The battle over English: It’s long been happening in France and more recently, there has been anti-English language remarks by an Indian leader. What will become of this world language, especially in China, where English has, in the past several years, been one of the primary measures of success in schools? Offbeat China reported October 23 that Beijing education authorities are considering downplaying the emphasis they school system puts on English language learning, reasoning that with too much focus on English, Chinese language – and with it, it’s culture – risks getting lost.
Sound familiar?
Read the article below:
“4-year-olds are the main targets of our English training programs. Parents fear that it would be too late to start learning English at an older age.” A staff at a Beijing English training center explained. Many of the center’s customers have their kids start English training at 2 when they probably cannot yet speak their mother tongue fluently.
Nothing better depicts China’s obsession with English. But could a downgrade of English in formal education cool off people’s fanatic passion of the alphabetic language and revive interests in Chinese?
Read the full article here.
This post first appeared in the beijinger on October 24 and has been slightly modified.
Photo courtesy of Rex Pe
