Job Discussion Forums

[dreadnought]

Actually is not a student, it's a teacher on a methodology course I'm running.

He's got an extremely strong accent and I have literally no idea what he's talking about. Unfortunately, he also happens to be the most dominant, outgoing and expressive member of the group, so I have to deal with this utter incomprehension on a regular basis. Most of the time I just nod and say 'um, that's interesting' or 'that's a good point', though for all I know he could be reciting his shopping list or denouncing me as an imperialist pig.

I was kind of hoping that I would gradually 'tune in' to his accent and finally work out what he was saying, but this course has been going for quite a few weeks now and it's still not getting any better.

Has anyone else had the situation where they couldn't understand a single thing a student (or teacher!) was saying to them? How did you deal with it? Any tips?

[dduck]

Does your course have any preselection? Are there any other instructors who can understand him? Do the other trainees find him impossible to understand?

The only thing I can suggest is that you take him aside and discuss (as best you can) the problem. If he's aware of it, he might be able to do something about it. For example, speak more slowly, clearly...

Finally, is he going to pass your course if you can't understand a word he says?
Iain

[dreadnought]

The course is funded by a charitable foundation and is designed to help improve the quality of teaching in the region. There's no real preselection as such, just a limit on the numbers we can take at any one time. For the teachers it's completely free.

I suspect the other trainees can understand him, largely because he was THEIR teacher at university as well. This causes some additional problems as they are unwilling to challenge or object to anything he says (but that's another issue). The other instructors are local, so I think they have no problems either.

If it persists, I'll give your suggestion a go. But he's a very touchy character, and I don't think he'll react too well!! But thanks all the same!

[Kurochan]

Well, maybe you could offer him extra one-on-one time with you outside of class. You could claim that since he is such an important guy (a teacher and everything) it's extra important for his English to be "even better." You know, like make it sound like it's really good already, even though it isn't, and you're just trying to help him perfect it. Then you could work on some of the pronunciation points without saying you can't really understand him. Also, he might be apt to be more humble when there are no students around. He might be more amenable to admitting his faults or asking for help if he didn't have to worry about losing face in front of the students.

I dunno -- just a suggestion ...

[Minhang Oz]

Bit of a free plug here, but I remember thinking this book was hilarious when I first read it many years ago. It would obviously mean a lot more now! Dreadnought's description of his student reminded me so much of Hyman Kaplan, I had to post this.

Published by Harvest Books
Pub. Date: February 1989
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 0156278111
List Price: $12.00
Buy online from Amazon.com for $9.60
Review by AG
An hilarious look at both teaching and learning the English language, this book manages to convey all of the frustrations, contradictions and misnomers of English through the lens of Hyman Kaplan, the enthusiastic immigrant student who, with his thick Middle-European accent, somehow contrives to learn without making progress and in so doing turns the tables by rendering his long-suffering teacher, Mr. Parkhill, speechless.

Rather than a sequence of events, the plot follows Kaplan and his classmates through an academic year, each chapter acting as a single lesson on the elements of language: vocabulary, pronunciation, tenses, verbs, comprehension. It is Hyman Kaplan�s numerous interjections and enthusiastic suggestions, however, which turn what would be an ordinary evening class into a study in consistent misunderstanding and malapropism. Hyman Kaplan�s charm is that, while his answers are not always correct, an essential hysterical truth which it is hard to deny lies behind his mistakes.

For instance, when asked to name the opposite of new, Kaplan replies �second-hand�. When asked to decline the verb �to fail� his reply is �fail, failed, bankrupt�. His refusal to be interrupted which infuriates the bewildered Mr. Parkhill point to a casual indifference on Kaplan�s part. Why should he follow the usual maxims of conversation? Kaplan has his own plans for conquering America!

Every new idea introduced by Mr Parkhill is examined in fine Talmudic detail by the unsatisfied Kaplan. When learning about homonyms he interrupts his distraught teacher to inquire �how eet ees possible thet Mary�s littel lemb hes fleas as white as snow?�. Kaplan takes on the full moral force of the language he is learning. In one memorable episode a fellow student�s life story is interrupted by Kaplan�s polemic against citizenship and the U.S. immigration service. Although presented as the immigrant everyman, an unmistakable Jewish pattern lurks in Hyman Kaplan�s thought patterns. Even his comments on history are attempts to Judaize American icons. On the Gettysburg Address he remarks: �Abram Lincohen vas soch a schlemiel telling all the pipples ver he liffd!�.

While it remains a classic of linguistic anomalies, the book is actually about a relationship; between pupil and teacher and the simple fact that both, in the end learn from each other. The former begins to understand the glorious complexity of the English language, while the latter learns that communication between human beings relies more on passion and positive intent than just plain speech. As for the reader, it is an adventure back into the classroom and a reminder that while we take the mother tongue for granted, many of our immigrant ancestors could not. Hyman Kaplan is an undoubted link to those ancestors and a delightful rejoinder to those who forget we all have to start somewhere.



�Mr Kaplan rubbed his chin. "In voibs, vhat does de beginnis cless nid? Just de prazant tanse, de pest, an� de future. Dat�s enof for a lifetime!"
Mr Parkhill tried to repress his dismay. "You mean you would erase all of the tenses except past, present and future?!"
"Mit� plashure."
"But so many of the other tenses and moods � are so valuable!"
"Bendages are weluable too," mused Mr. Kaplan, "if you are bliddink. But if you are not bliddink, iven in a finger, vhy bendage op de whole hend?"
Mr Parkhill gazed with falling affection and failing pride upon that impressive aggregation: the staunch "shall have�s, the bold "shall have beens". He felt awful.�

[Roger]

A great suggestion, Minhang - I began to like Mr Kaplan!
Maybe tape-rec ording would help the student with that horrible pronunciation? Let him become aware of his own communication difficulties - he can speak the lingo fluently, but not pronounce it well enough though that's the part of speaking that he is the least aware of since he never listens to himself.
I wonder if he would agree to being recorded!