As a Japanese native, the only foreign language I studied at school was basically English.

However, as part of my ancient Japanese language education, I studied classical Chinese literature written in Chinese characters, from which hiragana and other Japanese characters are derived, so ancient Chinese might also be included in the list of foreign languages ​​I learned.

English of course, the language of the invaders

I did grammar school, so we had:

• Dutch (our native language)
• English
• French
• German
• Classical Greek
• Latin
• Chinese (optional course)

Dutch and English were all through school, the other ones you took for 2 years and then picked two languages to follow through on, one of which had to be Greek or Latin. I did German and Greek.

We had to choose 2 of English, German, Spanish, French, Italian. We had the option of Japanese as extracurricular

In my hometown, it was Spanish, Latin, German, French, or ASL (I know, I know, not a foreign language. Arguably Spanish isn’t either, but anyway).

But each school only had one, so you only got fo choose if you had enough free periods to drive across town three times a week.

My school had Spanish. I learned Latin once I was in college.

Spanish is most common, but many high schools also teach French, Latin, and German.

Fun times when my German teacher had the idea of showing up to the French class cookout uninvited (there were only 6 of us, cf. 12 students in French)

ASL, Greek, Italian, Russian, and Japanese were only offered at specific schools in my district, with a bus that takes you to those classes and back. Japanese ended up being just a TV broadcast alongside worksheets and was eventually dropped from the catalog. Friends and family living in larger cities and suburbs told me about taking Mandarin Chinese, but the school district I attended (and neighboring districts) didn’t offer it.

edit: this is in the US

In US, had French and Latin, plus of course English.

Spanish, French, German, Latin, and if you wanted to learn Italian, you could go to the sister school in the morning for that class and then come back by bus.

In my part of Australia we had to learn Japanese between the ages of 10 and 14, after that is became optional.

I only remember French, Spanish, or German (this was back in the 90s). My kids have all those plus Japanese, Mandarin, and ASL to choose from

French, Spanish, and Latin.

Does English count in the USA? 😆

I think mine only had French or Italian. I’m Canadian.

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English, Spanish, German, French, and eventually Japanese.

As a person from pacific, we could choose between Mandarin Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, and the local austronesian language, in addition to mandatory english, for high school.

Pacific economy relies a lot on tourism, and it mainly comes from Asia or America, so knowing how to talk to tourists can be handy.