TOEFL scores reflect poor teaching methods

With all the enthusiasm for English among the Taiwanese, and the enormous stock of resources spent in this area, it would seem that the average level of English ability in Taiwan should be outstanding as compared with the people in neighboring countries.

The contrary is true, however, if the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) is a fairly accurate measurement of how successful one can be in using English. It must be admitted that the level of English proficiency of the Taiwanese is embarrassingly poor.

The TOEFL is the world’s most widely accepted academic English exam. It evaluates the potential success of an individual to use and understand English at a college level and is required for non-native applicants at many English-speaking universities. Additionally, institutions such as government agencies, businesses, or scholarship programs may require this test.

According to the Education Testing Service (ETS), which administers the TOEFL, Taiwanese participants in the test achieved the average score of 72 in 2007, lower than the 77 for mainland Chinese test participants, and the 78 for Koreans. The ranking for the Taiwanese, whose average score rose one point over the preceding year, was 17th out of 30 Asian countries that took the test.

The English instruction in South Korea used to be so problematic that graduates of Korean high schools who attended Taiwan’s universities were far behind Taiwanese students in English. Most of them failed their freshmen English and could not pass the course without their teachers giving them favorable treatment.

Although the Taiwanese have progressed somewhat on the TOEFL, their ranking moved forward only by five notches, there is ample room for improvement.

One National Chengchi University professor, in commenting on the performance of the Taiwanese on TOEFL, urged that the English instruction on the island be reformed so that the lessons are more relevant to everyday life and more helpful to students in answering TOEFL questions.

That is a view we have advocated in our editorials over the years. Traditionally, the emphasis in Taiwan’s English instruction has been on helping students understand English grammar and remember words and phrases.

In the past two decades, there has been a shift of emphasis to the need for learners to communicate. But the effort to make this change has been slow. In the majority of the island’s school classrooms, English is taught as an academic discipline rather than a communicative skill. Students are required to memorize vocabulary items and study grammatical rules but are seldom encouraged to practice using the language in real-life situations.

Foreign language teaching experts hold the view that, to be fluent in a language, one needs to start learning it at a tender age. It is necessary, therefore, that English lessons be taught from the first grade in the island’s elementary schools.

Opponents of this view argue that English learning for small children would interfere with their study of their native language. This is not true. Small children have the potential to acquire fluency in several languages simultaneously. We are, for this reason, supportive of the call for moving forward the start of English learning from third grade to the first grade at all the island’s elementary schools.

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