… bilingual English classes?
For several years, students of “Callatis” High School have been offered bilingual English classes. Every level, from the 9th to the 11th grades, has at least one such class, studying English for 6 classes per week.
Is this beneficial for the students? They say it is! They work a lot for these classes, both in the classroom and at home, doing grammar exercises, writing essays, browsing the internet for sources of information, reading materials and writing their own materials for different school projects or to be posted on our school blog, English@CallatisHigh. Our students’ level of English allows them to effectively communicate their ideas, to participate in contests and, last but not least, to apply for continuing their education in prestigious universities in the UK.
Some critics argue that neither the students going to UK nor the universities they applied to are the best. These critics are aware that this is only partially correct, but they like to make it sound as if it were the general situation mainly because that’s what critics do: love to hear themselves talking and sounding omniscient…
In his recent visit to our school, the author of the Straightforward coursebook series, Philip Kerr, told the students he met and worked with that their level of English is very good and way higher than that of students’ their age across Europe and encouraged them to continue studying languages because, if they aim at working abroad, they will need at least four languages in their future jobs.
Whom should we believe then? Local critics who boast with their minimal level of English but couldn’t have a decent conversation with a foreigner or a teacher of English? Or an English native author of coursebooks?
