Job Discussion Forums

[Mark-O]

This is just a general query that has bothered me recently. After living for x years abroad, teaching English, have you found that your accent or general speech has changed at all?

I imagine clarity and speed of speech must alter as a product of teaching English(?) Also, is the tendency to use slang more limited?

I expect family and friends from your home country would be the best indication of any change in our accent/speech.

[arioch36]

I speak much slower, depending on which students I have for the semester. Clearer, yes. So people say. I find myself checking myself after saying any idioms, getting ready to immediately explain if needed, a habit I had even after being back home for two months.

[Shonai Ben]

I feel that I speak slower and when I go back to Canada I feel everyone is speaking faster than normal,but soon get used to natural speed again.
Also suffered from information overload.Suddenly I could understand every conversation in a room.I guess I got used to turning off my ears in Japan.

[veiledsentiments]

After spending most of the last 18 years abroad teaching English, there is the obvious slowdown in speed and disappearance of vague idioms --- but the strangest thing to me is that North Americans suddenly think I am British!!

Needless to say, no British person ever suspected it. I can only think it is because I stress the consonants. Of course the reality is that running speech all together and deleting sounds is as true of the average British English speaker as the average North American English speaker. North Americans seem to have this idea that all the British sound like the BBC news readers, which of course they don't. innit?

Have any other North Americans come home and had people think they were British?

VS

[Capergirl]

Absolutely. I'm not even able to mimic the local dialect very well these days. Not that I would want to. The most annoying thing for me is listening to people massacre the language all the time. "I seen" and "I done" are used a lot around here. When someone says, "He should be hung" it's like nails on a chalkboard to me. I am truly annoying now...and mostly I annoy myself.

[Lynn]

In a word, "YES!!!", and I hate it. I'm constantly being looked at funny, and people just assume I'm "foreign" When I say I'm and American born and bred, they just say, "Well, where's that accent coming from?"

[leeroy]

I had a pretty thick London accent a few years ago - but TEFL soon sorted that out... Bizarrely, I am sometimes told I have an Australian "twang" in my voice - though I have no idea how the bugger got in there.

[donfan]

I didn't really notice but in the two months I have been home doing casual school teaching in Australia the schoolkids keeping asking me, "Where are you from? Your voice is funny." When I tell them I'm from Australia they look very sceptical.

[Wolf]

Oh, yes. I use phrases I picked up from my Australian/British co-workers. I hope I use them correctly. . . .

I Japan I had this wierd tendancy to just speak Japanese all day unless I was teaching. . . does that count?

I think my accent has changed. But that's something that's hard to be sure of. I'd have to meet someone who knew me before I left home be be certain.

[Gordon]

After coming home after years abroad, I wasn't able to understand the radio properly as they spoke too quickly.
Watching the news on TV was also difficult as the stories changed so quickly.
In Japan, the stories on the news move so painfully slooooowwwwly. One story can take 20 mins and it wasn't even interesting or important to start with.

[shmooj]

Mark-O - good topic.

Not only is there an influence on how we communicate with other native speakers but also with our students in class. In fact, as our English deteriorates while we are here as we forget idioms and slang etc, we often joked that if this happened at a faster rate than we learnt Japanese, we'd end up language-less!

Yes, I'm sure my language has changed while I'm here but certainly not in terms of speed - even in my kids classes. I try to maintain my speed while downgrading my vocabulary in particular and speaking clearly and with much more body language and stress. It has worked and even my kids can understand fast English provided the body language support is there.

Yesterday my dad visited my upper-intermediate FCE prep class. THey had trouble understanding him even when he slowed down because he used all sorts of turns of phrase that, well, to be perfectly honest, not many of us use any more. But when I talk to them I realised that it is much much faster but much much simpler.

When I train new teachers though I notice their number one strategy is not to simplify their English. Rather they simply say the same thing slower and louder. This hardly ever works. I try to help them communicate more through simplifying their English and using a lot of body language and re-phrasing than speaking slowly. If they continue to speak slowly, it will not help our students cope with connected speech.

So, how do you cope as a teacher with your own English in your classrooms?

[Gordon]

What is it with Newbies who when they feel (correctly) that students don't understand them, speak louder?
They aren't deaf. It is so funny sometimes.
What is your name?

[denise]

I do consciously try to speak more slowly--not because I think my students can't handle "real" speech, but because ever since the day I was born people have been telling me that I speak too quickly. I try to slow myself down to a "normal" pace, which is still faster than a relaxed EFL robot/teacher pace.

As far as lexis and grammar--if my students are advanced enough, I deliberately do not "dumb myself down." I want them to hear new forms, new vocabulary, etc. I will often rephrase something just to clarify, but I do not shy away from difficult forms.

As far as I know, my speech patterns have not changed dramatically (other than my conscious effort to slow down). I have picked up a few British-isms, but that's about it.

What I find amusing is the ways in which non-teachers modify their speech when speaking in English to Japanese people--uninflected verbs, no articles, etc.: "Yesterday I go to store." Or, more accurately, "Yesterday... I go... to store."

d

[Corey]

It depends on the company I am keeping but in general yes, TEFL has changed my speech patterns. Spanglish can emerge if I am not careful. I am also much more aware of when I speak colloquial English with friends vs. "proper" English with business associates.

Corey

[yaramaz]

I have found that I tend to integrate a lot of the local language or dialect into my English speech, whether I intend to or not. This integration is not temporary either, as I find myself using South African slang or London intonations or Irish curses and tones in my everyday speech... and I haven't lived in those countries in years. Few people can place my accent either, as I've been out of Canada for 10 years and have picked up bits and pieces of many accents (alas, I am a sponge). When I lived in London, several separate individuals declared that I must be from County Donegal in the NW of Ireland (never been there). Here in Turkey everyone thinks I'm English or Australian. In Canada, when I return home, they really don't quite know where to place me...

As for TEFL, I find myself restructuring the language involuntarily to better fit with the local lingo--- not a good move and I try to quash it before it emerges from my lips-- for example, I find myself saying to friends on the street, 'I wait you now' or 'You say me true?' and other grammatical atrocities that the Turks seem to find very easy to understand. I also tend to leave out articles and use simple present waaaaay too often. I don't use these simplifications/aberrations in the classroom though. I really watch my speech around my students.