Quote:
Originally Posted by Yolina
That's when it gets interesting as we can see how things are taught in different countries - though in my case we're talking more than 20 years ago! In France we had to take 2 compulsory foreign languages: the first one at around 12 years old I think - normally English but some schools did offer German as well, and a second one got added on a couple of years later - usual choice would have been English (for those decided to go with German first!), German, Spanish, Italian and some schools had Russian too. I also had to do Latin for a couple of years, didn't particulary enjoy that but it hasn't traumatised me either (and I *still* remember bits of it)
|
Oh, the first year, I had Dutch, English and French, the second Dutch, English, French and German. The third year, the same. The fourth year, you made (it's been changed about a dozen times the last 20 or so years...) a choice about what subjects to take. And that's when you had to start reading those books in those languages you took.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yolina
For French classes we didn't have a choice - we were told "we're going to study X book" and that was it - all classics, nothing modern, though I couldn't now say exactly which books we did, I remember Rabelais, Moliere, Corneille, Racine and Victor Hugo. No always fun or entertaining, but again it never put me off reading, it just had to be done and that was that.
|
That's the same for me (mostly), but then, I've always loved reading. But can you imagine somebody who likes to read, but nothing more than that? And that person is also an adolescent who will always push against the rules and regulations?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yolina
Reading books in foreign languages wasn't part of our curiculum - lots of grammar though from what I can remember! However (and luckily for me) one of my English teachers realised that my English was much better than anyone else in the class, so she started lending me books in English to read instead of me just sitting there getting bored to death going over something I already knew.
|
I even had to read those French and German books the first three years (or 4 if you did another branch of our high school system), but those are mostly the easy books, children's books. Once you got to the last two years, the difficulty shot up and you were required to read "adult" books, mostly literature. And let me tell you, Dutch literature is boring! (though, I did find the one and only science fiction book that was also part of the list! Can't remember what it was called, though...)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yolina
Even though I've been in the UK for nearly 18 years, I still buy plenty of French books (and obviously lots of English books too). There's just so many out there to choose from, I wouldn't let a few books I was made to read and didn't like ruin the enjoyment of the many others I can choose to read!
|
Most Dutch writers write horror, or drama. Or literature. Can't stand any of those. The last mostly because of that childhood trauma
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yolina
That's rather worrying...
|
Yes, it was... But who cared, those who read the worst, were the best football players!