The given chart indicates the figures of 13-year-old students chose to study either Mandarin or French from 2000 to the present day in a school in the UK.
It can clearly be seen that, overall, the number of students studied Mandarin significantly went up over the period shown and then slightly fluctuated until now. In contrast, there was a downward trend for French learners for half a decade and remained stable up to the present day.
From the starting point, there was a huge gap between the two languages, with the number of students who took French was 150, compared to with just under 10 Mandarin learners. Nevertheless, over a period of five years from 2000 to 2005, the students studying French dramatically fell to the lowest point with the quantity of approximately 85 learners. On the other hand, those who chose to study Mandarin witnessed a considerable growth in popularity to reach its peak of nearly 80 students over the following five years.
Since 2005, there have been steady trends in both language options. Specifically, French saw a minor increase to reach a hundred students in 2006, then remained constant with an enrollment of around 90 students in the following years. Meanwhile, it can be seen that Mandarin students had an opposite trend in 2006 with a slight decline in the quantity to just over 60 students and gently fluctuated under the amount of 80 students.