Slump in language teaching at British schools.

Adam   Fri Nov 04, 2005 9:41 am GMT
Slump in language teaching

Rebecca Smithers, education editor
Friday November 4, 2005
The Guardian


Only a quarter of state schools are making modern foreign languages compulsory at GCSE, according to a survey. The schools which do offer languages after the age of 14 are mainly grammar schools, specialist language colleges and those in more affluent areas.

The fourth annual survey carried out by CILT (the national centre for languages), the Association for Language Learning and the Independent Schools Modern Language Association reveals that the proportion of schools retaining a compulsory language at key stage four this autumn fell to 26% from 36% last year.

Thousands of youngsters are choosing not to study French and German in favour of subjects such as drama or media studies, the survey finds, while "very low proportions" of youngsters are studying more than one language.

There has, however, been a surge in interest in Spanish, increasingly seen as "a cool language". The survey is based on a a random sample of 2,000 secondary schools in England (1,577 maintained and 423 independent). It reveals that languages remain compulsory in 85% of maintained grammar schools, compared with 21% of comprehensive schools.

An accompanying report identifies varying provision between types of school. Languages remain compulsory in 75% of independent schools, for example.


guardian.co.uk
Adam   Fri Nov 04, 2005 9:44 am GMT
The languages of "Old Europe" (French and German) seem to be in decline in Britain, whilst the languages of "New Europe" (e.g. Spanish) seem to be on the increase, as the British find Spanish to be "cooler" than French or German.
Rick Johnson   Fri Nov 04, 2005 4:38 pm GMT
I would hardly describe Spain as "New Europe", it was a pretty strong colonial force in Old Europe- maybe if had mentioned Swedish or Polish I might have agreed with you.
Travis   Fri Nov 04, 2005 5:41 pm GMT
Rick Johnson, you obviously forget that at one point in time, both Sweden and Poland (actually Poland-Lithuania) were very significant powers, Sweden from the early-mid Thirty Year's War until Poltava, and Poland-Lithuania from union of Poland and Lithuania until the Deluge.
Rick Johnson   Fri Nov 04, 2005 5:50 pm GMT
Travis, I was really thinking of colonies outside of Europe. Spain conquered most of South America. I'm not aware of significant colonies from either of the other two countries.
Travis   Fri Nov 04, 2005 5:54 pm GMT
Actually, Sweden did have a colony in North America, New Sweden, but it was shortlived, IIRC being taken over by the Dutch not that long after it was founded.
Alloacious   Sat Nov 05, 2005 6:58 am GMT
I really don't see the point in studying a foreign language if you can't even speak the standard version of your native languge. Schools should focus on teaching Standard British English (RP) before focusing on some totally different language. At least in France, most young people today speak "standard" French. Local accents exist but they tend to be the exception rather than the rule among young, educated speakers. Paris doesn't have an equivalent to Cockney. While there are some differences in speech among people, speakers of "Standard Parisian French" do not form some tiny, dying minority, as is the case in England with RP.
Damian in Edinburgh   Sat Nov 05, 2005 9:40 am GMT
I think more effort should be made in getting British kids to speak ENGLISH effectively before even thinking of learning foreign Languages. There have been a succession of reports in the UK press about the declining standard of spoken English in many areas of this country and complaints made about some jobseekers barely able to make themselves understood at interviews. For the most part they've merely grunted their way through them.
Saif   Tue Nov 08, 2005 8:49 am GMT
Dare I disagree with both Alloacious and Damian?
My experience has been that learning foreign languages actually improves a student's understanding of his own language (in may case own languages).
What know they of English, who only English know?
Travis   Tue Nov 08, 2005 6:38 pm GMT
>>I think more effort should be made in getting British kids to speak ENGLISH effectively before even thinking of learning foreign Languages. There have been a succession of reports in the UK press about the declining standard of spoken English in many areas of this country and complaints made about some jobseekers barely able to make themselves understood at interviews. For the most part they've merely grunted their way through them.<<

What does "declining standard of spoken English" constitute in this case, just for the record?
Adam   Tue Nov 08, 2005 7:18 pm GMT
"I think more effort should be made in getting British kids to speak ENGLISH effectively before even thinking of learning foreign Languages"

Especially the Scots.

I don't think they've quite mastered the English language to the level that the English and Welsh have.
Damian in Edinburgh   Tue Nov 08, 2005 10:37 pm GMT
In response to the question: **"declining standard of spoken English" constitute in this case, just for the record?**

Judging from several official educational reports which I have read there have been "complaints" from business and commercial sources in the United Kingdom that many young people (presumably by that they mean school leavers who reach the official school leaving age and who do not go into further education) do not reach the same level of competence in spoken English as those in previous years recently. In other words, there is a perceived "decline in the ability to speak English clearly and with reasonable articulacy up to an acceptable level to meet the required standards by most employers". The situation affects boys much more than it does girls, on the whole.

Reasons given for this apparent decline in the competent use of English by these school leavers are quite varied and complex, from lack of interest and lack of support, social background, peer pressure (again especially among boys) and the increasing isolation in interpersonal communication because of the universal use of computers and mobile phone texting and the like.
Easterner   Wed Nov 09, 2005 4:24 am GMT
Some months ago I read about the results of a survey which showed that many British youngsters seem to be losing interest in other cultures (Continental European ones in particular), and can mostly relate to or are chiefly intrerested in other English-speaking ones (American, Australian, etc.). Can it be possible that this awareness of European multi-culturalism is increasingly "out" in Britain? That may explain the general (but I'm sure not all-pervading) lack of interest in learning foreign languages.

Incidentally, I read about another piece of statistics, showing that Brits and Hungarians are on the whole the worst foreign language speakers in the EU. Heaven knows we try, but over here it is mostly the access to authentic foreign language content along with quality language teaching for quite large segments of the population (especially in the countryside) that is lacking, not the interest. It seems that it is the other way round in Britain, as I suppose both the above prerequisites are available there.

Talking about Spanish, it seems to have an increasing appeal because it is getting more and more prominent in the US. I suppose it won't take long before most English speakers will opt for Spanish as a preferred second language on both sides of the Atlantic. In this way it could become more a cross-Atlantic communication tool in the same way as English is now.
Damian in Edinburgh   Wed Nov 09, 2005 8:23 am GMT
Britain's island status may well be another reason for the lack of ability or desire to learn foreign languages in this country......we have no land border with any other major country with a different Language. We can discount the Celtic fringes of the UK where the loval Languages, whether we like it or not, are very much of minority status.

The throwback from the days of Empire, when the English Language was exported to all four corners of the globe, has probably intsilled some sort of arrogant sense of superiority in the British mentality. There was a perceived notion that there was no need to learn and speak any other Language...everybody else would speak ours. I know that's not a laudable way of thinking but that's the way it was and still is by and large.

The rise of the United States and the American culture involving the English Language further limited the need to learn Continental Languages in these islands...that great power across the ocean had an enormous influence in one way or another and if that country spoke the same Language (more or less) as we did, why bother with any other? Of course there are very considerable cultural differences between the UK and the US but the Language bond is a very strong one.

The British have never been great linguists, and with English now sort of reigning supreme as a World Language, they never will.

Maybe that may change as this century progresses and the balance of world power shifts to the Far East.....China will udoubtedly become the No 1 World economic power in the not too distant future, with India probably close behind, so the Brits, like many other countries, will have to get to grips with Chinese, for one.
JJM   Wed Nov 09, 2005 8:50 pm GMT
Yawn.