Big possibility of moving to a European country in a years time. Spouse will be moving there in the next mOnth. Want to use the time to learn as much of the language as possible. It's a country we could get on fine with English and work there with just English too, but more to get on socially and for the children.
There is an evening class starting in October which I will do but looking for as many options as possible. Are there any good online courses?
Was not very good at languages at school but hoping with a target i might improve!
Well a lot depends on the language and of course the person.... do you mind telling us where you are going or is it a big secret?
In the case of the main European languages you can of course attend evening courses and so on. But in addition you can also do things like watch TV, get involved with the local ex-pat community from the country and so on.
For other languages such as the Nordic ones, Dutch, Luxembourgish, Swiss German and so, it is going to be much more difficult as there are not many options out side living in the country and learning it there.
In the case of the kids, I would not worry at all about them, as they will pick it up much faster than the adults, in fact I'd be willing to bet they will be fluent within a about 6-12 months. I've seen it here in the Swiss schools, were usually about 50% of the kids can not speak the local language when starting school in August, but by Christmas most of them will have no problem following along during lessons.
In school I was terrible at languages too, but these days most of my business meetings are done in Swiss German or High German and I can often go an entire working day without speaking a single word of English! So it is possible, it all depends on the motivation - in my case there just was no other choice!
Jim