Horizon

Language Instruction Lamentations

In the preface to the 1942 Scientific German for Intermediate Students, the author — one Harold F. Lenz of Queens College — laments the state of foreign language instruction:

What is most likely to be discarded in these days of streamlined "reading method" are the features involving active use of German in oral and composition work. The author urges that they be retained. He agrees that it is preposterous — in the time usually allotted to languages in the curriculum — to try to teach the student to speak, write, or even read like a native. But in the final analysis we are doomed by human nature to "learn by doing." Mere sight of things, silent contemplation and cerebration — no matter how profound — leave us with shadowy and lifeless impressions.