We lived in the US for a couple years when I was in grade school. My parents always laughed and mocked the stickers that my teacher would put on our assignments: "Great Job!", "You're the best!", "#1". (almost 20 years later, it is still a recurring joke in my family).
An English professor of mine in college loved to dissect differences between the French and English language, and how they highlighted the differences in how anglo-saxon cultures and French culture approach education.
French schools mark out of 20 (0 being worst, 20 being best); but no one ever gets 20. In middle and high school, getting 17 or 18 is already stupendous; in college, top students rarely ever go above 15, and some professors skew their grading to rarely give out marks above 10 in order to toughen up students. On the other hand, getting an A or a 100% in a US college class is not all that hard.
In French, we also often use the verb "to perfect" ("se parfaire") to mean "improve"; for instance, "I'm taking classes to perfect my English". I don't believe I've ever encountered that construction in English (if it is grammatically correct, then it is infinitely rarer)
My professor's main point being that in French culture, perfection is something we strive towards, but never achieve; whereas in anglo-saxon culture, it is something fully within reach.
I was never a straight A student; in middle and high school, my grades would rarely go above 14/20; in college, they were more around 12/20. I did finish my undergrad in a British institution, where my marks immediately skyrocketed and I graduated with the highest honors (ha). In grad school (US), I got a B or two, but they always were from some tough foreign professors.
By contrast, I dated an American girl for a while who had always been a straight A student in middle/high school (graduated valedictorian) and college (graduated on the dean's roll etc. etc.). Her blaring success stopped right as she graduated college though; she quickly fell in deep depression at that point due to the stark contrast with what she experienced and the professional world.
Addendum: Differences between the French (and European to some extent) and American culture have fascinated me for the past few years, as I grew up in a pluricultural environment in the later years, but very French in my early years (and as I slowly become a functioning adult, understanding what shaped my youth and education is interesting to me). To anyone interested in that question, I recommend the book "Bringing Up Bébé" by Pamela Druckerman, which is about a British/American couple discovering French parenting and contrasting it with their own. It is pop-cultury and light on actual research, but does contain interesting insights. Any recommendations on that same topic are very welcome :)
Statistically, most students in American colleges achieve low marks, fail a lot of classes, or drop out entirely. I suspect these students still encounter daunting obstacles in the real world.
The difference between schooling and the real world is not the heapings of praise, it is the lack of regimentation. In the white-collar workplace, there is not often a cohort of twenty men completing the exact same carefully-directed tasks as the recent graduate.
p.s. English "perfect" comes from Old French. Using it as a verb is valid but rarely seen in today's English. To me, the sentence "I am in a class to perfect my French" seems arrogant because it implies that my French is already very good.
I agree with you about praise versus regimentation. My parents never really praised or chided me and my sister. If we did something wrong, they treated it as a learning opportunity. If you washed the dishes badly, it was probably because you just need to learn how to wash dishes better. If you hit somebody, it was probably because you need to learn why hitting other kids isn’t necessarily the best way to resolve an argument.
So in a way I was raised to believe that praise and encouragement for their own sake are basically useless—real critique should give you a simple, concrete handhold by which to improve yourself. We also had a lot of freedom to make our own mistakes, though my parents were always there if we needed them.
And that isn’t at all how school works. I wasn’t very “successful” in school, because I was depressed by the dishonesty of getting good grades without any real effort. All the way through college, I wanted challenges, but there simply weren’t any to be had. So I had to find my own and motivate myself to learn and improve, or else I would have killed myself.
So, sure, I got some bad grades, failed a couple of classes, and dropped out of college. But it was just because I’m the kind of person who’s better off working on real challenges. The “real world” didn’t break me down—it saved my life.
>Statistically, most students in American colleges achieve low marks, fail a lot of classes, or drop out entirely. I suspect these students still encounter daunting obstacles in the real world.
Very good point. Perhaps my point then becomes more about how the top ~30% of students are treated, rather than all of them.
I could understand the French system where no-one gets a top grade in courses outside of engineering, mathematics, and the sciences where problems may be less well defined but if say I'm given 20 math problems on a test and I get all of them right why would that not give me 100%? Do the French just make their tests impossible to solve at some point or do they grade more finely on things such as approach, technique, etc (e.g. in comp sci where your program may be correct in terms of output put you may be downgraded depending on how well your code is written) ?
Well I think he made a bit of an exaggeration here. Up until the end of high school it's perfectly possible to get good grades in all courses.
However after high school, in the "classes préparatoires" it is perfectly normal for everyone (including the best pupils who aced their exams and all) to get extremely low grades (like 4/20) repeatedly because the notation system changes from there: instead of gaining points when giving the right answer, you lose points for every wrong one, and it's extremely easy to make 15 or 20 minor errors on a 4 hours math assignment or philosophy dissertation.
This is however, precisely done to "toughen up" students and make them master perfectly the courses in and out, and it works wonders (for those who can get through).
Unfortunately this state of mind is rapidly losing ground in France too, and people more and more consider they are some sorts of "customers" "buying" a form of "education service" from schools, and that therefore if the children doesn't fare well it's the professor's fault, or the school's, or the ministry, or everyone else's but theirs or their stupid brats'.
> ... because the notation system changes from there: instead of gaining points when giving the right answer,
> you lose points for every wrong one ...
This is not a general rule, where I was it was still "positive scoring" (get points for what you solve). But I agree with the rest: the notation gets much harsher and it's a way to toughen up previously top of the class students who were used to have a rather easy time before.
The regular oral tests ("colles") are also part of that...
I don't know about France, but in The Netherlands where we have a similar system in my opinion it is just quite hard to get all questions on a test right.
Even the smartest most hard working kids do not often get every single question right. Ofcourse if the math test is just solving 20 similar equations then the smart kids will easily solve them all and get a 10/10, but a math test is never solving 20 equations.
Do kids that get an A(+) in the states have the correct answer with the correct explanation (deriviation) for every question?
If so it could be they've just studied harder, culture can do funny things.
It is grammatically correct in English to say, "I'm taking classes to perfect my English." It is more common to say, "I'm taking classes to improve my English." To me, in English, saying that you are doing something to perfect a skill implies the belief of attaining near perfection. It's much stronger than saying that your goal is to improve. However, saying you are doing something to improve a skill sort of implies a lack of total commitment. It give the impression of an almost hobby aspect to the skill.
I've heard "trying to perfect my _____" in common usage (western United States) quite a bit, usually with respect to specific narrow goals. It often has to do with cooking (perfecting a recipe), athletics (perfecting a maneuver), or games (perfecting a sequence of moves). The common thread is that there's a very specific problem with an attainable or near-attainable optimum.
In contrast, "trying to improve my ________" seems to be used more with respect to general and broad goals. People speak of improving their marriage, improving their language proficiency, improving their work-related skills, and so on.
A fellow who I believe had been a dean at Virginia Tech wrote a book on his experiences. He said that the English "His work is quite sound, actually" might well be higher praise than the American "His work sets the standards to which we all aspire". So I don't think it's purely a linguistic thing.
It's also interesting that "his work is sound" is an absolute measure; regardless of anyone else's work, his work is internally consistent and one of quality. "His work is a standard we should aspire to" is a relative measure, that might be that of a Rhodes scholar or simply the best of a bad bunch.
In French, we also often use the verb "to perfect" ("se parfaire") to mean "improve"; for instance, "I'm taking classes to perfect my English". I don't believe I've ever encountered that construction in English (if it is grammatically correct, then it is infinitely rarer)
It is, but in English "to perfect" has connotations of finality. I.e., "he perfected his technique" meaning it couldn't get any possibly better than it is. It's rare because perfection is rare.
"To improve" means that there is room for growth, which from what you say is implied by the French use of se parfaire.
In American universities, if you routinely got 12 out of 20 as your final mark you would be put on academic probation and risk not being admitted next term. Also, I don't know what classes you are taking, but acing mathematical or hard science classes in an American university is certainly no cakewalk.
You might enjoy reading "Cultural Misunderstandings: The French-American Experience" by Raymonde Carroll. She was born French and married an American, which triggered her interest in this topic. And she has a professional eye to these things as both her and her husband are ethnologist ;) But this is not a scholar book. There's a chapter on children education.
And also one on friendship and how it differs on both side --- which if more widely known would have cut down on the hysteria during the second Iraq war (freedom fries and all this hoopla). But then, media like the hysteria.
I would just like to point out one issue with these discrepancies in grading.
In this exceedingly global economy, where one might want to apply for college or grad school in a foreign country, this type of "grading gap" can severely limit ones chances.
If the institution to which you are applying is not fully aware of your regional grading tradition, being "toughened up" with a hard earned B or C average, could block you from being accepted at your preferred Universities.
An English professor of mine in college loved to dissect differences between the French and English language, and how they highlighted the differences in how anglo-saxon cultures and French culture approach education.
French schools mark out of 20 (0 being worst, 20 being best); but no one ever gets 20. In middle and high school, getting 17 or 18 is already stupendous; in college, top students rarely ever go above 15, and some professors skew their grading to rarely give out marks above 10 in order to toughen up students. On the other hand, getting an A or a 100% in a US college class is not all that hard. In French, we also often use the verb "to perfect" ("se parfaire") to mean "improve"; for instance, "I'm taking classes to perfect my English". I don't believe I've ever encountered that construction in English (if it is grammatically correct, then it is infinitely rarer)
My professor's main point being that in French culture, perfection is something we strive towards, but never achieve; whereas in anglo-saxon culture, it is something fully within reach.
I was never a straight A student; in middle and high school, my grades would rarely go above 14/20; in college, they were more around 12/20. I did finish my undergrad in a British institution, where my marks immediately skyrocketed and I graduated with the highest honors (ha). In grad school (US), I got a B or two, but they always were from some tough foreign professors.
By contrast, I dated an American girl for a while who had always been a straight A student in middle/high school (graduated valedictorian) and college (graduated on the dean's roll etc. etc.). Her blaring success stopped right as she graduated college though; she quickly fell in deep depression at that point due to the stark contrast with what she experienced and the professional world.
Addendum: Differences between the French (and European to some extent) and American culture have fascinated me for the past few years, as I grew up in a pluricultural environment in the later years, but very French in my early years (and as I slowly become a functioning adult, understanding what shaped my youth and education is interesting to me). To anyone interested in that question, I recommend the book "Bringing Up Bébé" by Pamela Druckerman, which is about a British/American couple discovering French parenting and contrasting it with their own. It is pop-cultury and light on actual research, but does contain interesting insights. Any recommendations on that same topic are very welcome :)