The Worst Countries to Learn English-Part I

"Ukraine is one of the worst countries in Europe in terms of English abilities, coming in at 43rd place out of 88 countries and in 28th place out of 32 European countries in a ranking of English proficiency. " - by Kyiv Post

Photo by UNIAN

Here's an interesting topic. Yes, the best and worst place to learn a foreign language. I'll narrow it down to just English. Before going further, let's start by this question. What determines the rankings?

Without a doubt, a big portion of the factors is our life-long companion, examination which is what this article will be circled around. Just yesterday I was having a discussion with a student of mine on why we have tests at all and should they even exist "in schools".

Interestingly, his impression on tests is that it makes him nervous, inadequate and lack of confidence but later on added that "we should still have tests because they help students improve and be competitive".

A little contradicted, isn't it? My theory is that the suppressed, given time, will likely to help its suppressor. People get pushed for long enough and they will lose hope, try to rationalize their hardship and push along. Most of us, if not all, have excluded the scenario of a school system without tests.

Here's what it does:

1. create proof to discipline those who don't follow (pressure)

2. keep track of how much or little you learn (quantification of knowledge)

3. showcase (vanity)

Do tests produce good results? Yes, it does make some of us want to be better by looking at our result after working really hard. Let's get real though, how many of those people are we talking about? Public education is supposed to help the general public to maintain to a standard, pulling up instead of pushing down.

Nonetheless, let's look at the part where tests make us competitive. Competition has never been a fun part of school. No... it's a game designed to have winners and losers and there will only be one winner. The rest of the "players" are just fighting for less of losers. I am certain that this... this is not the reason we go to school. This... is not the goal of education. It's the complete opposite.

---

Personally, I've been to Ukraine. That's why seeing that article entitled "Ukraine one of the worst countries at speaking English" got my attention. On a side note, if it wasn't so bad, perhaps I wouldn't have had the chance to go.

Ukrainians speak their own language Ukrainian and also Russian. It's similar to our Chinese and that of China's I suppose. However, lacking international cooperation and with powerful nationalism (different states vary), when being in Ukraine you either learn to become them or you struggle. Capital aside, walking in the streets of Ukraine, you barely see anything other than its own language and culture. This explains why they're not good at speaking English or the English language at all: [There's no need for English.]

Needless to say, language learning requires environment. How can you learn when the only reason to learn is that you have to. Besides, there's also that friend called examination, remember? I'm surprised to have seen some of my students like English, to be honest. Now that I recall and examine more deeply, of course, they didn't like it from their classes. We're not in the 90s.

To be continued.

#education