[lg policy] Language education policy in the UK: Is English the elephant in the room?

[Harold Schiffman]

Paper session 11: Language education policy in the UK



Language education policy in the UK: Is English the elephant in the room?


(by Dr Ursula Lanvers, Open University, UK)


(And elephant in the room is a metaphor describing something that
people are aware of existing, but are uncomfortable to talk about and
rather avoid the subject)


In short:

There is a contradiction between what is said and what is happening.
In other words, even though officially there's a lot of talk and
'action' promoting the people in UK learn foreign languages, people
don't do so. Why is that? Have the attempts to increase language
take-up been serious enough? Do people in UK actually think that it is
essential and necessary for the UK to raise profiency in foreign
languages?


In her research, Ursula Lanvers, has come to a conclusion that there
is a assumption that English alone is enough and people in general are
not at all convinced that there is need to promote other languages.

Language education policies


There has been many goverment initiatives (The National Languages
Strategy for England, 2002: Languages for all: languages for life)
supporting community languages, promoting careers by promoting
languages at work etc.


Reports and reviews:


The Dearing Report, 2007 with some recommendations.
Nuffield Enquiry 2000, conclusion: 'English is not enough', with
several recommendations towards that, (e.g language supremo)
National Languages Strategy, 2002


Lots have happened on Secondary sector too:


GCSE = ISCED
2004: 14+ compulsory language learning abolished in England
GCSE results: 71% of pupils achieved Grade A* – C grades in 2009
Steady increase from 1994 (about 53%) to 2009


A level = ISCED level 3 results:

Those who do language for A levels get very high grades in general.
Huge increase of good marks especially on languages.


Multilingual UK – Community languages
14.3% of primary school children and 10,6% of secondary school
children speak a first language other than English (2008)


UK Language skills: some figures Eurobarometer 2006 are quite
embarrassing for the UK, for example: Average number of foreign
languages studied at school per student:

A level: UK 0,1, while Finland 2,7

For Primary languages there is no curriculum – only suggested framework
Other weaknesses:


no specialist teachers

very narrow selection of languages ( 2008: French 89% school, Spanish
25%, German 10%)

Community languages


very few take "community language GCSE"

Low uptake, low status

High education sector


Many language department s have been closed, (UWE, Belfast, Sussex)
and language programmes have been closed.
The rhetoric is politically correct, has emphasis on qualifications
not proficiency and there are initiatives and reports on this subject,
BUT the reality is rather different.


When looking at the news and media texts some interesting discourses
start to emerge.
UK poor linguistic skills are recognized there (One headline: "UK
heads for bottom of the class for poor linguistic skills")
and also the students voices echo this. In many ways the students are
well ahead of what the politicians have figured out.
The students are highly aware of negative attitude towards languages
and about the fact that global English demotivates them.

"English is enough – English language is the global language"
–assumption seems to emerge here and there, although it is never
mentioned in any official papers.
For example Gordon Brown has said (2008), "… If you have skills,
educated in Britain, you can work almost anywhere in the world", which
obviously refers to the language.


What to do?


Some suggestions:


acknowledge global English as potential threat and demotivator to UK
language learning

address the fallacy publicly: losses to UK

In the discussion and comments coming from the audience, it was noted
that it would be very important not to raise awareness only among the
citizens but also of the politicians too.
What about language marketing for spreading multilingualism?
As it had already come evident there have already been many
initiatives with good recommendations, but it has not lead to proper
action – lots of words, yet not much has happened.

http://whoneedslanguages.blogspot.com/2010/06/paper-session-11_09.html
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