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How did you learn languages in school? | ||
Tags: School Education | Foreign Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 6129 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 9 of 22 15 February 2011 at 12:24am | IP Logged | ||
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1. What country are you from/were you educated in:
USA. 2. Native language/language learned in school: English/Spanish (1 year Jr. High School) English/German (3 years. High school) 3. How many hours per week (on average) were devoted to teaching this language? And how was it taught? With German about 5 hours a week in class and maybe another 3-5 hours a week with homework and other studying. We had a textbook and we did one lesson per week. We wrote short essays and read aloud the textbook dialogs in class. We had regular vocabulary quizzes. I had a lot of trouble memorizing vocabulary words -- if I had had SRS back then I would have totally owned this class. I mostly got A's anyway. I also remember doing translation from German to English on tests. The teacher was an English native speaker, one of those, sort of, hippie gone straight type guys who had done a lot of traveling. He also taught the Spanish class, I believe, but I think he had more emotional attachment to German. He was non-native, but as far as I knew he was a German-language genius. I have no way to judge at all how competent he was in the language. The textbook had no audio component, which I see now as kind of a problem. German classes, especially in the 3rd year, were really quite small and we got quite a bit of attention from the instructor. In California, not a lot of people study German. 4. Were any other activities undertaken in the target language? (some people do certain subjects in other languages). We did have a German Club, though we didn't speak much German, we did go out to see movies as a group. Mostly we just hanged out though, really. I was moderately well-motivated, but I had a lot of other interests those days competing for my time, and not quite enthusiastic enough to push it to the next level. 5. What would the general expected level be after this education? (Could students converse easily for final exams). I was non-fluent. There were some students who had come from other countries, who seemed pretty fluent to me. I had a frighteningly bad American accent while speaking German. I did take the German AP test, though I have no recollection of how I did on this. 6. Did you feel confident on completion of your education that you could get and do a job in the target language? Get a job in German? No, not even close. Really, I think after 3 years of high school, with extreme stress I might have been able to, say, check into a hotel -- uh, maybe. I think the class was basically okay. Maybe with a bit more listening exposure I would have done better. I still remember a tiny bit of German, and I can hack out bad German in a chat room. A lot of vocabulary remains in my brain, though I'm afraid the years have wiped out a lot of the noun genders. Edited by cathrynm on 15 February 2011 at 12:28am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| g-bod Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5986 days ago 1485 posts - 2002 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, German | Message 10 of 22 15 February 2011 at 12:30am | IP Logged | ||
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1. What country are you from/were you educated in: UK (specifically, educated in England)
2. Native language/language learned in school: Native language English, learned French and German 3. How many hours per week (on average) were devoted to teaching this language? And how was it taught? First year at school (age 11) we spent half the year studying French and the other half German, I think for about 1 hour a week but it's hazy. Next two years the bright kids (including myself) took both languages, with 1 and a half hours a week per language. For two years studying for GCSE I took French only, which was 2 hours a week. I then took French for A level, over two years with 5 hours of classes a week. My impressions of the teaching was mixed. In my first year of classes, we had the same teacher for both languages and there was not much expectation of students. Each week we would do a very limited practice of a particular dialogue pattern, and maybe have a list of 10 or so words to remember. I have very vivid memories of one lesson asking the teacher how to say something which did not fit into the dialogue pattern of the day and getting shouted at, the teachers words were along the lines of "I'm fed up of people like you always trying to get ahead of the class!" All I can say is thank goodness most of the teachers at my school did not have this attitude. In my second year I had a different teacher for French and for German and there was a marked difference. The French teacher was a little bit creepy and he taught in a rather traditional style, lecturing the class from the front but also picking on students to answer various questions and engage us in conversation and seemed to give us a thorough grounding in basic grammar. Our German teacher was awful and could not even master basic classroom control (remember, my class was the one with the bright kids who were generally motivated to learn) and I finished the year feeling like I knew nothing. The teacher got sacked and in our third year I had a better teacher but she had to reteach everything from scratch and the class never really caught up, the result being that I felt like I was good at French but bad at German, so I dropped German for GCSE. GCSE years of French were very similar to the previous two years of French teaching, with a reasonably good teacher who emphasised grammar a little bit more than was fashionable at the time (thank goodness). She also picked up that I seemed to be quite good at (or at least motivated in) French and used to try to encourage me to listen to the radio and things. I really wish I'd taken her advice now! For A level I went to sixth form college instead and the expectation of the teachers was much higher (although sadly their teaching skills were not as good). We were exposed to native materials from the beginning and it was quite a shock coming straight from GCSE level. It didn't help that due to low student numbers they ended up combining the year 1 and year 2 students into one class, so I was studying alongside students who had already been studying at this level for a year. In terms of conversation it was a bit of a sink or swim situation and I am sorry to say I sunk somewhat, I finished the course with a rather unimpressive C grade. I remember that the teachers used to have a go at me for not studying enough outside of class but at the same time gave very little guidance in terms of how I should be studying. Sadly boards like this didn't exist at the time and I failed to develop good self study skills or a sense of responsibility for my own progress. 4. Were any other activities undertaken in the target language? (some people do certain subjects in other languages). No. 5. What would the general expected level be after this education? (Could students converse easily for final exams). With a good grade at GCSE (taken at age 16) I think it would be reasonable to say you were around A2 level on the CEFR scales, although with a mediocre grade you would not be anywhere near this and it is fair to say that most people in the UK do not take languages any further. I would say that to get a good grade at A level, the expectation is much higher. You would be expected to be able to do things like read newspaper articles and listen to news reports and you would need to be able to converse easily (all be it on a limited range of subjects) and write with a good degree of accuracy. I think expectations in terms of grammatical knowledge and accuracy were much higher than in terms of amount of vocabulary needed. 6. Did you feel confident on completion of your education that you could get and do a job in the target language? It would depend on the nature of the job but I would say in most cases, no. However, if I had the specific goal of getting a job in French, or perhaps more appropriately studying at a French university, it would have served as a very good foundation but I still would have needed to put in more hours to reach the standard required for either of these. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Adelie Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5368 days ago 4 posts - 5 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Icelandic, Hungarian, Sign Language | Message 11 of 22 15 February 2011 at 12:53am | IP Logged | ||
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1. What country are you from/were you educated in: USA
2. Native language/language learned in school: Native: English Course: Spanish 3. How many hours per week (on average) were devoted to teaching this language? And how was it taught? Every other day for about an hour and a half. Around three or four hours a week? Both of my teachers were native Spanish speakers. Except for the occasional lesson where the teacher actually spoke (always in English), we mostly kept to ourselves and completed tedious assignments in our workbooks. I especially remember the vocabulary drills. Our assignment was to copy down a list of words, and that was that. I barely retained a thing. 4. Were any other activities undertaken in the target language? (Some people do certain subjects in other languages.) Nope. 5. What would the general expected level be after this education? (Could students converse easily for final exams.) Definitely not fluency. A basic understanding, at the least, if the student even remembers it after the course has ended. We had vocabulary quizzes and final exams, usually in the format of fill-in-the-blank, and neither required much effort. 6. Did you feel confident on completion of your education that you could get and do a job in the target language? Not at all. Edited by Adelie on 15 February 2011 at 1:06am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6913 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 22 15 February 2011 at 2:05am | IP Logged | ||
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1. What country are you from/were you educated in:
Sweden 2. Native language/language learned in school: Swedish/English/Spanish (some German, some French, some Ancient Greek) 3. How many hours per week (on average) were devoted to teaching this language? And how was it taught? Two-three "hours" (40-50 minutes) per week. Listen/repeat/read/read aloud/vocabulary/conversation/grammar/exercises/translation for all languages except Greek (mostly grammar and reading/translating). 4. Were any other activities undertaken in the target language? (some people do certain subjects in other languages). No. 5. What would the general expected level be after this education? (Could students converse easily for final exams). More easily in English than any other language (by the time we finished high school, anyone had studied English for 8-9 years). 6. Did you feel confident on completion of your education that you could get and do a job in the target language? Not really. I could definitely converse in English, although not on a highly academical level. For the other languages: no. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6276 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 13 of 22 15 February 2011 at 10:32am | IP Logged | ||
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UK (Scottish education system)
My school languages were German, French and Spanish. I thought the teachers and teaching were at least adequate. There seemed to be low expectations for spoken fluency - when I actually spoke French (and not very well) on a school trip to France in 1979, there were those who thought this a nearly amazing feat. In my final year I was given plenty of opportunities for study time - the equivalent of the US "study hall". 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| DaraghM Diglot Senior Member Ireland Joined 6155 days ago 1947 posts - 2923 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French, Russian, Hungarian | Message 14 of 22 15 February 2011 at 11:03am | IP Logged | ||
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1. What country are you from/were you educated in: Ireland (like original poster) 2. Native language/language learned in school: Irish, French 3. How many hours per week (on average) were devoted to teaching this language? And how was it taught? Irish: From primary at 5 years old until leaving cert at 18. My primary education was good, and I had a reasonable command of the language. My secondary eduction was a disaster, and the Irish teacher was eventually sacked by the department of Education. Nobody passed even lower level Irish in the school. A new teacher came in, but it was too late for me to do higher level. I did well enough on the lower paper. The old teacher made heavy use of wordlists, but never tested them. He also never taught grammar. (~3 hours per week) French: Started at age 12 until age 18. Taught by non-native speaker, but her accent wasn't bad. Usual mix of exercises including the infamous cloze test. Severe lack of audio material meant I'd a very bad accent. (~3 hours per week) 4. Were any other activities undertaken in the target language? No. 5. What would the general expected level be after this education? Basic conversations in Irish and French. With proper teaching, Irish level should've been stronger. 6. Did you feel confident on completion of your education that you could get and do a job in the target language? Absolutely not. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6276 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 15 of 22 21 February 2011 at 9:58am | IP Logged | ||
To add to the above message, there was an interesting study system in my school. At the start of the study period, I would often move into a small side room attached to a classroom with a kind of counter-like table and a chair. I would get out my textbooks, dictionaries and exercise books and get to work. The system was designed for peace and quiet - the classroom was usually unoccupied so there were no distracting noises. I can't remember if I was locked in the room by the teacher for the duration of the study period or whether I was given a key so I could go in and out when I needed to. Probably the latter - the system was designed for sixth year pupils who were considered likely to actually study, as opposed to goofing off. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6015 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 16 of 22 21 February 2011 at 9:54pm | IP Logged | ||
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You don't need me to tell you that the Scottish system is woefully inadequate, and I haven't mentioned my brief TEFL career break in aaaaages, so I'll talk about that instead.
I was in a Basque town, and I had a few after-school classes with kids ranging about 10-16. Most of them had been learning English since they started primary school, alongside both Basque and Spanish. They could ask question? No, they no could ask question. They no could do negative sen-tense. The worst part is that one of the girls had a father from Essex. In the end, the best after-school class I had was the lowest-level one: the kids who went to the German school. They'd started English later (12, I think) and had been taught in a structured way. On the other hand, the ones who'd been started on it at 5 or 6 had been "immersed", but with one (only sometimes native) teacher and a couple of dozen kids in the class, their grammar suffered catastrophic interference from Spanish. I don't know whether the lack of correction stemmed from the "make it fun" philosophy or the abilities ot their teachers. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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