Egypt: Bridging the Gap between School English and Real English
Teaching English in Egypt in general and in my town Damietta in particular, is mainly directed towards helping students to pass their final exams. Unfortunately, most teachers do not adopt a long -term approach that guarantees that their students will be able to use English outside the classroom. So students only concentrate on one skill which is writing. Thus their listening and speaking skills are disabled. What is important to them is to pass the exam which is primarily based on writing .Teachers are not only concentrated with providing their students with questions that are similar to those of the final exam, particularly General Secondary Education Certificate (GSEC) Examination, so students spend most of their time answering typical exam questions.
Most students' scores are high; a lot of students get full marks. However, few students are able to communicate in English because their role plays. As a result, a lot of students complain that they are unable to understand and talk fluently with native speakers of English.
To enable students to communicate freely and spontaneously(自然地) in English, I bring features of real communication into language practice, I always ask students about their own experiences, and suggest groups of students practice what they have learned outside the classroom. This helps lower-achieving students absorb language. Furthermore, role play is a very effective way to improve speaking skills particularly if it is connected to the experience of the students.
小题1:Who probably write this passage?
A．a teacher
B．a governor
C．a student
D．a reporter小题2:In Egypt, the students only concentrate on ------
A．listening skill
B．speaking skill
C．reading skill
D．writing skill小题3:The teachers question their students based on -------
A．what they learn in the class
B．What their parents expect
C．The questions that are similar to those of GSEC
D．The ability that will be used outside the classroom小题4:Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
A．Most of the students can't get high marks but can communicate with the native speakers of English.
B． Communicating skill is more important than writing skill.
C．Role play connected to the speaker's experience is more effective
in improving his skill.
D．The lower--achieving students can do better in speaking skill than the upper achieving students.小题5:Who will responsible for the gap between school English and real English?
A．Their parents
B．The students
C．The school
D．The education sys tem