Job Discussion Forums

[ls650]

[Deicide]

[william wallace]

nilo

[coffeedrinker]

I guess my opinion is that the problem is more with the rigid requirement that teachers be native speakers than with defining who is a native speaker. (and I don't mean to direct this at the original poster - this idea is all over the place)

I'm a native English speaker, but I'm a good teacher because I prepare for my lessons, do my best to respond to student needs and wishes and react to what goes on in class. Yes, sometimes a native speaker can think of a vocabulary word faster than a non-native and sometimes students claim they want native pronunciation...but there is plenty of variety within native speaker pronunciation. I've taught beginners who required a native English speaker, and it is a bit funny to me that people think it matters what their teacher's first language is when they are learning greetings, time, and there is/there are. Methodology matters, yes, but native language of the teacher?

I'd say record the voices of these potential teachers, record a few native speakers, play them and see how many students can pick out the difference. My guess would be, especially at lower levels (which, presumably, native speakers also teach at your school if you hire only native speakers), not many can tell the difference.

[jr1965]

My native language is English. The best Spanish teacher I ever had (my second lang. is Spanish) taught at a local community college in California. He was not a native speaker of the lang.

Some of the worst teachers I ever had were native speakers (from Peru, Argentina, and Spain). They "taught" classes I attended at university and in private lang. schools.

I now live in Spain and have a decent command of the lang (I think ), and it's never mattered one bit that the wonderful teacher I had was not a native speaker (or a speaker of Castellano for that matter). What made all the difference for me was that he knew HOW to teach the lang and not just talk to me in it.

[Deconstructor]

[furiousmilksheikali]

[SeasonedVet]

Sgt Killjoy wrote:

[SeasonedVet]

http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/job/viewtopic.php?t=42807&highlight=native+speaker+qualifies

[jr1965]

[rusmeister]

Of course it's obvious that being a native speaker does not by itself make you a good teacher. I don't think there's anything useful to add to that.

But all other things being equal (ie, experience et al), it's certainly a serious advantage. Confidence in your own use of the language is a big plus, particularly if you are being compared with teachers from, say, the foreign country you're in who've never really traveled anywhere.

[Deconstructor]

I've come across a few kickass teachers for whom English was not even a second language, but a third. These guys were amazing teachers. I would argue that they were at times even better than native ones: They were more aware of what they were saying and how; they're language was much clearer, as if having dealt with a foreign language they had thought about it much more than a native speaker, for whom everything happens "naturally".

Furthermore, the former sometimes teach better because having to deal with a foreign language means that they cannot speak as fluently as the latter. This means that they have no choice but to slow down in class, which works really well for the students who often complain that "the teacher is speaking too fast".

I'm not saying one is always better than the other, but teachers for whom English is not a native language more often than not do a great job in the classroom.

[william wallace]

nil

[JZer]

Deconstructor wrote:

[JZer]

jr1965 wrote: