The instructors from Kennesaw State University praised their students, hailing them as better than those in previous classes, as they nailed another phrase in French.

With the body-parts vocabulary well in hand, they moved on, asking, "Comment tu t'appelles?" (What is your name?)

Andy Sharp/Staff (ENLARGE)
KSU student Orchid Marvasty uses a poster in the class. The Big Shanty course reflects the realities of public school foreign language instruction today: It totals less than five hours, is taught by student volunteers and was organized by a parent.
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They gave their names in flawless, complete sentences. Well, as flawless as a fourth-grade tongue could manage.

"I just like the funny noises, the 'R' sound," said Thomas Gregory, 10, referring to the throaty sound he learned on his first day of class.

These bright-eyed fourth-graders were eagerly absorbing as much French as they could get in the 45-minute class, part of an introduction to the language at Big Shanty Elementary School in Kennesaw.

Though the weekly session, taught by volunteer college students, gives the children less than five hours of instruction over the six-week course, that's much more than many elementary school students in Georgia are getting these days.

As school systems across metro Atlanta struggle to close budget gaps caused by new state requirements to reduce class sizes, foreign language instruction is falling by the wayside. Mainly, that's because the Georgia Education Department doesn't mandate foreign languages in kindergarten through fifth grade. With the student population growing and new mandates, officials say the language situation isn't likely to change anytime soon.

"There's not much out there," said Susan Crooks, foreign language and international education program specialist at the state Education Department. "It's a very sad state of affairs. ... It's not systematic, it's just bits and pieces here and there."

Douglas County public schools, for example, offered comprehensive foreign language classes in all of its elementary schools just six years ago. Now it's taught in just one of the county's 17 elementary schools.

"I'm very thankful that we still have it in one school," said Corinne Barnes, Douglas County's curriculum coordinator for foreign languages.

Next year, Forsyth County Schools plans to scale back its Spanish and French program for third- to fifth-graders from two days to one day per week because of state cuts combined with double-digit percentage growth in the student body.

"We need to be spending more time on math and reading in the classroom," said Forsyth schools spokeswoman Jennifer Caracciolo.

A notable exception to the trend is the Atlanta public school system, which has perhaps the most comprehensive elementary-school foreign language program in Georgia. At 54 out of its 57 elementary schools, it offers 30 minutes of daily instruction in Spanish or French in fourth and fifth grades.

"Learning to communicate in another language is critical to our students being equipped to function linguistically and culturally in a global society," Deborah Riedmiller, foreign language coordinator for the Atlanta schools, wrote in an e-mail.

Crooks, the state education official, tipped her hat to the Kennesaw State students, Big Shanty administrators — and a parent who wouldn't take no for an answer.

"Big Shanty is very creative," Crooks said. "That is such a neat idea that they came up with to at least expose students to some [foreign] language."

The Big Shanty French class was the brainchild of parent Sabine Smith, who was concerned that her children wouldn't be exposed to a foreign language after taking some Spanish in first grade and second grade. Smith, a professor of German at KSU, talked to Big Shanty's principal about it, and the principal asked her to get KSU involved.

"I didn't have the allotment that I would need to hire a teacher," said principal Diane Hudson. If it weren't for this collaboration, "we would have no foreign languages."

A few KSU students who have studied French, but are majoring in something else, teach the class under Smith's supervision. The students learn words for greetings, colors, numbers, body parts, clothing items and animals.

Hudson said that learning French "helps you to understand your own language more," by looking at endings, possessives, plurals and tense agreements.

Even if the students are not exposed to foreign languages again, experts say, the mini-course teaches them that there are other languages and cultures out there. In addition, Smith said, it's easier for children to learn languages while they're this young, and they're more likely to speak the acquired language without an accent.

Even if students such as Gregory find it "challenging to remember all the words," they enjoy learning a new language.

"I think it was really fun," he said.