I discovered on Saturday, a fairly recent innovation in Germany, bi-lingual schools. The intent, I am told, is to encourage mor fluency in English. Thus, a certain percentage of subjects (in the case of my friend's children, all the sciences) are taught in English, often with native English speakers. Other subjects, are taught in German.
The thinking is obvious, the learners get fluency in two languages as they are forced to use two, with a degree of regularity, but is not forced to learn everything in the foreign language, as would be the case with English medium schools. Given the number of official languages in South Africa, maybe this is also a viable way of encouraging bilingualism? Personally, while I was taught Afrikaans at school, there was no motivation for gaining any level of fluency, since it was only one subject, and a minor one at that. Being forced to learn Afrikaans, for another subject, would have certainly provided greater practice and motivation to learn.
1 comment:
Hmmm - we already have bilingual schools here - perhaps you are not familiar with them? Long established concept. It's been a long, long time since you were at school, son.
More importantly, the Germans are not the only one's: increasing globalisation requires common languages of communication, and while French was in vogue previously, it is clear that English has taken over.
But, what do I know - I'm just the ex-girlfriend who is amused by your superfluous expenditure of opinion :D
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