It makes sense to learn Foreign Languages
We are passionate about encouraging children to have the good sense to learn a foreign language. Languages provide the platform to enable conversations -which can develop into great personal experiences, the making of great friendships and to build a career doing what you love doing.
Mark Wingfield speaks fluent German and reasonable French. It has made sense for him to learn a foreign language.
Click on the attached pdf for a personal story about how languages have crucially helped the development of Mark Wingfield.
Mark was in Berlin the weekend Ronald Reagan told us to "Tear this wall down".
He has trained Russian salesmen and technical colleagues and thereby visited Moscow because he got a job with JCB largely as a result of his German and French language skills.
During a sales conference with Monroe Shock Absorbers in Singapore, he was able to chat to the German team about their experiences travelling up the East Coast of China, which was described as one long building site - in 1994.
6% of the world's population speak English as a first language. More than 20% speak Mandarin as their first language.
The future balance of power and influence in the world will be driven to a great extent by what happens in modern China.
This threatens the long-term predominance of English as the world's international language.
The English-speaking world will no longer be able to rely on their mother tongue getting them by in business. To stay up with the latest technical developments in manufacturing that happen in the East, it may be necessary to learn the local language.
To communicate ideas, enthusiasm and opportunity most effectively, your audience should be hearing your plans in a language they understand. If that is their mother tongue, even better.
If you learn a foreign language it doesn't have to be Mandarin, Spanish or German, but English alone may not be enough.
It makes sense to learn a foreign language.