How Should Languages Be Taught in School? Wie sollten Sprachen in der Schule unterrichtet werden? How Should Languages Be Taught in School? ¿Cómo deben enseñarse las lenguas en la escuela? Como é que as línguas devem ser ensinadas na escola? Как должны преподаваться языки в школе? Diller Okullarda Nasıl Öğretilmelidir?

How about figuring out how to motivate the students? Wie wäre es, herauszufinden, wie man die Schüler motiviert? Как насчет выяснить, как мотивировать студентов? Hi there, Steve Kaufmann here today to talk again about language learning and to talk about how languages should be taught in school with particular reference to an article that appeared in The Guardian from the UK, a leading newspaper in the UK. Hallo, Steve Kaufmann ist heute hier, um erneut über das Sprachenlernen und darüber zu sprechen, wie Sprachen in der Schule unterrichtet werden sollten, mit besonderem Bezug auf einen Artikel, der in The Guardian aus Großbritannien, einer führenden Zeitung in Großbritannien, erschienen ist. Привет! Сегодня здесь Стив Кауфманн, чтобы снова поговорить об изучении языков и о том, как следует преподавать языки в школе, уделяя особое внимание статье, опубликованной в The Guardian из Великобритании, ведущей газете Великобритании.

Remember if you enjoy these videos, please subscribe, uh, click on the bell for notifications and uh, if you're following me on your podcast, please leave a review. So this, um, article, cause I follow things in the news, uh, related to language learning. Więc ten artykuł, bo śledzę w wiadomościach rzeczy związane z nauką języków. Итак, эта статья, потому что я слежу за новостями, связанными с изучением языков. So here was this article in The Guardian about the recommendation from a body in the UK, that concerns itself with education, that... suggesting that a new approach to language learning, one that would sort of inject some more enthusiasm into language learning would be to have a list of 1700 basic words that students would be required to learn. Hier war also dieser Artikel in The Guardian über die Empfehlung eines Gremiums in Großbritannien, das sich mit Bildung befasst, dass … ein neuer Ansatz für das Sprachenlernen vorgeschlagen wird, der dem Sprachenlernen mehr Enthusiasmus verleihen würde eine Liste mit 1700 Grundwörtern zu haben, die die Schüler lernen müssten. ガーディアン紙に掲載されたこの記事は、教育に関係する英国のある機関からの勧告に関するもので、言語学習への新しいアプローチ、つまり言語学習により多くの熱意を注入するアプローチを示唆しています。学生が学ぶ必要がある 1700 の基本的な単語のリストを用意する必要があります。 Итак, вот эта статья в The Guardian о рекомендации органа в Великобритании, занимающегося вопросами образования, который... предлагает новый подход к изучению языка, такой, который привнесет больше энтузиазма в изучение языка. должен иметь список из 1700 основных слов, которые учащиеся должны будут выучить. And this of course brought a tremendous sort of wave of criticism from people who are involved with language teaching saying you can't just, uh, learn from lists. Und das hat natürlich eine gewaltige Welle der Kritik von Leuten ausgelöst, die mit dem Sprachunterricht zu tun haben, dass man nicht einfach, äh, von Listen lernen kann. That's going to discourage people. Das wird die Leute entmutigen.

That's not going to create a sort of a sense of love of learning a language. Das wird keine Art von Liebe zum Erlernen einer Sprache erzeugen. So I, I sort of thought about this and I did a lot of reading on the subject. Also habe ich darüber nachgedacht und viel zu diesem Thema gelesen. それで、私はこれについてちょっと考えて、このテーマについてたくさん読みました。 So first of all, there is a bit of a crisis surrounding language learning in the UK, even though they are just across the Channel from France, not far away from Spain, uh, not to mention, uh, other countries. Also zuallererst gibt es eine kleine Krise rund um das Sprachenlernen in Großbritannien, obwohl sie direkt auf der anderen Seite des Ärmelkanals von Frankreich liegen, nicht weit entfernt von Spanien, ähm, ganz zu schweigen von, ähm, anderen Ländern. Po pierwsze, jest trochę kryzysu związanego z nauką języków w Wielkiej Brytanii, mimo że są one po drugiej stronie kanału La Manche od Francji, niedaleko od Hiszpanii, nie wspominając o innych krajach.

Uh, not to mention the fact that we can easily connect with, with China, with, uh, with the Middle East and learn all these different languages and yet interest in language learning is declining. Äh, ganz zu schweigen von der Tatsache, dass wir uns leicht mit, mit China, mit, äh, mit dem Nahen Osten verbinden und all diese verschiedenen Sprachen lernen können, und dennoch nimmt das Interesse am Sprachenlernen ab. And I did some research and, uh, I think more than 50% of schools give 45 minutes a week of instructional time to language learning. Und ich habe etwas recherchiert und, ähm, ich glaube, mehr als 50 % der Schulen widmen dem Sprachenlernen 45 Minuten Unterrichtszeit pro Woche.

So very little time is spent with language learning, interest in languages is declining. So wird sehr wenig Zeit mit dem Sprachenlernen verbracht, das Interesse an Sprachen nimmt ab. Uh, one of the reasons given is that students think that, um, languages are difficult. Uh, einer der angegebenen Gründe ist, dass die Schüler denken, dass Sprachen schwierig sind. So it's a risky subject to take up because you may not do well. Es ist also ein riskantes Thema, weil Sie vielleicht nicht gut abschneiden. And so that might affect your chances of getting into university and so forth and so on. Und das könnte sich auf Ihre Chancen auswirken, an die Universität zu kommen und so weiter und so weiter.

So I thought about this. So on the one hand, of course, it's hard to learn from a list, but on the other hand, I thought, you know, if you have a very concrete, specific goal, you have to learn 1700 words, then it's very clear, what you have to do in order to get grades on language, whichever German, Spanish, French. Also auf der einen Seite ist es natürlich schwer aus einer Liste zu lernen, aber auf der anderen Seite dachte ich, weißt du, wenn du ein ganz konkretes, bestimmtes Ziel hast, musst du 1700 Wörter lernen, dann ist es ganz klar , was Sie tun müssen, um Noten für die Sprache zu bekommen, egal ob Deutsch, Spanisch, Französisch.

Um, and I think there's something to be said for that, because I think now a lot of people don't know why they're even bothering to learn the language. Ähm, und ich denke, dafür gibt es etwas zu sagen, weil ich denke, dass viele Leute jetzt nicht wissen, warum sie sich überhaupt die Mühe machen, die Sprache zu lernen. Um, i myślę, że jest coś do powiedzenia na ten temat, ponieważ myślę, że teraz wiele osób nie wie, dlaczego w ogóle zawracają sobie głowę nauką języka. They don't know what they're supposed to achieve. Sie wissen nicht, was sie erreichen sollen. Uh, Unfortunately, this recommendation also suggested that the students be required to use these words and to use them correctly. Uh, leider schlug diese Empfehlung auch vor, dass die Schüler aufgefordert werden, diese Wörter zu verwenden und sie richtig zu verwenden.

That's much, much more difficult. Um, I think the objective of any language program should be to make the students like learning the language, even if they're not tremendously motivated to eventually use the language. Ähm, ich denke, das Ziel jedes Sprachprogramms sollte es sein, die Schüler dazu zu bringen, die Sprache zu lernen, auch wenn sie nicht besonders motiviert sind, die Sprache letztendlich zu verwenden. If they like the process because it's very clear cut "I have to learn 1700 words and I'm going to go about learning them"

um, that I think it's possible might induce more people to get interested in, in language because the task is kind of finite. Ähm, dass ich denke, dass es möglich ist, könnte mehr Leute dazu bringen, sich für Sprache zu interessieren, weil die Aufgabe irgendwie endlich ist. Yeah, I can do that. If I go at it for five years, I can learn 1700 words. Wenn ich es fünf Jahre lang mache, kann ich 1700 Wörter lernen. Uh, so on that level, it's not a bad idea. It's not a good idea, in my opinion, to demand grammatical accuracy from language learners in school, because so few of them end up speaking the language. Meiner Meinung nach ist es keine gute Idee, von Sprachlernenden in der Schule grammatikalische Genauigkeit zu verlangen, weil am Ende so wenige die Sprache sprechen.

What does it matter whether they are able to nail niceties of grammar at the age of 12? Was spielt es für eine Rolle, ob sie im Alter von 12 Jahren in der Lage sind, Feinheiten der Grammatik zu lernen? To me, it doesn't matter. Uh, if there's some way of making them enjoy the process of language learning so that they expose themselves to the language, they develop some degree of comprehension, they develop a certain level of vocabulary. Uh, wenn es eine Möglichkeit gibt, ihnen Spaß am Sprachenlernen zu machen, so dass sie sich der Sprache aussetzen, sie ein gewisses Maß an Verständnis entwickeln, sie ein gewisses Maß an Vokabular entwickeln.

That's good enough. And some of those people will be motivated enough to take it to another level right now. Very few relatively few graduates of schools in the UK end up speaking another language, the lowest level of any country in the European Union. Sehr wenige relativ wenige Schulabgänger im Vereinigten Königreich sprechen am Ende eine andere Sprache, das niedrigste Niveau aller Länder in der Europäischen Union. They're not... no longer in the European Union, say in Europe.

And I don't think the situation is much different in North America. So, but where I think they've gone, they've got it wrong with this list of 1700 keywords that you must learn is does let them learn any 1700 words. Why should you determine which words they have to learn? And if you set it up so that they learn these words through a process of listening and reading, like LingQ where you're looking at words and saving words, and we can keep track of the words you've learned, and we can even test you on your comprehension of these words in context, using close tests, using multiple choice and so forth, flashcards, whatever it might be. Uh, but why say you have to learn these words because one thing we know for sure is that the high frequency words they're going to show up anyway. So the first even thousand words, if you do a lot of reading and listening, you're going to get those words cause you're going to meet them so often, apparently theoretically, you need to meet a word eight times in order to have a 50% chance of remembering it.

So that's going to happen for the first thousand words. And then if you look at any analysis of frequency, frequency drops off so fast that for the next thousand words, so that might get us closer to where this, uh, British, uh, educational, uh, you know, authority was proposing 1700 words, you end up having to read two or three times as much in order to have a chance of meeting these words often enough to remember them. Besides which... pretty much it drops off so quickly that it doesn't really matter whether you learn the next thousand or the next, the, the thousand after that, they're all a lot less. Abgesehen davon... fällt es ziemlich schnell ab, dass es eigentlich egal ist, ob du die nächsten Tausend lernst oder die nächsten, die, die Tausend danach, die sind alle viel weniger.

And so what matters much more is what subject matter are you covering? If you are interested in sports, there are certain words that will appear more frequently. If you're interested in economics, other words will appear more frequently and as long as you have 2000 words, in other words, if you have exposed yourself to enough of the language, listening and reading that you actually know 2000 or 1700 words, whichever words they are good enough.

Now I'm going to get into the difference between word families and words. However you want to count them. If it's 1700 word families, maybe it's 5,000 words. It doesn't matter. Some numbers, some arbitrary number is what a student is responsible to learn. Not necessarily this specific list of words, but a specific number of words.

And you go on read whatever you want to read and listen to in that language. And we will test you on it. We'll test you on comprehension and if you do okay, then you're considered to have passed. In fact, I wouldn't even test them on comprehension in terms of, you know, answering questions about what happened and something they read, because that's a different skill.

Again, that's the skill of trying to remember what you heard. Uh, if we just testing them on say the objective is to get you to where you recognize in context, 2000, 3000 words, we test you on that. You do that. That's, what's going to give you your mark in the language. That might give the learners our greater sense of achievement.

Those people who are inclined, those learners, who are inclined to get enthusiastic about the language through their listening and reading through that sense of achievement, of, of understanding more and more of a language of enjoying content of interesting of interest to them. Those people will take it further.

And so with them, the objective of, of turning learners into enthusiastic learners will be achieved. Remember, there are two keys I often talk about three, but let's talk about two fundamental keys of language learning. One is the attitude of the learner, the enthusiasm, the interest, the motivation, and the other is the time spent.

So if teachers can motivate their learners to spend the time for whatever reason, because have a very concrete task learn 2000 or 3000. Or because through learning these words and phrases through a lot of listening and reading, they have a sense of achievement and they have this sense of understanding and other language.

And then they are interested in learning more about the language. Then that again is a major, um, you know, should be a major goal of, of language instruction. I always have, whenever I talk about how I learn languages, inevitably, the language teachers who prefer to have... and who always say, well, that's fine for you because you're motivated, but I have a classroom full of unmotivated learners. Ich habe immer, wenn ich darüber spreche, wie ich Sprachen lerne, zwangsläufig die Sprachlehrer, die es vorziehen, ... und die immer sagen, na, das ist in Ordnung für Sie, weil Sie motiviert sind, aber ich habe ein Klassenzimmer voller Unmotivierter Lernende.

So therefore your system would never work. Therefore they do what they've always done, which in fact, isn't very motivating, which is teaching grammar and then testing them on grammar and finding that they get six out of 10. And so therefore they're discouraged. So that's not motivated maybe rather than saying, well, Steve you're motivated.

So your system works for you, but I have unmotivated students, therefore it won't work. How about figuring out how to motivate the students? Maybe not all of them, but a larger number than are motivated right now. And maybe with an approach like that, we won't see this dropping off of interest in language learning, which is a major issue in the UK, uh, and probably in, in North America, despite all of the enthusiastic teachers. I have met them. I've met them at the, uh, American council of teachers of foreign languages. And there are lots of them. And yet the statistics are there. There's less and less interest in foreign languages. So something is not working.

One solution suggested here by this, and I'm going to leave all the relative links in the description. Is this idea of having a list of words that you have to learn. It may or may not work, but obviously what is, and this is despite years of research like studies. Whenever I go and search on the internet, I find detailed studies about all different aspects of, of language learning.

Most of which refer to who what's happened, what happens in a classroom as if that's the only place where you learn languages, which of course it isn't. Uh, the classroom should be where you turn people on to learning languages. They will learn them elsewhere on their own if they're turned on. But despite 50 years of research, all we see is declining interest in language learning. Aber trotz 50 Jahren Forschung sehen wir nur ein sinkendes Interesse am Sprachenlernen.

We don't see increased success in language instruction at school, in the UK or North America. Maybe it's not so complicated. Maybe people shouldn't over-complicate it. Maybe they should just stick with what Krashen says, and what I definitely have experienced in my language learning. And that is if you can expose yourself to enough of the language you're going to learn, and some people will be motivated enough to do that others won't be.

And if they at least have a very concrete task at school, you have to learn 2000 words and we're going to test you on it in using cloze tests or multiple choice. So then they have a clear idea of what their expected to so. Some people will only do that. And I think maybe as many people as now or more will be motivated to take it further.

And so with that, I'll leave you with, I'd be interested in your comments on this and maybe a couple of videos where I've talked a bit about motivation and input and how that helps us learn languages. Thank you for listening. Bye for now.