The hand-wringing in the wake of the disappointing results of the survey of 12,850 public junior high and high school students about English education is understandable. Despite earnest efforts by teachers to meet the goals established by the education ministry, only 36.1 percent of third-year junior high school students scored at Grade 3 or higher on the Eiken Test in Practical English Proficiency. The test, which comprises seven levels, with Grade 5 being the lowest, is widely accepted as evidence of English-language ability. However, it's not the test but the instruction that is the likely cause of the lackluster outcomes.
If valid inferences are to be drawn from any standardized test, including the Eiken, teachers need to design lessons that provide students with practice specifically geared to the knowledge and skills being evaluated. For example, practice in grammar and reading will not help very much with speaking and listening. It's not that the former is not important, but it is not likely to transfer to the latter.
This appropriate practice principle is the single most important strategy for teachers of any subject. For English-language learning in particular, it is indispensable. That's because so much of foreign-language acquisition is determined by what the ear hears. There are many people who can speak a foreign language but can't write it, or vice versa.