The first bar chart illustrates how many students learned a foreign language in the years 1984 and 2007 while the second one gives information about the three most popular languages being studied by students over the same period.
Overall, the percentages of girls and boys studying a foreign language decreased from 1984 to 2007. While French and German witnessed declines in their number of learners, a slight increase was seen in the figure for Spanish.
Looking first at the percentage of students who learned a foreign language, the figure for girls was nearly 50% in the first year, after which it dropped to exactly 40% in the next 23 years. A similarity was seen in the proportion of boys, witnessing a decrease of about 7%.
Moving on to the second bar chart, 50% of students chose to study French in 1984, and then this figure saw a twofold decline in 2007. However, this language still gained the greatest popularity. The data for German was 20% in the first year, also followed by a decrease to 15% in the final year. Lastly, Spanish followed a contrasting trend compared to the one observed in French and German, increasing from 5% to 10% over the period.