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Year abroad worries

So I'm just about to finish my 2nd year exams and I am waiting to hear on my British Council region in Spain for next year. Only problem is I study 3 languages and I made the decision to do this at the end of year, and I'm really worried I'm going to struggle in 4th year, having had little/no contact with my other 2 langs (French, German). I'm looking for some work placements/internships for summer but not had much look so far. 1 option is au-pairing but I au-paired twice last summer and although it was good, I'd like to try something a little bit different! So, what experiences do you guys have coming back in 4th year? and any advice on what I could do in the summer/on my YA to help? Or am I going to have to accept I'll struggle in 4th year and my grades won't be great?

Sorry for the rambling haha, thanks!
Original post by ash9423
So I'm just about to finish my 2nd year exams and I am waiting to hear on my British Council region in Spain for next year. Only problem is I study 3 languages and I made the decision to do this at the end of year, and I'm really worried I'm going to struggle in 4th year, having had little/no contact with my other 2 langs (French, German). I'm looking for some work placements/internships for summer but not had much look so far. 1 option is au-pairing but I au-paired twice last summer and although it was good, I'd like to try something a little bit different! So, what experiences do you guys have coming back in 4th year? and any advice on what I could do in the summer/on my YA to help? Or am I going to have to accept I'll struggle in 4th year and my grades won't be great?

Sorry for the rambling haha, thanks!


Hi, have you considered doing something like this: http://www.ccfs-sorbonne.fr/sommaire.php3?lang=en

My friend is doing British Council in Spain right now and is planning to top up his French by doing a month long Sorbonne course. I'm sure the Goethe institue has similar things for German.

The only problem would be the lack of a salary - it might make a considerable dent in your Erasmus grant.

Another point: you may well find yourself hanging out with some French/German people in Spain if you're doing British council. My friend spoke almost as much Spanish as French while in Rouen and even learnt Galician.
(edited 9 years ago)
I wouldn't worry too much if you're confident now.
I study French, German and Japanese and my uni specified that I had to spend the year at a university in Japan (which was what I wanted too!).
So I then spent 4 weeks at a German language school in the July after second year. And i spent 3 weeks at a French language school in August after I returned back from Japan.
I've had no real problems coming back and my marks haven't really changed either.
I'm guessing that like me, you won't be the only student choosing the split your year abroad unevenly between languages? I have people in my French class who spent most of their year in Spain and only did a couple of months in France, so the abilities are all mixed.

Also, you may have opportunities to do meet French/German people abroad, or take evening classes etc. It's quite easy to keep them going if you have friends you can chat to in the language or if you listen to the news or read newspaper articles online for example. Not that I did any of that and it still worked out for me okay!

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