gregotch - one thing I am not saying is that children in the UK are "fick" or stupid. What I am saying is that they are being badly let down by an education system that claims to be doing a good job, but isn't. What we need to do to ensure that UK companies employ UK people is educate today's student properly.
Agree wholeheartedly and not just properly in some areas, but consistantly across the whole country and across all groups. Dont see it happening in whats left of my lifetime though. political assasinations are whats needed(sniper rifles not newspapers),hurry up n thin out the old boys club,let the country bloom again.:Hilarious:
"Agree wholeheartedly and not just properly in some areas, but consistantly across the whole country and across all groups. Dont see it happening in whats left of my lifetime though. political assasinations are whats needed(sniper rifles not newspapers),hurry up n thin out the old boys club,let the country bloom again." Could everyone spell properly and use apostrophes correctly in your day then?
I refuse to believe that people being imported from eastern Europe and the like are being brought over for their English skills. I speak French fluently, having studied and worked across the Channel, so I know first hand just how challenging it is to master a foreign language well enough to be able to use it confidently in a working environment. It may well be that there are other skills they bring to our economy – and I could not comment on that. But purely for their prowess at English - sorry, that's just counter intuitive. Do you not also think that the fact such employees often have lower living costs because they are single and not establishing family lives here, so demand lower wages, has an impact on their attractiveness to employers?
Tbh i didnt know everyone in my day,do you? Didnt need to,one there was no internet ,we did a thing called "talking",sometimes going for a double "going out to meet each other and talk." Im not a pretend intellectual,nor a pretend typist,i type as i think,im certainly not bothered about all the poncy bollocks of dots n dashes,thats for mindless diction slaves who have little else going for them and get a woody on because they know something lmao. Or "teachers" i suppose,,,(and of course pretend teachers,sad but there are some out there,failed at being a teacher so became a copper or a traffic warden),forums and internet a way of salving their broken egos,having taken the easy option in life and simply repeating information from books they never wrote to children who know no better and yet unwilling to allow others the freedom to write as they please without the endless scolding and false subtle ridiculing that can only be expected from those with large blank gaps in their character. heheheh
@ Speed Triple - I am not talking about low-paid east-Eoropean migrant workers, and I don't believe Gregotch was either. But, as you come to mention it - I work in an area where a substantial number of foreign workers are employed, mostly St Helenian or Chillean, and a good number of them speak English equally as well as many of the British workers, even though they are mostly in fairly menial jobs. It's a question of expectations - their education system expects them to be able to speak at least one other language fairly fluently in order to allow them to maximise their employability. Our education system can't even be bothered to teach children how to speak their own language correctly...
I don't know how it is now but I suspect it hasn't changed from when I was at school. Peer pressure always worked to dumb down the learning process. Ignorance and clownery during lessons were celebrated, studiousness was treated with derision (at best). It's the culture in this country that is wrong, the triumph of mediocrity and conformity. Poor teaching methods and standards are simply a symptom of that. This is why some private schools work so well for their students. The culture within them is the exact reverse of what is seen generally.
Loz is exactly right... In a society where children see being a "celebrity" as a valid career path, where the brain-dead morons on everything from "The Jeremy Kyle Show" to "Britains's Worst Drivers" are seen as role models, and where people believe that all you need to do to be set up for life is get on "Big Brother" or "X-Factor", there's no wonder that there is no interest in being educated. Does anyone else remember "Ask The Family" ? I'm not saying that everything was perfect back in the 60's and 70's - but there's a reason why programmes like that wouldn't work now...
Other countries still value education, and don't see it as "uncool" to actually be educated. That is why the Chilean girl who clears our table after lunch can speak perfect English, and not one of the supposedly well-educated British people sitting at the table can speak Spanish...
language argument is a poor one, all other countries need to learn one language, English, we have to learn at least 5 if we want to be seen as fitting in to Europe is this a thread about opting out of Europe, or how poorly educated the British are? Or is it about Scottish independence?
And all damn foreigners understand English if you shout loudly enough... I was thinking about the people I come into contact with through work - Chilean, Dutch, German, Austrian, Danish, Norwegian, French, Belgian, Portugese, Nepali, Chinese, Italian, and many others...
Same point applies. They all need to learn one extra language. Then they can converse the world over. Easy. If learning Spanish meant I could go to China and have a conversation, broken but understandable, with people in business, and then on to Thailand for the same, then Dubai... and be able to speak Spanish in a Greek café and know they could understand...
