To wish there was not a decline in the number of children studying foreign languages

[ForalltheSaints]

According to a BBC survey, a 45% drop over c20 years in the number of language GCSEs taken, with a bigger drop in French, though more taking Spanish.

Apparently because they are perceived as more difficult.

I rejoice in not being the typical Brit or American abroad expecting everyone to speak English. Should we not be more encouraging, perhaps by allowing universities if they wish to insist on one language GCSE alongside English Language and Maths as a condition of entry?

PinguDance - so many British people say "I'm crap at languages." I'm sure a large proportion of Swedish or Dutch people must be equally crap, but they still manage to acquire a good degree of fluency in English.
ElloBrian - I think that's a good point, although perhaps not so much with countries like Romania, where there are a lot of factors (e.g. low wages, lack of jobs) driving people to leave, and not so much incentive to immigrate there. Although freedom of movement goes both ways, many British people would lack the language skills to work in another European country, or lack confidence in their ability to learn if they struggled with languages at school.

Yeah of course there are many factors - state of the economy, type of jobs on offer, rates of pay etc.

You just never hear the kind of people who bang on about ‘them’ coming ‘over here’ then saying ‘but my brother works in Warsaw so I reckon it evens out overall’ .... and in my experience if you suggest that the right to live and work in 27 other countries is a benefit to people in the U.K. as much as it is to the citizens of the rest of the EU, it is met with blank incomprehension and a general ‘how would I manage to do that?!’ attitude.

It is not necessary to learn 5 languages in order to have an understanding or an appreciation of other cultures. Whatever culture we foster, an English speaking nation is simply not going to start learning multiple languages.

What do you think the education system ought to do in order to change the MFL situation? They could make GCSE MFL compulsory again, but that doesn't actually make people want to do MFL.

"What do you think the education system ought to do in order to change the MFL situation? They could make GCSE MFL compulsory again, but that doesn't actually make people want to do MFL."

It is difficult atm because teachers are strapped in a system which rewards the mindless parroting of phrases not understood and is completely under-resourced.

Looking at the young man I am helping with his German GCSE revision atm- all he has is a revision book which consists of a few passages about selected topics and from this he has to construct his own oral, with no access to a dictionary, and no real understanding of how the grammar works or how you construct new sentences and get them right. How is he supposed to do that?

And the material is mind-numbingly boring. It's not the teachers' fault, but the lack of ambition when comparing it with e.g. maths or English literature is striking.

The format of the oral exams has always been problematic. However, I don't quite get what you mean about 'constructing his own oral without access to a dictionary'. In their oral exam, the Year 11 German class I teach will do unseen situational role plays, a 1 min presentation on a topic of their choosing, plus further conversation on GCSE topics. The only bit that's parroted is the presentation.

Students shouldn't have 'no understanding of how the grammar works', as grammar is taught throughout in secondary level MFL. I even teach some in primary. The only students who have no grasp of the grammar are the very weak ability ones or the ones who don't put any effort in.

The material is inevitably a bit boring because there's a limit to how fascinating topics can be when you are only at a low level in a language, have few lessons a week and are possibly in groups with low ability students. The maths syllabus is only interesting if you like maths (lots of students hate it). Ditto English literature. Even the kids who like reading usually hate writing endless 'PEE' paragraphs about what they've read. My bright, bookworm 13 yo dd is sick to death of it (and prefers Spanish lessons!).

Students shouldn't have 'no understanding of how the grammar works', as grammar is taught throughout in secondary level MFL.

The grammar that is taught for GCSE MFL is really very minimal indeed. It looks like a lot if you are English but, if you are French or German, you are very confused as you know that GCSE does not provide sufficient grammar to scaffold even remotely complex expression.

Well yes, you don't get to the level of very complex expression at GCSE. That would be beyond its scope. It is largely basic, transactional language, because that's as far as you can get on the amount of teaching time you have, with the ability range of pupils you have in a standard state school class. Nevertheless, gramnar is taught.

GCSE expression isn’t even remotely complex. The huge problem of inadequate grammar would be resolved if English children were given a proper foundation in their own grammar before tackling the grammar of MFL.

The huge problem of inadequate grammar would be resolved if English children were given a proper foundation in their own grammar before tackling the grammar of MFL.

I remember my MFL teachers saying the same thing to me back around 1977! Some things never change. My first French teacher was particularly scathing about our poor English teaching and really begrudged having to teach us about tenses etc in English language before she could start doing it in French!

Kazzyhoward I remember our German teacher despairing that we had no idea what the subject or object of a sentence was, which made it much harder to teach cases.

MariaNovella - you are quite right about the importance of learning their own grammar. I've been banging on about this for decades. It's better than it was, due to the KS2 Spag test, but it's dropped as soon as that's over and done with.

The KS2 Spag test is a step in the right direction but very inadequate as a basis for learning MFL grammar. In particular, the proper teaching of English verbs and tense sequencing would be of enormous help.

I did find it very sad that when we were looking round secondary schools only the private school made it compulsory to take another language.
I say this as somebody who found languages really difficult at school but still stuck at them to get French and German GCSEs
I am massively in favour of a broad education and stretching kids as they don't always know what they want to do at the ages we make them narrow down their choices. I'm sure this is just because we've reduced the funding and resources in state schools to a bare minimum and therefore we are only pushing to cover a bare minimum for the majority. Short sighted policy that will shaft a generation- so sad, it will widen the gap in opportunities available for the 'haves' and the 'have nots'.

I say this as somebody who found languages really difficult at school but still stuck at them to get French and German GCSEs

It is very difficult to learn MFL in the English context of inadequate teaching of our own language as a basis for learning others.

We need to overhaul our approach to language teaching massively. MFL should be taught as early as possible, by native speakers, from reception class onwards. Not secondary. Secondary is far too late in most cases for effective language acquisition.

Obviously at reception level, kids would be learning through play to an extent, and teachers would need skills that are much more akin to speech and language therapy than traditional teaching. Think role play, songs, games etc. rather than mind-numbing lists of vocabulary and grammar, or the half-baked process I remember which consisted mainly of crackly tape recordings that we then had to stand up in front of the class and imitate as best we could. That's fun when you have a hearing difficulty. Do I see change happening? Not any time soon.

I'm of an age where we taught very little English grammar; verbs, nouns & adjectives and that was it.
Yet in 30+ years of employment I have produced 1000s of documents in professional environments, including contract agreements, and cannot recall this being any hindrance. I really had no idea what a "fronted adverbial" is, I've had to Google it.

MFL should be taught as early as possible, by native speakers, from reception class onwards.

Instinctively we believe this to be the most efficient way to learn a second language but it is not born out by research. Firstly, the native speaker teaches aren’t available. Secondly, it is, strangely enough, easier and quicker to learn a second language starting at 11 rather than at 4, providing the proper groundwork has been put in in the mother tongue.

Bilingual language learning/teaching is totally different - the optimal situation for bilingual DC is to be taught to mother tongue standards right through.

Not being taught English grammar worked fine when children from middle class English homes spent a lot of time reading: good usage and an extensive vocabulary could be absorbed from authors and recycled in essays. This system does not teach the explicit knowledge of grammar necessary for second language acquisition. French children have never been able to acquire sufficient understanding of French grammar just from reading.

As regards teaching, my son was taught French from year 7, and in year 9, they spent most of the year "learning" French literature, which DS absolutely hated as he hates English Literature, let alone in a different language. I still almost have nightmares thinking about the weeks he was forced to spend creating his own "film" on the computer, finding images and downloading a music track and adding in titles to match the words of some French poem about putting milk and sugar into a cup - what an absolute farce and waste of a year. Up to then he was good at French - straight A's in all tests etc., but that year finished him off. He originally put French down as his GCSE option but by the end of the year, he ended up pleading with the school to let him change it as he'd grown to hate it due to that year.

Looking at the young man I am helping with his German GCSE revision atm- all he has is a revision book which consists of a few passages about selected topics and from this he has to construct his own oral, with no access to a dictionary, and no real understanding of how the grammar works or how you construct new sentences and get them right

That doesn't sound very much like GCSE. I would check his exam board and the specification so you're clear on what you're helping with. If he has been told to sort out the 'conversation' aspect of the speaking exam, I would expect him to have suitable questions/answers in his books somewhere. It also sounds like he may not be very clear on what he's supposed to do and/or he has more information/worksheets/workbooks etc. that he could give you and/or he doesn't really understand what is expected of him. Who's fault that is, of course, is another thread entirely.

I can only agree to an extent that knowing English grammar helps a pupil learn other languages- I certainly learnt a lot about grammar through studying MFL but I don’t think a really comprehensive knowledge of English grammar is necessary to get a good GCSE in MFL.
It might help if you know what eg. a demonstrative pronoun is but in French you still have to learn ce, cet and cette in place of the English ‘that’ so its different and It doesn’t particularly matter if you can name it as a ‘pronom demonstratif’ you just need to know they all mean ‘that’. Conjugations in English are much simpler than French or Spanish, we don’t have cases like in German, we don’t have genders. English is really pretty easy to learn in terms of getting to an elementary level - around the mid- intermediate stage it gets tough cos you have to learn so much syntax.

I don’t think it’s worth putting the kids through the boredom at the fronted adverbial for the sake of MFL!

Oh embarrassing rookie error in my post above - they all mean ‘this’!

Pingu it makes a massive difference to teaching time if all you need to do is say "These are the French demonstrative adjectives" (ce and cette are demonstrative adjectives, not pronouns), rather than explain what demonstrative adjectives actually are. Naming things by their proper grammatical terms is a very useful shortcut. No, you don't need a terribly advanced knowledge of English grammar to learn an MFL, but a decent knowledge is very helpful.

Slowknitter - I agree 100%. Far too much teaching time in MFL is wasted because pupils don’t have basic knowledge of grammatical concepts and the vocabulary to name them.

Tense sequencing is really quite difficult and incredibly important to meaning. I wish more emphasis were put on it.

www.theguardian.com/education/2019/mar/06/sixth-forms-drop-languages-a-levels-due-to-inadequate-funding