Page 18 - ELG2011 Nov Issue 473

YOUNG LEARNERS SPECIAL . SPECIAL FEATURE

Leaning into Pisa sending children on school trips to language
In Europe, there is a long tradition of

schools in English-speaking countries. It’s not
in one week, though language anxiety has
Melanie Butler predicts the effect of the new tests ROSSHELEN / SHUTTERSTOCK clear how much language they actually learn
been shown to drop dramatically, which in
he plan to introduce, in the OECD’s representative sample of 15-year-olds in each turn is shown to improve speaking scores.
If there is one thing that Anglosphere
2024 Pisa tests (see page 7), an territory, whereas candidates for Ielts and schools are really good at, however, it is test
optional foreign language Toefl (whose scores correlated extremely preparation – they routinely get Ielts results
Tassessment, will increase the pressure closely) are largely drawn from super-bright up half a band score in two weeks. For best
on school systems around the world to and often super-rich 18-24-year-olds. The results, though, they need to know the task
improve the level of English of their under- results, however, do generally seem to match type a test uses, so short, test-oriented school
16s. the one international test for 15-year-olds we trips will work best once we know what the
Many governments set huge store on their do have: the EU tests designed by Cambridge Pisa test actually looks like.
countries’ Pisa results. Rumour has it, for which were piloted in 17 European countries And finally, in desperation, countries will
example, that Poland reduced its emphasis on in 2012. turn to the British Council and beg for mass
English to increase classroom time dedicated We also included the English scores for the Despite a language far removed from English, Estonians do very well on the Pisa, perhaps because of the multilingual nature of the country teacher training in communicative
to the three subjects currently tested: maths, majority English-speaking countries which, methodology.
science and reading. you will notice, are not the highest. In the Singapore comes top when we add in Again, the evidence suggests this will not
Whatever Poland did to improve its Pisa case of Toefl, that may be partly because the English scores, though China maintains The secret of success always work. Two large research assessment
scores, it worked. If you look at the Pisa 2018 score is the average of everyone who took the second place, despite ranking 111 for English! exercises, one from the Welsh government,
table on page 19, which ranks countries Only two other East Asian territories, Hong the other from the University of Oxford,
based on the mean average of all three Kong and Macau, stay in the top ten while found that the language level of the teacher
subjects, Poland ranks number 11, just below Could the Taiwan drops to number 22 and Japan and at Pisa English tests had much more impact on student outcomes
Finland. Korea don’t even make our ranking. than any methodology. If the teacher does
Now, the OECD disapproves of averaging introduction of Meanwhile, Northern Europe leads the not speak the language to a good level,
the scores across the subjects, but national optional English tests rush up the ranking, with Eastern and nobody learns anything.
governments and, of course, the media do it Central Europe close behind. Southern Melanie Butler looks at evidence- That’s the reason why Xavier Gisbert,
anyway. So, could the introduction of turn the Pisa tables Europe still doesn’t get a look in – the mastermind of Madrid’s successful Clil
optional English tests turn the Pisa tables English test scores for Latin language based language policies programme, insisted that all teachers must
upside down? upside down? countries, though higher than those from speak the target language to C1 and paid for
As part of the media, and as a magazine Asia, are significantly lower than for the rest them to take classes in local language schools
which does its share of ranking, EL Gazette test in that country, so will include of Europe and not enough – when averaged ountries around the world have The problem may lie with the tests. Early and to attend summer schools in the
decided to see what would happen if we international students. Ielts scores for a with their scores in the other Pisa subjects – spent many years trying to improve learners, like native speakers, tend to be Anglosphere. The level of the student will
added English scores into the mix. We used a country are based on nationality, but for the to push them to the top tier. the English language levels of their better at recognising grammaticality and using never exceed that of the teachers, he tells
combination of national average Toefl scores one English-speaking country where we do In terms of language learning, the results Cchildren. With the emergence of collocations, but do less well in tests of overt me.
and, where available, Ielts scores by country have results from both tests the correlation closely mirror those from the EU tests in Pisa tests of English, the demand for effective knowledge. One reason, perhaps, that the So, if you want to improve the language
and used the marking base and score between them is very close. 2012 where the speakers of Germanic language policies will increase. So, what Pisa ranking of the UK actually goes down level of your students, improve the language
distribution system used by the OECD to So, what is the impact of adding in English? languages, like Dutch and Swedish, had the might they do, and will it actually work? when you add in our scores on EFL tests. level of your teachers.
come up with a proxy Pisa-style English Well, it’s bad news for East Asia. In the highest scores, with the Slavic language Perhaps the most commonly adopted In Asia, the
score. Pisa 2018 ranking, 6 of the top ten ranking speakers a little behind on average and the measure is starting English earlier, but favourite solution is
Of course, the population of students countries come from the region, or 7 if you Latin speakers following on behind. children in many countries are already sticking a native-
taking the Pisa tests are a demographically count Singapore, which is in South East Asia. This fits in with the language distance starting in year one. speaker graduate in
hypothesis which posits that it is easier to each state school.
learn a closely related language, as Dutch is Japan has been doing
to English, then a more distantly related one, In Asia, the this for 40 years with
like Spanish. Hardest of all is learning a seemingly little
completely unrelated language like Dutch favourite solution is impact. The Korean
compared to Arabic. government became
Indeed, as we reported last issue, in a sample sticking a native so disillusioned with
of 50,000 migrants learning Dutch, language speaker graduate in the lack of progress
difference was key – with only the best 5 per from its own scheme
cent for L1 Arabic-speakers doing better than each state school. that it started to cut
the bottom 50 per cent of Germans. Japan has been it, until angry parents
However, this does not explain the demanded it back.
excellent results of Estonia – not only on doing this for 40 years A more successful
Toefl, but also in the EU 2012 test. Estonian model was used in
and Finnish are Uralic languages which are with seemingly Uruguay’s plan Ceibal.
not Indo-European. little impact. Senior schoolteachers
However, both of them are multilingual with a specialism in
countries: a quarter of Estonians speak English, often non-
Russian, while all Finnish school children More importantly, there is evidence that natives, appeared in
spend four years learning the language of when it comes to results on formal language the class online –
their main minority, Swedish. The top Asian tests, starting younger may not be better. In working with the
country for English is Singapore and the 2016, a large German cohort study followed classroom teacher. US
highest English score overall came from two groups of children, one which started company Eleutian has
Switzerland and with Belgium, Macao and English at 8 years-old, the other at 11. While successfully used a
Hong Kong all ranking highly, multilingual the early starters got higher test scores at age similar approach in
territories may have the advantage. 12, by 16 the late starters were ahead. Korea and China.

18 November 2020 editorial@elgazette.com 19