Uk Language Teaching

I recently took on a new student who wanted help in two directions. One, to help him with his A level studies and two, to help him speak the language better for a work experience visit to Spain next Feb. I was a little worried as I have never taken an exam in Spanish and did not know what level he would be at and how much I could help him. The student is 16 years old and has studied Spanish for almost 5 years having completed his GCSE. As I explored his knowledge on our first lesson I could not believe how little he actually knew. We went through an A level test paper ( a fill in the gaps test). This test could not have been more irrelevant with obscure vocabulary. Bear in mind this student was of Polish parentage and had learned English as a second language, which he spoke better than me. So he understood the requirements of language learning and had engaged me to improve his learning. The bottom line is this (casting no aspersions on the student): He did not know how to ask for the bill in a restaurant He did not know the word for yesterday He could not say tomorrow morning He was only just starting to learn the past tense! No wonder we do not speak foreign languages! In Puerto Banus I worked with two Spanish language graduates, yes, they had been to university to learn Spanish. One could speak the language comfortably, the other could not utter a sentence. The one who could speak Spanish had lived as a nanny in Madrid for a year. How about that. You get a DEGREE in Spanish and cannot speak the language!. Until we address language teaching in this country we will never compete in Europe. I despair at the pathetic standards our young people have to put up with.