How good/bad was your school languages experience...in reality?

[zgriptsuroica]

Our secondary schools also don't generally offer any degree of specialization, like I've been told is common in other countries. If universities were to expect students to come already having studied their degree track in some depth, they would essentially cut themselves off from a large pool of applicants who lived in a state that just didn't teach to that standard.

When I read these descriptions I'm always surprised how different the concept of 'high school' is between the U.S. and UK/Europe. We don't really 'graduate' from secondary school and nothing in it is regarded as a 'degree'. I just attended and then sat and passed my targeted exams and then left. Some of my university friends did a year or more at U.S. universities and at that time I had no idea about how degrees worked there. So I was baffled by the idea of incorporating languages alongside something else, as if there was no specialisation. If you compare it to how a UK student just starts their e.g. Law course and they are just studying law and any related disciplinary areas. The idea of spending some of these credits on, say, Spanish seems to me very strange. Especially that it might be required.

There was only one person I knew on my own degree course who was studying French. Philosophy and French so she was on the philosophy modules (of the PPE). This was a 'joint honours' degree (a 'double major' I believe it is called in the U.S.). Yet this is like doing a complete degree in French. Not just partial credits or a year or something. I think any UK student would consider such a thing a complete waste of time and credits.

This, and the cost, is part of why I'm doing a degree with the OU, rather than locally. There is just some much time spent on unrelated topics, allegedly in the name of making students "more well-rounded" in their education. Here (PDF) is the list of requirements to graduate with a BA in Spanish, from City College, which boasts of being ranked 105/443 best national universities in one ranking, so not exactly some random degree-mill. I would say this is a pretty typical curriculum for a US language degree, from what I've seen. You only need to complete 36 credits of courses within the actual subject of your degree, with general education requirements representing up to another 42 credits, though there may be some overlap, depending on your major. A typical BA requires 120 credits, so you have 30 that are guaranteed to be unrelated in the general ed, maybe you can pick relevant courses for the next 12 courses, meaning 48/120 credits are actually directly related to your chosen field of study. You could still graduate with your degree while a full 60% of the courses you studied weren't even in the same discipline.

I don't know how things translate outside of UK universities, but if it helps, doing a French/Spanish Honours BA through the OU requires 360 credits to graduate over the course of 3 years full-time study, or 6 years at half-time, as I'm currently doing. The entire curriculum requires exactly two modules that are not either teaching Spanish or French. By the time I finish my third year and am only halfway through the degree next year, I'll already have 120 credits in my chosen languages, which is just a touch under what is required over the whole four-years of a US bachelor's degree.

I'm posting this to provide some context for those who might find claims of the US system exaggerated in its deficiencies. Even at the university level in a well-regarded school, we generally give insufficient time to study of language to have any meaningful outcomes, except for those students who take it upon themselves to go beyond what their school requires and learn more. Just over a year of full-time study, strung out over the course of four years, simply doesn't have the hours involved to provide students with any more than a cursory understanding of a language. Where you might be expected to have a B1 command of a language when starting university in other countries if it's your chosen major, you might expect to hit B1/B2 at the end of your degree here, depending on the school and what you do outside of class on your own time.

[Le Baron]

Interesting information. Thanks for outlining it.

[M23]

I think any UK student would consider such a thing a complete waste of time and credits.

American kids think the same, it's just that we have to run through these hoops to get the degree.

[Le Baron]

American kids think the same, it's just that we have to run through these hoops to get the degree.

That's a pity.

[Rey]

This thread is getting personal and heated. Please try to avoid personal remarks. If this cannot be avoided, the mods will likely delete posts or lock the thread. Thank you.

You admins, can delete or block whatever you want from what I have written. Your home, your rules. Not mine.

My apologies for the inconvenience.

[Severine]

From the state's perspective, the goal of a public education system is socialization and training skilled workers. It must also be as cost-effective as possible. I do not say this as a criticism necessarily, but it does shape decisions about curriculum, staffing, etc.

Countries where foreign language use is an essential or highly valued skill for workers are, in general, much more successful at producing a sufficient quantity of 18-year-olds with the ability to speak foreign languages sufficiently well for professional use. Anglophone countries, where foreign language skill is nothing but a nice perk on your resume or CV (if that), are not. France, in the age of its cultural and diplomatic glory, wasn't either, although it is steadily improving at English instruction now that English ability is widely considered more important to advancing one's career.

This gets to the heart of how and why we learn languages, in my opinion, or rather how and why we do anything effort-intensive that requires long-term attention. We have to really care, either because we love it or because we genuinely believe it's important and will benefit us. This goes beyond schooling, because students in countries with good FL outcomes don't just learn at school. They are surrounded by signs that FLs are useful, and by opportunities to use them. They learn by watching undubbed television (the existence of which is itself a lesson) and seeing adults around them using and benefitting from their FL skills, and because they receive constant social messaging from parents, teachers, family friends, the media, etc. that language skills are something they need to get ahead. Not only is the instruction generally better, but they believe that it matters. They care more, so they do more, so they do better. The state, in addition, cares more about their success in that realm, and pays serious attention to language education.

I grew up in an anglophone part of Canada where French instruction was compulsory for grades 4 through 9 (ages 9 through 14). I will not speak of the quality or style of instruction, because it's almost irrelevant. The real issue was that nobody thought it mattered. Not the parents, not the teachers (sadly), and consequently not the students. The teachers never tried to convince us we would need it, or even derive any pleasure from knowing it, and in fact I am sure they were certain we would not. As a child doing French homework, you would hear nearby adults laugh about how they hated French classes in school, never used it, and had forgotten all of it a long time ago. Parents who grew alarmed at less-than-perfect math performance would shrug off near-failing grades in French. The message was clear across the board: we are teaching this to you because it's required, and that is the only reason. Don't worry about it.

All of this is to say that, in my view, expecting good FL teaching outcomes in countries where the general populace places little to no value on FL skills is extremely unrealistic. Passion and necessity drive learning. If you have neither, good pedagogy and well-trained teachers can only do so much - which is why the US churns out lots of B1/B2 university graduates whereas those entering university in Norway, the Netherlands, Romania etc. are often functionally bilingual at least.

[Slowpoke]

The message was clear across the board: we are teaching this to you because it's required, and that is the only reason. Don't worry about it.

Ding ding ding. I also think this is why most European countries I've seen fail to teach foreign languages other than English. I live in a border region where German is taught from kindergarten until high school, and the level of German amongst francophones is very low. On the other side of the border, once you go beyond "bonjour" it's impossible. Because I imagine that German/French are viewed the same way there that French is in Canada.

[M23]

I do not have many complaints about my high school Spanish. I recall doing Spanish karaoke in Spanish I and watching Destinos in Spanish II. I also recall having students that were learning English in Spanish II, so that made for an interesting class. The teacher also learned Spanish from Spain, so as a person that spends most of their time in contact with Mexicans, Colombians, Argentinians, and so on, the Spanish that I learned was pretty useless. I also learned the "me gustaría..." form for ordering in a restaurant and I know that nobody uses that. Not surprisingly, I forgot most of it when I graduated.

The college experience has been more laden with clutter that should not be in the class, and is primarily there as bits that one needs to complete a degree. I have to do a seven minute PowerPoint presentation on something that has do with Latin culture. Will it help me with my language learning? No. Do I still have to do it to pass the class? Yes. The pace of the class is also very fast, and I cannot imagine handling it if I took a language like Chinese or Japanese. I am not very fond of the general college method of teaching students by have them read at length about a subject and then test them not on what they read, but on the obscure details about what they read (making studying an almost worthless task). In this case, there is the amount of knowledge that you have to stuff in your brain to pass, and there not being much time to try to retain it all. If I were taking this class from square one I could imagine having the familiar feeling of trying to drink from a fire hose. The teacher has mentioned in passing that she does not like the syllabus of the class and would prefer to teach the class differently, so I know that I am not completely crazy.

On the plus side, our teacher is from Argentina so there is not much work with the Vosotros form of the verb other than to be aware of it. That was not the case in high school Spanish, and that was a real surprise to learn that that form was not really used on this side of the ocean. The college professor is also teaching words like "dormitorio" that is good for general Spanish but not so good if you are interested in a place like Mexico that uses a different word to describe that room.

Overall, I am fairly happy with high school Spanish and a little less happy with college Spanish so far.

[Cavesa]

I think any UK student would consider such a thing a complete waste of time and credits.

American kids think the same, it's just that we have to run through these hoops to get the degree.

This doesn't cease to amaze me. The americans have probably the most expensive university eduation on the planet. Yet, they are wasting money on stuff not really related to the degree, and in case of languages also of notoriously low quality (and quantity). If every credit costs so much money, then it is a waste of money and opportunity, to spend several on a beginner language class. Yet, the system forces the students to waste the money.

Ding ding ding. I also think this is why most European countries I've seen fail to teach foreign languages other than English. I live in a border region where German is taught from kindergarten until high school, and the level of German amongst francophones is very low. On the other side of the border, once you go beyond "bonjour" it's impossible. Because I imagine that German/French are viewed the same way there that French is in Canada.

Well, I think it is partially intentional. The countries know, that if they give enough resources and priority to a different big european language than English, they might facilitate expatriation or commuting "too much". There are various regions in Europe (basically along the borders of Germany, Luxembourg, Switzerland,...) that could do with much more non-English foreign language education. But not making it accessible through schools, countries are keeping at least some part of the population helpless and poor, but still in place. And it doesn't really matter, whether it is Lorraine in France, Karlovarsko in the Czech Republic, it works the same way.

The neighbouring languages are the most obvious example. But even non neighbouring other languages of Europe, that are not English, could improve lives so much (these days Swedish or Dutch are great options in some fields, but most people don't find out). But by brainwashing the population with the attitude "English is all you need", "English is THE international language", "everything but English is a waste of time" and "well, you had been learning English at school, do you really want to start something else instead", many people simply miss out on important opportunities. They won't try.

So, we keep seeing lots of working poverty just twenty km away from the borders of a richer country, lots of tourism workers relying on Bad English even if 90% of their customers speak one non-English language, lots of unused opportunities (and used crime opportunities) due to nobody learning languages of huge immigrant groups, and so on.

The message was clear across the board: we are teaching this to you because it's required, and that is the only reason. Don't worry about it.

And that is nothing against the situation they don't expect. If you actually "worry about it". You are not really supposed to succeed. And above all, you are not supposed to expect being given high quality education, high quality teaching. You are not supposed to question, why is the school system making your restart several times and lose several years of investment on both sides, or why is the school library French section nearly non-existent.

Really, I used to be mocked for learning French, liking it, learning it seriously, and not liking English. Not just by kids, I was mocked and criticised by adults. They were disrespectful, making jokes, and insisting on how useless my choice was and that my parents were not strict enough, as they were allowing this. Well, I've proven them wrong. But the bitter memories stay.

A related funny memory from just a few years ago: one very stupid woman (I had known she was neither bright nor kind even back when I was a kid, but she was in the friend circle of my parents) even assumed I was working in France or Belgium as a doctor in English

Like this:
Me:yeah, I work in France.
Her:oh, was it hard to get a job in English there?
Me: -at first not understanding what she meant, then trying not to laugh at her- no clue, I speak French of course.

With this level of ignorance in the population, it is very hard to expect countries to push the necessary means for plurilingualism into schools.

[Ug_Caveman]

A related funny memory from just a few years ago: one very stupid woman (I had known she was neither bright nor kind even back when I was a kid, but she was in the friend circle of my parents) even assumed I was working in France or Belgium as a doctor in English

Like this:
Me:yeah, I work in France.
Her:oh, was it hard to get a job in English there?
Me: -at first not understanding what she meant, then trying not to laugh at her- no clue, I speak French of course.

With this level of ignorance in the population, it is very hard to expect countries to push the necessary means for plurilingualism into schools.

Those moments when you read something that causes the despair you feel for humanity to increase exponentially...