English Should not be Compulsory in High School

[MattNelson]

Fun fact: English is the world's #1 second language.

It will always be required in high school, especially in America.

 

[The Atheist]

What are years 12 & 13? 12 year old and 13 year olds?

6th & 7th form.

We used "forms" up until about 1990, when someone decided we should move to the American model of using the years at school.

 

[Thermal]

6th & 7th form.

We used "forms" up until about 1990, when someone decided we should move to the American model of using the years at school.

We don't have a year 13 in the States, really. That is freshman/first year of college

 

[The Atheist]

We don't have a year 13 in the States, really. That is freshman/first year of college

Your "kindergarten" year is Year 1 here, so the end result if the same.

 

[theprestige]

6th & 7th form.

We used "forms" up until about 1990, when someone decided we should move to the American model of using the years at school.

Your "kindergarten" year is Year 1 here, so the end result if the same.

The American model uses grades, not years, though.

Kindergarten, first grade, second grade... twelfth grade. America is a large and diverse country, so I wouldn't be surprised if there's some subgroup or dialect somewhere that refers to third grade as "year three", but that's not how it's been talked about in any part of America I've ever been to.

 

[smartcooky]

In Australian high schools, mathematics is not compulsory in the last two years of high school, but English is.

This has always struck me as a highly discriminatory practice as some of us will never be able to get a decent result in this subject, while at the same time we are capable of getting top marks in subjects such as mathematics or languages.

I have no objection to English being compulsory in the lower years of high school, but our marks in the final year of high school have a strong influence in what we will be able to do in life.

I am pretty sure that those of us who will never be able to write an essay on what TS Eliot meant by his poems have a great deal to contribute to society and should not have this built in disadvantage at the most important year of our schooling.

I would be interested in hearing other perspectives on this.

Judging by the number of High School leavers I encounter every day in my business, both as clients and as job applicants, whose spelling, grammar and ability to write coherently is nothing short of atrocious, I completely disagree with your suggestion. In fact, if someone gives me a CV full of grammatical and spelling errors, I pretty much rule them out for employment before any other consideration.

If anything, the teaching of English language should be strengthened. IMO, at senior school levels English should be split into two separate subjects; Communications English (which should be compulsory) and English Literature (which could be optional).

 

[smartcooky]

We don't have a year 13 in the States, really. That is freshman/first year of college

You do, you just call it 12th grade; the 13th year of your education system.

Your First Grade is our Year 2.

 

[zooterkin]

What are years 12 & 13? 12 year old and 13 year olds?

The same as years 12 & 13 in the UK.

17 and 18 years old, roughly. Sixth form, under the old system.

In the UK, they’re doing A levels, specialising in 3 or 4 subjects usually, which could be English but that’s not required.

 

[Trebuchet]

I feel like every engineer should have a very good understanding of at least one poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes: The One-Hoss Shay.

I can't count the times I have used this poem with engineers.

Thanks, I enjoyed reading that again!

As an engineering major in college, I was required to take a course in technical writing, taught by the English department. It took very little time to learn that no Engineering professor would accept a paper written in the manner taught by that course.

 

[Thermal]

You do, you just call it 12th grade; the 13th year of your education system.

No, we don't have a 13th. That would be unlucky, so we invented kidnergarden, as a garden for kidners.

USA! USA!

 

[angrysoba]

Mine was split "English language" and "English literature" and we had separate exams for both. The language section was about comprehension and structure of language and the lit was critical analysis of novels, stories, plays, poetry (yes they really did force us to deal with such obscenities) and so on.

Very surprised that maths isn't required in the last two years, that seems very strange.

Yes, but that wasn’t what them foreigners call “high school”; it’s what they call “junior high school”. I think Robin also makes it pretty clear that the English subject being studied in high school is English literature with the complaint about T.S Eliot. In the UK I don’t think there are any compulsory subjects in “high school”.

 

[smartcooky]

No, we don't have a 13th. That would be unlucky, so we invented kidnergarden, as a garden for kidners.

USA! USA!

Count 'em

New Hampshire
Massachusetts
Connecticut
Rhode Island
New York
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
Delaware
Maryland
Virginia
North Carolina
South Carolina
Georgia

Stars and Stripes: Count 'em

Unlucky for some....

 

[theprestige]

You do, you just call it 12th grade; the 13th year of your education system.

Your First Grade is our Year 2.

The point is we don't call it Year 13. Just like you don't call your Year 2 "First Grade".

 

[marting]

Since I didn't take English, but the Americanized bastardization of English in school I've always had a different interpretation of:

"Knock her up in the morning"

 

[Minoosh]

Very surprised that maths isn't required in the last two years, that seems very strange.

When Algebra 2 gets around to factoring quadratic equations with complex roots, I secretly end up agreeing with the students that most will not use this stuff in "real life." Actually what trips them up more than anything else is arithmetic when it involves decimals or fractions.

I think Algebra 2 got started because by the freshman year of college most students could not remember anything from Algebra 1. It's mostly the same stuff.

 

[Sideroxylon]

Given the amysmal grasp of the English language of so man Australians, I have absolutely no problem with compulsory English to year 12.

If you haven’t got a grasp after 10 years of school, two years of literary analysis is not going to help.

 

[theprestige]

If you haven’t got a grasp after 10 years of school, two years of literary analysis is not going to help.

Presumably those with a weaker grasp will be taking compulsory remedial classes, rather than the more advanced compulsory classes for those in a position to deepen their mastery of the nuances.

 

[angrysoba]

Given the amysmal [sic] grasp of the English language of so man [sic] Australians, I have absolutely no problem with compulsory English to year 12.

Are we talking about poor written English or spoken English? I understand that Australians have a weird colloquial vocabulary, but that is a normal part of natural languages having regional varieties and it is poor form to denounce non-standard English as somehow inferior or "incorrect". Furthermore, when you mention the poor English skills of Australians, do you mean those for whom English is a second language and/or those who migrated, or those who were born and raised there, in English, and went through the entire Australian curriculum?

 

[Trebuchet]

Count 'em

New Hampshire
Massachusetts
Connecticut
Rhode Island
New York
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
Delaware
Maryland
Virginia
North Carolina
South Carolina
Georgia

Stars and Stripes: Count 'em

[qimg]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b3/Flag_of_the_United_States_%281777-1795%29.svg/353px-Flag_of_the_United_States_%281777-1795%29.svg.png[/qimg]

Unlucky for some....

And look at the mess that country is in now! Unlucky indeed, it just took a while.

When Algebra 2 gets around to factoring quadratic equations with complex roots, I secretly end up agreeing with the students that most will not use this stuff in "real life." Actually what trips them up more than anything else is arithmetic when it involves decimals or fractions.

I think Algebra 2 got started because by the freshman year of college most students could not remember anything from Algebra 1. It's mostly the same stuff.

I have used quadratics and trigonometry in real life. But I agree about the fractions and decimals. Especially the decimals, because when I went to college calculators weren't a thing and slide rules wouldn't put the decimal in correctly.

 

[arthwollipot]

As I understand it (and my kids are all grown up now so it's been a few years) the way it goes in Canberra is like this:

Preschool - 1 year. This is only a little more advanced than daycare.

Kindergarten - 1 year.

1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade, 6th grade - primary school.

Year 7, year 8, year 9, year 10 - high school.

Year 11, year 12 - secondary college.

When I was in high school, there were no electives in Year 7, and in Year 8 I got to choose what electives I would have for the other three years (I chose Latin, History and Technical Drawing). Year 11 and 12 were all electives, except for English, Maths, and Science, which were compulsory.

I'd like to see kids these days study more English grammar and spelling, because what they have now is atrocious. On the other hand, written language is evolving alongside spoken, and while awful from a grammar traditionalist perspective, it is rarely unreadable.