The St. Charles Middle School Foreign Language Program, revised in 2005, enables middle school students to complete first year French and first year Spanish by the end of their 3-year middle school experience. Sixth graders begin one language, taking it two times a week, then continue the same language in 7th grade, meeting five times a week through the third quarter. At the beginning of the fourth quarter, 7th graders switch to the other language, meeting five times a week for the rest of the year and through their 8th grade year. For the last four weeks of 8th grade, students will complete an intensive review of French or Spanish, depending on what they have elected to take in high school.

The French and Spanish texts used at St. Charles are introductory high school level texts, and, as such, are appropriately challenging for our students. Each student’s performance will determine whether he or she will be able to take the second level of the chosen language as a freshman. To do this successfully, the student must have a firm grammar and vocabulary base, achieved through regular study outside the classroom, an approach which has yielded good results for many former St. Charles students.

Spanish teacher Senora Haskell and French teacher Madame Lemrow believe that the foreign language program at St. Charles gives students a safe and comfortable environment to try new languages. Middle school is the perfect time to expose students to a more diverse curriculum, enabling them to find their strengths and their interests; it is for this reason that both Spanish and French are included in the program. Once students get to the high school level they may specialize in Spanish or French, or choose from myriad alternatives such as German, Japanese, Latin or Italian.