Print      Print
Search    

The Study of English as a Foreign Language *

1968– 1973

This study mirrored the French as a Foreign Language Study and took place at the same time (with data collection also in 1971). It employed a similar test of reading, listening, writing, and speaking. The objectives of this study included - an examination of the place of English in the educational system - an examination of the relationship between level of achievement and characteristics of the student, teacher, school, and the country - an analysis of errors made by students in responding to the test in order to obtain a grater understanding of how students learn English.

Target Population

The target population was 14-year-old students and students in the final grade of the secondary school.

Participating Educational Systems

Belgium (French), Chile, Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), Finland, Hungary, Israel, Netherlands, Sweden, Thailand.

Key Findings

  1. There was a strong relationship between students’ verbal ability (measured by word knowledge in their mother tongue) and their achievement in English. Many errors in responding to the test arose not from an absence of linguistic competence but from a lack of general ability.
  2. Both numbers of hours of instruction in English and number of years of studying of English were substantially related to achievement. The grade level at which the learning of English as a foreign language normally commenced was positively and moderately correlated with achievement. Countries that began earlier had, in general, higher standards of achievement at the 14-year-old level.
  3. Conducting classes in English was moderately associated with student achievement at the secondary school level and weakly associated with achievement at the 14-year-old level.
  4. The students studying English in the Federal Republic of Germany, Finland, Israel, Italy, and Sweden tended to be more representative of the total school population than were the students studying French as a foreign language in the Netherlands and the English-speaking countries. These students came from higher status and more educative homes.
  5. The teaching of English as a foreign language in the participation countries was more for business purposes than for the cultural value of the language. More than 80 percent of students were studying English in seven of the 10 countries participating in the survey.

Major Publications

 

Lewis, E.G., & Massad, C.E. (1975).

The Teaching of English as a Foreign Language in Ten Countries.

Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell; New York: John Wiley.

 

Walker, D.A. (1976).

The IEA Six-Subject Survey: An Empirical Study of Education in Twenty-One Countries.

Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell; New York: John Wiley & Sons.

 

* Part of the Six-Subject Survey

 

< < prev     next > >