Chapter 106 If you pay attention, you will find that in the whole of Asia, only Japanese people do not speak English

Here, it is necessary to talk about English education in Japan. After many twists and turns, the Ministry of Education finally stipulated that starting from the fifth grade of elementary school, students should be given early English education once a week.It now appears that there is no need to do so.Because most of the politicians in Japan don't know what English is, the Ministry of Education can't handle English education. They don't know how to implement English education. After Abe came to power, he tried to popularize English education from the fifth grade of primary school, and set English as a compulsory course. The then Minister of Education, Culture, Sports and Culture Ibuki said: "There is no need to make English compulsory. If you can't speak beautiful Japanese , learning any foreign language is useless!"

It can only be said that this is the misfortune of Japanese children for such a person to be the top leader of the education administration department. Everyone knows that English is now the universal language of the world, and it is the standard language of the world.Business, academic, political and diplomatic activities cannot be carried out without speaking English, not to mention Japanese.And if children are not allowed to learn English, it is equivalent to lacking hands from the beginning of their lives. In 1999, the media reported that “the average TOEFL score of the Japanese is the lowest in Asia.” At that time, Japan’s TOEFL average score was 498 (the computer-based test score was not available at the time), and it was tied with North Korea for the lowest score in Asia. Today, it has Over the past 10 years, TOEFL test scores in Japan have not improved.

Japan is an important part of the global economy, and our lives are closely related to the global economy.Therefore, Ibuki's remarks are actually the theory of seclusion of the country. His so-called choice between beautiful Japanese and practical English is inherently absurd.Our economy cannot grow and our country cannot stand in the world if none of our people speak English. For example, Germany is not an English-speaking country, but the English level of the whole country has been very high in the past 10 years. This all stems from the fact that when companies such as Hoechst, Bayer, Siemens, and Daimler made large-scale acquisitions in the United States, the Germans realized that "you will not be able to run the company if you don't know English." Expand in the enterprise.They always have a sense of crisis, that is, "if the branch in the United States does not manage well, it will endanger the parent company in this country."

Afterwards, this kind of awareness quickly had an impact in various universities in Germany, and then students told their parents about it. It didn't take long for the whole of Germany to start learning English from elementary school. Ten years later, Germany has made great progress in English. Now English is the lingua franca of the whole European world, and it is also the standard language of business. The same is true in Asia, except of course Japan. Let’s take an example. When the financial crisis broke out in South Korea in 1997, it received assistance from the International Monetary Fund. This required all employees of Korean companies to understand English. In Samsung’s entrance exam, the TOEIC The test must have a score of 900 or more.

The same is true in college.I am a visiting professor at Yonsei University and Ewha Womans University, and I give lectures in English, which students can understand. Ewha Womans University and Korea University have stipulated that teachers must use English in lectures long ago in order to cultivate talents who are in line with the world, so the competition among teachers is also very fierce. "SKY University" in the traditional sense of Korea refers to Seoul National University (S, formerly Seoul University), Korea University (K) and Yonsei University (Y).In addition, the most famous among women's universities is Ewha Womans University.Among them, Korea University first implemented English teaching, and then other schools began to follow suit.

Of course, under such an upsurge in English learning, primary schools must have already carried out early education in English. As mentioned above, China has also spent a lot of effort on English education. In 2001, the state stipulated that English education should be implemented from the first grade of primary school. There is even a video on YouTube that says, "By 2015, the number of English speakers in China will surpass that of the United States." Up to now, English education in Japan is still at the level of "the third person of the verb should be added with 's', and how to distinguish the article 'the' from 'a'", which is caused by our unique "〇X-style education". of.

In the past 10 years, the distance between Japan and these countries has begun to widen. I worry that in the next 10 years, the gap between us and other countries will be even greater.Many young people in China and South Korea have gradually become bilingual, while young people in Japan can only speak Japanese. If this continues, young people in Japan will become "frogs at the bottom of the well". The day is not far away.