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Results of English learning speak for themselves

By Wang Ying (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-08-05 09:07

The faces of a boy and girl from a famous children's book are showing up on a variety of fanfare.

But the popular characters whose mugs adorn a growing number of T-shirts, schoolbags and stationary are not from any best-selling novel or comic series - rather, the lovable lad and lass hail from the 1990 edition of the national High School English Textbook.

Students practice English at a primary school in Dexing, Jiangxi province, in front of an Olympic bulletin board in May. [Zhao Zhongwei]

It seems a fad anchored in nostalgia. Surely, the lives of Li Lei, the boy, and Han Meimei, the girl, are not nearly as exciting as those of Harry Potter and his pals, whose shenanigans at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry proffer white-knuckled, edge-of-the-seat adventure.

But they have become icons emblazed in the collective memory of China's 20-somethings who have studied English all their lives, starting with the exploits of Li and Han. Some 6 million students, who started high school between 1993 and 2000, are all too familiar with the doings of these youngsters, as portrayed in a colorfully illustrated series.

It was this demographic that began, as a group, to really speak English, listening to native speakers and learning about the customs of those for whom English was the native tongue.

They were envied by their elders, many of whom still felt "deaf and dumb" after studying English for six years in junior and senior high school.

When the first batch of high school students using the new textbook graduated in 1999, Southwest China Normal University in Chongqing municipality conducted a study comparing the English proficiencies of these graduates with those of their predecessors from the 1980s.

The study included more than 10,000 students from across the country. It found the average score of 1999 graduates was higher than those of their predecessors. Their overall speaking and writing proficiencies, and listening and reading comprehensions, were also better.

Perhaps nobody was more delighted by this than Liu Daoyi, chief editor of the series, which was the first official national English textbook jointly produced by top Chinese publisher People's Education Press and its international partner, Longman Press (UK), since New China was founded in 1949.

"I feel amazed that the textbook had such an impact on young people," said Liu, the education press' former deputy editor-in-chief, who coauthored the textbook with Briton N. J. Grant.

The 70-year-old Liu, who retired a decade ago, spent nearly half a century teaching English, and writing and editing English textbooks, for children. She was in touch with the dramatic changes in the textbooks and the ways English has been taught in classrooms over the past few decades.

In the 1950s, Russian was the most widely taught foreign language in schools. After China reclaimed its seat in the United Nations in 1971 and President Richard Nixon's historic visit to the country in 1972, learning English became fashionable among young people.

However, as the "cultural revolution" (1966-76) regarded most foreign things as "decadent", English textbooks were filled with Chinese political jargon. There were stories, but almost all were about the lives of Chinese people.

The launch of China's reform and opening up in 1978 boosted foreign-language learning's popularity, as the country geared itself towards introducing advanced science and technology from overseas.

However, due to a lack of proper English textbooks and qualified language teachers, English learning became a headache for most Chinese students. It was the most demanding but least useful subject in the 1980s.

Even Liu admitted that English textbooks before the 1990 edition burdened students with so much emphasis on grammar and various sentence structures that language learning became a rote exercise.

"And learning a foreign language well means more than merely mastering the grammar, pronunciation and words; it also means learning native speakers' culture, including customs, habits and social norms," Liu said.

"The new textbook also offered students ample opportunities to listen and to speak, as we believe the function of language is to use it for communication," Liu said.

Although the textbook series by Liu and Grant were the most widely used by schools in the 1990s, English textbooks have since diversified.

One of the most popular has been New Concept English, created by UK linguist L.G. Alexander. Since it entered the Chinese market in the 1980s, more than 200 million copies of various editions of the series have been sold, figures from the Beijing-based Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press showed.

"Highlighting communication skills, New Concept English has a complete and well-tried system for learning English as a foreign language, enabling students to reach their maximum potential in the four primary skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing," said Yu Zilong, an English-language editor of the press, who also taught English in high schools for eight years.

Since the beginning of the new millennium, English teaching in China has started to highlight creativity, independent thinking and teamwork.

Learners are given tasks, such as evaluating an opinion or finishing a story that lacks a conclusion. Students are explorers, active learners who bring a great deal to the learning process, Yu said.

In 2001, primary schools in China officially started to introduce English courses for 3rd-graders.

Nowadays, children have had much more practice, and their English-language ability rises every year, Yu said.