Editing Foreign language (section)

==Foreign-language education and ability==
{{Main|Language education}}
{{Globalize|article|Europe|date=November 2010}}

Most schools around the world teach at least one foreign language and most colleges and high schools require foreign language before graduation.  By 1998, nearly all pupils in [[Europe]] studied at least one foreign language as part of their compulsory education, the only exception being [[Ireland]], where primary and secondary schoolchildren learn both [[Irish language|Irish]] and English, but neither is considered a foreign language (although Irish pupils do study a third European language). On average in Europe, at the start of foreign-language teaching, learners have lessons for three to four hours a week. Compulsory lessons in a foreign language normally start at the end of [[primary school]] or the start of [[secondary school]]. In [[Luxembourg]], [[Norway]] and [[Malta]], however, the first foreign language is studied at age six, and in [[Flemish Community|Flanders]] at age 10.<ref>{{Cite web |title=De lat hoog voor talen in iedere school |trans-title=Raising the bar for languages in every school |url=http://www.ond.vlaanderen.be/beleid/nota/talenbeleid-deel4.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070112090730/http://www.ond.vlaanderen.be/beleid/nota/talenbeleid-deel4.htm |archive-date=2007-01-12 |language=Dutch}}</ref><ref group=note>Children in the [[Flemish Community|Flemish Community of Belgium]] start learning [[French language|French]] at age 10, [[English language|English]] at 12 or 13 and, if chosen so, mostly [[German language|German]] or [[Spanish language|Spanish]] at age 15 or 16, but with only the first two being obligatory. In the [[Brussels Capital Region]], however, French is taught starting at age 8.</ref> In [[Wales]], all children are taught [[Welsh language|Welsh]] from the first year of primary school. The Welsh language is also compulsory up to the age of 16, although a formal [[GCSE]] qualification is optional.

In some countries, learners have lessons taken entirely in a foreign language: for example, more than half of European countries with a minority/regional language community use partial [[language immersion|immersion]] to teach both the minority and the state language. This method is also highly used in Canada, wherein anglophone students spend all of most of their lessons learning the materials in French.

In 1995, the [[European Commission]]'s White Paper on Education and Training emphasised the importance of schoolchildren learning at least two foreign languages before upper secondary education. The [[Lisbon Summit]] of 2000 defined languages as one of the five key skills.{{Citation needed|date=May 2007}}

Despite the high rate of foreign-language teaching in schools, the number of adults claiming to speak a foreign language is generally lower than might be expected. This is particularly true of native English speakers: in 2004 a [[United Kingdom|British]] survey by recruitment firm Office Angels showed that fewer than one in 10 [[United Kingdom|UK]] workers could speak a foreign language and that less than 5% could count to 20 in a second language.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Robb |first=Stephen |date=2004-07-29 |title=Why Britons are 'language barbarians' |language=en-GB |work=[[BBC News]] |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3930963.stm |access-date=2022-07-10}}</ref> In 2012, a [http://ec.europa.eu/commfrontoffice/publicopinion/archives/ebs/ebs_386_en.pdf European Commission survey] found that 61% of respondents in the [[United Kingdom|UK]] were unlikely to speak any language other than their mother tongue (page 5).

Since the 1990s, the [[Common European Framework of Reference for Languages]] has tried to standardise the learning of languages across Europe.

An article from ''[[The Atlantic]]'' claims that only 1 percent of the adults within the US population consider themselves proficient in speaking a foreign language. This is in stark contrast to many other countries, where the percentage is much higher. Even though there are many benefits that come with learning a foreign language, schools across the United States continue to cut foreign language from their budgets.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Friedman |first=Amelia |date=2015-05-10 |title=America's Lacking Language Skills |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/05/filling-americas-language-education-potholes/392876/ |access-date=2022-07-10 |website=The Atlantic |language=en}}</ref>

===Pronunciation===
{{Main|Non-native pronunciations of English|Anglophone pronunciation of foreign languages}}

===Instruments for foreign-language learning===
{{Main|Language education}}

In recent years, [[computer-assisted language learning]] has been integrated into foreign-language education and computer programs with varying levels of interactional relationship between computer and the language learner have been developed.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Palmberg |first=Rolf |date=1989 |title=Integrating CALL into Foreign-Language Teaching |url=https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED344452 |journal=Special Languages and Second Languages: Methodology and Research |language=en |volume=47 |via=[[Education Resources Information Center]]}}</ref> Language learning aids such as [[foreign-language writing aid]] and [[foreign-language reading aid]], targeted at the specific language skills of foreign-language learners, are also alternative instruments available for foreign-language learners.