MOTIVATION'S ALL YOU
NEED
Help with English
Ilgın Duru Kılıç
As you all know, we especially worked on Turkish, maths, science and social studies last year for SBS. Having good English
wasn’t required to get into Robert College. Every person who managed to get a good mark and wanted to get into Robert College did, so
there are people from all around the country and everyone has different levels of English.
Have you compared your English level with other friends of yours and perhaps you’ve wondered how life is for the students
who have good English, and the ones who have less? If you are from a school that didn’t teach English well, it is inevitable that your
English is not as good as others, but don’t get stressed so easily. There is a lot of support given here to equalize the English levels of the
students. As Mr. Carter says, the teachers work really hard to make sure that the students who have less English improve themselves. He
says, “SSR (Sustained Silent Reading) gives every student an opportunity to read and it is really useful especially for the students who
have less English.” He also says that the lessons and the collaborative activities are essential to improve speaking skills and to
communicate with your peers. The teachers also offer some in school and after school support from the Prep Writing Center hours, but
both Mr. Carter and Ms. Standley complain that most of the students don’t use it very much. Also, Robert College’s clubs are mostly done
in English, so this encourages those students to speak more English.
In addition, the classes are mixed in RC. They aren’t arranged according to the students’ English levels, so there are lots of
students who have different levels of proficiency in the same class. Some students may find it less effective, but most of the teachers think
it is a valuable method of instruction. For example Mr. Carter finds it wonderful. He also adds, “If we did the classes according to the
levels of English, all of the students from the same school would be in the same class, so they wouldn’t be able to socialize.” Well, it
might be hard in the beginning, but you will see the positive outcomes when all are equally fluent, probably by the end of 9th grade. Ms.
Standley admits that it is challenging too. She says that it is hard for some stude