
 SOUTHERN BRANCH, 
 
 iiNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, 
 
 ULBr?ARy, 
 
 L.OS ANGELtS. CALIr.
 
 2 MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL 
 
 and to leave off trying to make specialists or linguistic experts 
 out of the great body of school and college students who would like 
 to learn one or more of the modern European languages." 
 
 Copies of the statement made by President Butler in the Educa- 
 tional Review, together with the following hypothetical statement 
 which was prepared by the writer of this article, were sent to a 
 number of prominent professors of Romance Languages: 
 
 "It has occurred to me that it might be well to submit the 
 causes that most college teachers of modern languages give for not 
 succeeding in teaching their students to speak the language better 
 than they do. In most colleges and universities, first and second 
 year French are given in classes that meet only three times a 
 week. In elementary work the teacher can scarcely avoid speaking 
 to the class at least one-half of the time. So far as I am able to 
 ascertain the average college class throughout the country has 
 about twenty-five students and the average time given to a lesson 
 is fifty minutes. 
 
 "When classes meet three times a week, if the teacher speaks 
 one-half of the time and the students speak during the other half, 
 each student has one minute each day or three minutes a week, 
 which would amount to a total of about two hours' practice in 
 speaking French during the year. . . 
 
 "The other handicap to which reference is commonly made is 
 that most college students never expect to visit any place where the 
 foreign language is spoken. Consequently, they are primarily 
 interested in learning to read the language. Here it is again the 
 environment against which the teacher struggles. 
 
 "Some of us believe that the reform in teaching modern 
 languages must first be made in the secondary schools. . . There 
 are, however, in practically every college and university a chosen 
 few that would be willing to work hard enough to learn to speak the 
 language well if they had the opportunity to do so." 
 
 The letters that were received in reply are of great interest and 
 offer many constructive suggestions. Unfortunately only the 
 following extracts can be given: 
 
 "We are at one in the view that the teaching of modern lang- 
 uages should be better and more effective than it now is, and must 
 be made so. The first and most pressing measure to this end is to 
 establish a scale of salaries which will attract capable men and 
 women to enter the field. . . . 
 
 "My own observation since coming to France is far from 
 bearing out the statement I am told that President Butler made 
 that 200,000 American young men, after six months of military 
 activity in France and three or four hours of instruction a week in 
 the French language, can carry on a comfortable conversation 

 
 ARE MODERN LA NGUA GE TEA CUING METHODS WRONG 3 
 
 under ordinary conditions and circumstances with the mastery of a 
 vocabulary of at least a thousand words. If this is the case 
 such men should assuredly have had the preference in assignments 
 for study in the French Universities, and not a single case of the 
 sort exists among the 300 members of the School Detachment of 
 the University of Bordeaux. The only men of such facility as that 
 above mentioned fall into one of two classes: (1) Men who have 
 already had college courses in French in the States — this is by far 
 the larger class of the two; and (2) a very few scattered individuals 
 who have been billeted in French families and have passed sub- 
 stantially every moment of the time that was free from military 
 duties in the study and practice of French, and in no one of these 
 cases was the sojourn by any means so short as six months." 
 
 Edward C. Armstrong, Princeton University. 
 
 "... I long since decided that the only way in which we could 
 succeed in getting some students to learn to speak French accepta- 
 bly, was to pick out those who showed special fitness, and to give 
 them intensive training. With this object in view, I kept careful 
 watch on the first year classes, and the second year I made up a 
 class with those students who had shown that they could acquire 
 a good pronunciation and were eager to become proficient in 
 speaking the language. This second year class we call the "Drama 
 class." With them we make a special study of plays, preferably 
 comedies. The class never has more than 20 students. It is in 
 charge of an instructor, who is interested in dramatics and posses- 
 ses a certain amount of dramatic ability. Scenes of comedies are 
 taken up, learned and acted out in class. No English is spoken. 
 The dramatic study is occasionally varied by the study of poems 
 which are recited with the proper expression. From this class, the 
 best elements are selected by competition for the public perform- 
 ance of a play at the end of the year. . . . 
 
 *T spent six months in France, and I made it a point to enquire 
 of soldiers and officers how much French they had learned during 
 that time. I must have been particularly unfortunate, for I have 
 never met any that had learned to speak it 'comfortably.' Some 
 officers used a kind of pidgeon French supplemented by copious 
 gesticulation. As the French are an intelligent race, they generally 
 managed to catch on. ..." 
 
 J. L. BoRGERHOFF, Westem Reserve University. 
 
 "The teaching of modern languages under the conditions that 
 prevail among us is just about as much impeached by the reflexion 
 that 'many an American college graduate who has studied French 
 for years is as awkward and as nonplussed in a Paris drawing room 
 as he would be in the driver's seat of an airplane,' as the teaching of 
 arithmetic would be impeached by the observation that our boys
 
 4 MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL 
 
 who have been through the years of arithmetic of the elementary 
 school would be about as intelligent listeners in a conference of 
 insurance actuaries as they would be in a congress of esperan- 
 tists. . . . 
 
 "I think our critics must be forced to meet the issues properly 
 defined. ... If they press us to adopt a certain 'modern,' 
 'reformed,' 'up to date' method, let us ask them whether they deem 
 it equally applicable in the seventh grade, in the ninth grade, in 
 the Freshman year, and in the Junior year of the college or univer- 
 sity. If our critics insist on 'practical' results, then they must get 
 us a six year course, at least, before they criticise. . . ." 
 
 Arthur G. Canfield, University of Michigan. 
 
 "Did our courses in chemistry and physics train men to serve 
 the army at once in making powder and calculating high-angle 
 fire? . . . Off hand I should say that our American class work 
 ought to include better training in pronouncing according to 
 phonetic methods, more oral drill (chorus work makes it possible 
 to increase the amount of actual speaking that each man gets), 
 and that 'free reproduction' of reading material affords excellent 
 practice in using the language as well as in reading without trans- 
 lation. . . . Several of my old students became interpreters in 
 the army, and others found themselves able to speak French the 
 moment they got across. . . ." 
 
 Philip H. Churchman, Clark University. 
 
 "I spent some five months in France and was struck with the 
 very small amount of French that our men learned even under 
 unusually favorable conditions. It proved to me that our old 
 shibboleth about picking up the language in a few months when 
 among the people, is about as true as most generalities. Unless, the 
 men had a real desire to learn it and took some trouble to do so, 
 their progress was very small, especially in cases where they had 
 had no previous French. I should really like to know what Presi- 
 dent Butler means by the 'best' authority and where this authority 
 got his very precise facts as to the 'comfortable' conversation, and 
 the 'vocabulary of a thousand words.' 
 
 "The number of students of French in the various camps in 
 France has been estimated at 200,000. My own observation, 
 made on the occasion of visits to some of the camps, confirmed me 
 in the belief that this was a pure guess, and that even the very 
 much smaller number of soldiers in the French classes attended 
 so irregularly and for such brief periods of time that nothing like 
 the 'comfortable' conversational ability of which Mr. Butler 
 speaks, was attained. . , ." 
 
 A. Coleman, University oj Chicago. 
 
 "Like many other teachers of French, I have noticed Dr. 
 Butler's remark upon the failure of our schools and colleges to
 
 ARE MODERN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODS WRONG 5 
 
 turn out students able to speak and write with ease and correctness. 
 Dr. Butler attributes the failure to wrong methods. 
 
 "To my mind, the failure, which is by no means always as 
 complete as his words appear to imply, is due not so much to 
 wrong methods as to lack of time, excessively large classes, and 
 lack of a real incentive to learn. Our courses in philosophy are 
 not more successful in turning out philosophers, nor our courses in 
 poetry in turning out poets, at any rate, not usually. . . 
 
 "Our modern elementary schools, it seems to me, develop 
 passivity in the more intellectual subjects, or at best, receptivity. 
 Only in the teacher are activity and energy called for. His 
 'methods' are periodically under suspicion. Our high school 
 pupils do not know that one of the great aims of education is to 
 overcome difficulties. The teacher is required to find 'methods' 
 to make the difficulties disappear. Difficulties, however, cannot be 
 made to disappear. . . . 
 
 "Methods may be important. Far more important are small 
 classes, gifted pupils, and an effective stimulus." 
 
 C. A. Downer, College of City of New York. 
 
 "... As regards our college work in modern foreign lang- 
 uages a great mistake, leading to a great economic waste in our 
 teaching, is made through our failure to recognize the fact that no 
 small proportion of our students are linguistic morons. That they 
 are such is discernible already in their preparatory school stage, 
 where great difficulty is encountered in equipping such students 
 with even the modicum of French, etc., requisite for a bare pass 
 mark in the Entrance Examinations. Why should there be 
 continued effort of a linguistic sort with respect to such persons in 
 college? . . . 
 
 "P'or fit students I believe that a great advantage is gained by 
 the adoption, in at least the first year of college life, of intensive 
 courses meeting at least five times a week. 
 
 "In so far as purely practical considerations are concerned there 
 is no doubt in my mind that we can produce far more beneficial 
 results through the establishment of a greater number of set 
 courses in conversation and composition in which the instruction 
 is limited to sections of not more than a dozen to fifteen students 
 each. The chief issue is the procuring of the funds necessary for 
 so costly a form of training as this is." 
 
 J. D. M. Ford, Harvard University, 
 
 "... It is obvious that our somewhat antiquated methods of 
 teaching will have to be modified in accordance with future require- 
 ments, while, at the same time, care should be taken not to yield 
 too much to radical and showy systems, most of which only tend to 
 produce unstable and insufficient results. ... In the elementary 
 and intermediate courses the reform that will probably obtain is
 
 6 MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL ■ 
 
 the following: more frequent sessions of classes each week. These 
 extra hours of recitation need require no additional preparation on 
 the part of the student. They should be merely laboratory hours 
 for practising what has already been acquired in the class-room. 
 Extra credit should be given for such work. . . " 
 
 J. L. Gerig, Columbia University. 
 
 "... In so far as President Butler's criticism is aimed at the 
 slight oral instruction that has been offered in modern language it 
 has a basis of justice and expresses the feeling of the average person 
 with regard to his foreign language training. It is the duty of 
 modern language teachers seriously to consider this rather wide- 
 spread criticism and see if there is not some means of adequately 
 meeting it. 
 
 "It is true that we can not teach students to speak a language 
 under the conditions of our class rooms, if by speaking we under- 
 stand the acquisition of a language in a degree at all comparable to 
 our possession of our mother tongue. We can, however, and should 
 emphasize the spoken and aural sides of our work in such a way 
 that our students may feel at the end of say two years of work that 
 they are able to express themselves simply in the language studied 
 and to understand it when spoken under conditions that are not 
 too difhcult. . . " 
 
 Edgar S. Ingraham, The Ohio State University. 
 
 "President Butler has certainly been misinformed when he 
 makes the statement in the January number of the Educational 
 Review. During eleven months of 1918 I lived in the army zone 
 in France, where I saw much of American soldiers. I feel sure that 
 of the 1,015,000 men we had in France on July 1st, 1918, there 
 were comparatively few, certainly not one in five, who studied 
 French three or four hours a week and far fewer who attained much 
 proficiency in it. The thing that struck me especially in the A. E. 
 F. was its vast ignorance of French, the men's inability to pro- 
 nounce, or remember, the names even of towns in which they were 
 billeted. A number of men learned, of course, enough French to 
 procure the necessities of life for themselves and their comrades, 
 to find their way on the road or in a shop, or to venture a few 
 phrases about their health or the weather but beyond this I found 
 in them little ability to talk French. . . . 
 
 "Let me suggest the following ways of securing improvement: 
 
 1. Greater emphasis in graduate schools on ability to speak 
 and write the foreign language studied. 
 
 2. More frequent opportunities for teachers and graduate 
 students to travel and study abroad. 
 
 3. Smaller classes and a larger number of hours a week for 
 each class.
 
 ARE MODERN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODS WRONG 7 
 
 4. Or2;anizing special classes for the most proficient students. 
 
 5. Bringing foreign students into our institutions, organizing 
 clubs and tables where the foreign language is spoken, and having 
 lectures given by foreigners." 
 
 H. Carrington Lancaster, Jo/ms Hopkins. 
 
 "The general lack of success of which President Butler speaks 
 is of course partly due to large classes. No class in a modern 
 language (unless it is an advanced class in literature) should con- 
 sist of more than ten students. Every student added to the ten 
 makes teaching increasingly difficult, and I should say it is impos- 
 sible to achieve satisfactory results with a class of more than 
 twenty. 
 
 "I do not believe, however, that small classes alone would bring 
 about the results desired by President Butler. I believe he is 
 right in saying that there is something wrong in our method. I 
 believe that many of us make the mistake of not insisting stub- 
 bornly and uncompromisingly (1) on oral preparation of lessons, 
 and (2) on grammar. . . 
 
 "I believe that the future of modern language teaching depends 
 on these two things: upon making our students study out loud 
 and upon making them learn grammar. Whether these things 
 be done by the use of low marks or by the sheer persuasive ability 
 of an inspiring teacher — they must be done. Otherwise modern 
 languages will go the way of the classics." 
 
 F. B. LuQUiENS, Yale University. 
 
 "Ample time should be devoted to practical and conversational 
 worlc in the secondary schools without, however, curtailing the 
 systematic grammatical drill. 
 
 "In the case of beginners' courses in the College, the ideal class 
 would consist of ten or twelve students meeting five hours a week. 
 In view of the greatly increased cost of conducting such classes 
 and the further fact that our elective system makes it difficult to 
 give full time and credit for such courses, I should suggest the 
 following plan : 
 
 "Three hour classes with a maximum enrolment of twenty 
 students; an additional hour for exclusively oral and practical 
 drill based on the regular work of the class room, with the students 
 divided into groups of six or eight. This additional hour should be 
 regarded as parallel to the laboratory hours of the natural sciences 
 and should be a required part of the course. The student should 
 receive no additional credit for the 'laboratory hour' or, at most, 
 only a fractional credit. . . 
 
 "Wherever possible, and especially in beginning and inter- 
 mediate classes the foreign language should be the language of the 
 class room. To spend the time of advanced classes in acquiring 
 facility in conversation or skill in purely commercial branches, must
 
 8 MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL 
 
 result in lowering our educational standard for collegiate instruction 
 in modern languages. Additional facility in conversation is an 
 extra-curriculum problem which the intelligent student can solve 
 in various ways." 
 
 C. Carroll Marden, Princeton University. 
 
 "Let us make a selection of students and try to teach these to 
 'speak.' At the same time, the more important matter is the 
 schools. . . 
 
 "As to 'special' classes in college for 'speakers,' I also agree — in 
 principle. At the same time I am in favor of using this device only 
 as a make-shift until the schools realize that they, not the colleges, 
 are the places to teach students to speak a language — our function 
 being quite another. 
 
 "I hardly believe President Butler can have informed himself 
 thoroly on the matter." 
 
 Wm. a. Nitze, University of Chicago. 
 
 "... I believe that President Butler is right in calling atten- 
 tion to the fact that American college students, who have been 
 trained solely by the old translation method, are quite unable to 
 handle the language as an instrument of conversation. I think I 
 should go somewhat further than he in believing that they cannot 
 even read the language adequately or with a grasp of its inner 
 meaning. I do not believe, however, that he is correct in supposing 
 that at least 200,000 American young men, after six months of 
 military activity in France, and three or four hours of instruction 
 a week in the French language, can carry on a comfortable con- 
 versation. ..." 
 
 Everett W. Olmsted, University of Minnesota. 
 
 "... All our elementary classes meet five times a week. 
 Every instructor must speak the language readily and well. 
 These two conditions are merely preparatory to attacking the 
 problem. The next thing is to inspire in the students at the outset 
 the desire to learn to speak. With Spanish, I find that to be 
 easier than used to be the case when I taught French. We begin 
 by talking Spanish to them from the first day. . . . We are just 
 as rigid in our insistence that the grammar should be accurately 
 learned as the most reactionary of the classicists. . . 
 
 "We make, however, a somewhat different use of reading 
 material and composition than is usual under the traditional sys- 
 tem. The composition is for the most part done orally. That is, 
 the classroom presentation of it is oral: the student writes the 
 lesson in preparation. The reading material is read; not, except 
 where understanding demands it, translated. Our theory regard- 
 ing the nature of this material is thai it should be both interesting 
 and easy, and that the class should cover a comparatively large
 
 A RE MODERN LA NGUA GE TEA CIIING METHODS WRONG 9 
 
 amount of it. Even in the first semester we 'discuss' the reading. 
 We make it evident to the students that in the elementary work 
 the thing is to talk. . . 
 
 "Beginning with the second year we have a course in conversa- 
 tion, which meets five times a week and gives but three hours' 
 credit. This course is required of all students majoring in the 
 subject and is, of course, taught by a Spaniard." 
 
 Arthur L. Owen, University of Kansas. 
 
 "The following about represents our experience here, a State 
 Institution with a large enrollment in the Romance languages. 
 
 (1) Our salaries do not attract the best teachers and we cannot 
 honestly urge able and gifted men to go into the profession of 
 teaching unless they have private means. 
 
 (2) Capable and adaptable foreigners, fitted to teach our 
 courses in composition and conversation, do not grow on every 
 bush; those whom we secure do not always understand the Ameri- 
 can student. 
 
 (3) Our elementary sections have ranged from 35 (a minimum) 
 to 60 students; no teacher however competent can reach all 
 members of such a class. There are 'never' any funds available 
 for all the instructors necessary. 
 
 (4) A very small percentage (hardly more than five to ten 
 per cent) begins a foreign language with the object of making 
 use of it in foreign parts. Most students desire merely a reading 
 knowledge. . . " 
 
 R. ScHEViLL, University of California. 
 
 "... I doubt exceedingly the statement that 200,000 of our 
 soldiers have learned to speak French comfortably. None of the 
 considerable number I have seen returned is so fortunate. . . 
 
 "However, the main point is that speaking and writing the 
 language is not the chief aim for the great number of our college 
 students. If this were the chief benefit to be derived, most of them 
 should study something else, for they will never need it. Our 
 instruction is usually aimed at the chief value, reading. Speaking 
 is of large importance to the majority only to the extent that it 
 contributes by interesting and stimulating. 
 
 "There is a very important minority who need to learn to 
 speak and write the language. For these special classes and train- 
 ing should be provided. We give small classes (10-15) in conversa- 
 tion and composition, and they do learn to speak the language 
 reasonably well. Also there are other possibilities. One of these 
 we are now using here with remarkable success. This is our French 
 House, in which French only is spoken, at tables and at all times. 
 The advantage is that it makes use of what would otherwise be lost 
 time for the student. We keep several French natives in the house, 
 and thirty to forty of our students. These students have made a
 
 10 MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL 
 
 progress in speaking French fairly comparable to what they would 
 make in a similar amount of time in a French-speaking community, 
 and I dare risk the assertion that they in general speak the language 
 better and more readily than do any thirty who can be picked out 
 of President Butler's 200,000 soldiers." 
 
 Hugh A. Smith, University of Wisconsin. 
 
 "... The conversational ability of our students presents no 
 'sorry commentary.' We cannot avoid teaching our students how 
 to read the foreign language. Requirements in the professional 
 schools — the school of medicine, for example — demand a reading 
 knowledge; and there are other good reasons for exacting a reading 
 ability in the foreign languages. . . 
 
 "I have just conducted a survey in a second-semester Spanish 
 class on the difficulties offered by conversation in Spanish. The 
 answers by the students are what I expected: lack of opportunity 
 in class, lack of time outside of class because of other university 
 demands, the necessity of putting the language aside from one's 
 thoughts on leaving the class to go into another class, — perhaps 
 into a different foreign-language class, lack of self-confidence 
 because of the size of the class, the too rapid reading of texts, 
 lack of concentration, lack of Spanish environment, lack of mental 
 agility in language-study, lack of verbal memory. The problem is 
 by no means the simple thing that it appears to be. 
 
 "It would pay an experimental psychologist to study student 
 mentality under class-room conditions in the languages. He would 
 probably discover an unusually large number of intellectually 
 alert students whom it is nothing short of criminal to force into 
 language straight-jackets. He might find it necessary to advise 
 that such students not only be exempted from further language 
 muddling after the first semester, but that the ordeal of the first 
 semester be not counted against them, as manifestly unfair. . . " 
 
 J. Warshaw, University of Nebraska. 
 
 "... It is natural that such drastic criticism as that made by 
 President Butler should come from one extra niuros, who knows 
 little of the difficulties of the situation. You cannot put a quart of 
 water into a pint pot, and there is no use in claiming that it can be 
 done. As long as our classes in modern languages meet three times 
 a week in one hour sessions it is idle to talk of any such progress 
 as President Butler seems to expect. 
 
 "As to the statement that 'at least 200,000 American young 
 men, who, after six months of military activity and three or four 
 hours of instruction a week in the French language, can carry on a 
 comfortable conversation under ordinary conditions and circum- 
 stances,' etc., we may well be sceptical. During a recent sojourn 
 in France, I met no young American of whom this is literally
 
 ARE MODERN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODS WRONG 11 
 
 true, altho I met some who could talk a little about certain things." 
 
 Raymond Weeks, Columbia University. 
 
 "The possible values of knowledge of a modern foreign language 
 are of four types: first, values resulting from ability to understand 
 the language as written; second, values resulting from ability to 
 understand the language as spoken; third, ability to speak the 
 language; fourth, ability to write the language. 
 
 "The values of the first type are in themselves by far the 
 greatest, for they include the potential knowledge of all the 
 thought of the country in question, whether philosophic, religious, 
 social, political, literary, or scientific, which that country has felt 
 worth preserving. . . 
 
 "The values of the second and third types concern only those 
 students who will visit the foreign country or will have to deal in 
 some way with foreigners, who, on coming to this country, speak the 
 language of the country from which they come. The number of 
 students concerned with these values is larger now than previously, 
 but I do not believe that more than 10 per cent of the students are 
 really now so concerned. Furthermore, it is utterly impossible 
 under American school and college conditions to give these values 
 to more than a very small proportion of students enrolled in ordin- 
 ary language classes. It should be recognized that the ability to 
 understand the foreign language when spoken is distinctly more 
 valuable and distinctly easier to teach than the ability to speak the 
 foreign language. ... So far as American schools and colleges 
 are concerned, the endeavor really to give the ability to understand 
 and to speak should be made not in the ordinary classes, but in 
 special limited classes in which intensive laboratory conditions 
 should be approximated as closely as possible. . . " 
 
 Ernest H. Wilkins, University of Chicago. 
 
 "... Many individuals are quite lacking in linguistic 
 ability. Scientific tests devised to eliminate those thus handi- 
 capped should be instituted in both high school and college. 
 
 "Modern language classes are organized in the large city sys- 
 tems with about twice as many pupils in the class as there should 
 be. For instance, in New York City high schools it is no uncom- 
 mon thing to find an attendance of 40 to 50 in beginning classes, 
 the very type of class in which the number should be smallest. 
 
 "Modern language teachers are too often lacking themselves in 
 oral facility. Now that the war is over, these teachers should 
 study abroad (especially teachers of French and Spanish). To 
 make this possible, the sabbatical year with at least half-pay should 
 be granted by Boards of Education to all such teachers. 
 
 "I am convinced that the high schools do more to secure oral 
 and aural facility in French and Spanish than do the colleges. This 
 is due in part to the greater impressionableness of the minds of the
 
 12 MODERN LA NGUA GE JO URN A L 
 
 younger students of the high schools and in part to the fact that 
 the high schools deliberately aim to train tongue and ear, as well as 
 the eye of the student. . . " 
 
 Lawrence A. Wilkins, Acting Director of Modern Languages in 
 High Schools, New York City. 
 
 The statements given above make clear the general belief that 
 some reforms are needed in modern language instruction, but that 
 as a whole the present conditions are not nearly so bad as our 
 critics would have us believe. There seems also to be a wide- 
 spread opinion — which, however, is not held by all — that the 
 primary aim of language instruction in colleges and universities 
 is cultural and that the ability to speak the foreign languages must 
 be acquired either in the secondary schools or extra muros. It is 
 affirmed that beginners' French or Spanish is too elementary a 
 subject to have a place in a college, and that, moreover, the average 
 college student is too old to begin to learn to speak a foreign 
 language to advantage. 
 
 Although there is much truth in this affirmation, the conditions 
 are such in our general educational system that the elementary 
 courses in modern languages can not be discontinued at the present 
 time in most colleges and universities, and certainly not in the 
 State universities. Students come up from the high schools with 
 four years of Latin and they wish to take French, or they have had 
 French or German and they wish to begin Spanish. This demand 
 for beginners' courses in college must be met. 
 
 The real problem then is: What can we do for the students who 
 begin a modern foreign language in college? If the statements 
 made in this "Symposium" are typical — and I believe they are — 
 we are beginning to take the position that students who comm.ence 
 a foreign language in college should be separated into two groups: 
 those who desire primarily a reading knowledge of the language, 
 and those who wish to speak and write it as well. 
 
 If the beginners are divided into two groups, should the separa- 
 tion be made at first with the privilege of shifting later, or should 
 there be a general course for a semester and then make the separa- 
 tion? Only experience will tell which is better. 
 
 If the separation is made at the end of the first semester — or the 
 first quarter in those universities that have the quarter system — 
 it might be wise to excuse, at this time, from all linguistic require- 
 ments those students who give evidence of being "quite lacking in 
 linguistic ability," "hopelessly unfit," tone-deaf, or "linguistic 
 morons." This elimination should be made by a committee, and 
 it should be based either on the student's record in all subjects, 
 supplemented by personal interviews, or on scientific tests.
 
 ARE MODERN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODS WRONG 13 
 
 The students who are to continue the language would then be 
 separated into two groups. The reading courses would be con- 
 ducted largely in English and the emphasis would be put on 
 translation. It would be the purpose of the course to teach the 
 students to read and understand the written language and to 
 pronounce it intelligibly. There would be no pretence whatever 
 of teaching these students to speak the language easily and cor- 
 rectly. 
 
 The second group would consist of those students who wish to 
 learn to speak and write the language and are willing to make the 
 necessary effort. The plans suggested for the conduct of these 
 courses differ, but they all presuppose capable, well trained 
 teachers and wherever possible the use of the spoken language in 
 the classroom. 
 
 Two general plans have been suggested for teaching the 
 students to speak the language. One plan would be to organize 
 the students in groups of twelve or fifteen and give them live 
 times a week intensive work with much oral drill. The other plan 
 would be to organize "special limited classes in which intensive 
 laboratory conditions should be approximated as closely as 
 possible." The enrollment would be limited to twenty, or twenty- 
 five. The entire class would meet with the instructor three times 
 a week. Twice a week the class would meet in groups of five or 
 six, with tutors, for "exclusively oral and practical drill based on 
 the regular work of the classroom." 
 
 Opinion differs as to whether the college credit for these 
 courses should be three, four, or five hours. 
 
 The "laboratory system" offers interesting possibilities. The 
 chief difficulty would be to find tutors and rooms. If funds were 
 available to engage the services of competent tutors, and if rooms 
 were available, the "laboratory system" would be ideal. 
 
 Most of the students who enroll in the advanced courses in 
 philology and literature would come, of course, from these intensive 
 and laboratory courses. 
 
 Our "Symposium" has also made evident a rather general 
 opinion that, in addition to class work, students need the practice 
 and the stimulus that come from extra-curriculum opportunities 
 to speak and hear the foreign language. These may be had to some 
 extent in clubs, at tables, and probably best of all — at least for 
 the chosen few— in such organizations as the Maison Frangaise at 
 Columbia University and the French House at the University of 
 Wisconsin. 
 
 In conclusion, it may ease our conscience somewhat to learn 
 that the evidence available shows that, for the most part, our sol- 
 diers in France learned little French over there. I am sorry they 
 did not learn more. 
 
 Indiana University. 
 
 49843
 
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