essay British vs. Belarusian School Systems

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Belarusian and British Schools: Differences and Similarities

It goes without saying that education is very important in our life. It opens the doors into adult successful life and children should understand this from their childhood when they start primary school. I‘m pretty sure that practically every country in the world gives such an opportunity as educational systems in many countries are arranged according to common international educational standards, though there can be some differences.

Great Britain and Belarus are different countries that differ in their languages, traditions and culture. But their educational systems have much in common. First of all, in both countries there the same stages of school education – Primary and Secondary schools. Though in Great Britain children start Primary education at 5, meanwhile Belarusian pupils go to school at the age of 7. In Great Britain there are about 8% of independent schools. I suppose, in Britain quite a lot of parents can allow themselves to pay for their children’s education in public school like Eton. In our country this type of schools isn’t so popular, but as I know there are some private schools in Belarus as well.

As far as subjects in curriculum are concerned, here we have a lot of similarities as well as differences. For instance, students of both countries study Maths, Physics, History, and Chemistry. Of course, we study English in different ways, just because for us it’s a foreign language, for them – their mother tongue. What is more, the Brits have such classes as Cooking Technology, Art, Religion, we don’t.

And one more point I’d like to cover is a foreign language. Sure, the British students study a variety of them, but the most popular foreign language in the UK is French. Pupils are also actively taught Spanish and Italian. In Belarus English is the main foreign language at school and it is pretty understandable – it is a source of international communication. By the way, German and French are also popular with language-students. So, as you can see British and Belarusian school systems have both differences and similarities.

To sum up I would like to say that there is no perfect school in the world. I am of an opinion that Belarusian educational system is really good but as for me it would be great to add such subjects like Art or Religion into our curriculum, as well as to have a long break for lunch like the Brits have that lasts for an hour. So I consider if we borrowed the best inventions from the others, we could improve our system of education.