Well, either my high school spanning suspicion that my mentioned English teacher has a bit too high standards (and hence the grading was done to this higher standard) is true or simply I don't do well on exams. Whatever's the case, my speaking grade is always the worst. On my Matura I got about 88% on Extended Level Written English, but got only 65% or so in Basic Level Spoken English. Regarding mentioned Dutchman, it's usually he who wants us to talk exclusively in Polish because he feels like any practice can help. Unless it's about our research project in which case we usually end up using English, and I have to say that it's not lacking in any respect. As a side note, Dutch seem to have an almost freakish affinity for foreign languages. After two years of learning Polish he approaches high school level of skill and his German is friggin' flawless.