Job Discussion Forums

[candi floss]

Hello.
I studied languages at uni before I became an EFL teacher and although I'm sure this experience made me more aware of the processes of language learning than a monolingual teacher at the start of their career, I still don't know if this has made me a better teacher overall. It's impossible to say really if being proficient at other languages makes us better teachers - I think that it all comes down to the combination of different factors that each individual brings to the job.

If anything, the way I learnt French and Spanish was rather traditional and grammar based and my monolingual partner (also an EFL teacher) often reminds me that I tend to be a little grammar-obsessed when planning lessons. So, perhaps the old-fashioned grammar-translation method that was used to teach me Spanish at uni also subconciously rubbed off on me...
Yes, I'll admit it - I like to learn languages by starting off with grammar (probably due to the way I was taught as a teenager) and maybe I teach that way too without realising.

However, my partner prefers the more communicative-based methods and, I have to admit, his students absolutely love his classes and he has high success rates. (I have to say though, he's not completely monolingual - as I doubt many native-speaker EFL teachers are due to the travelling nature of our jobs and he actually knows more than he lets on!) Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that he wasn't influenced by any dodgy language teaching methodologies from his past like I may have been!!

A possible downside of knowing the language of your students is using it too much in class. I often ended up speaking way too much Spanish in class when I was out there teaching, just because it was easier to explain things to them that way and to keep control over rowdy teenagers and screaming three year olds!

I think observing any teachers (whether language teachers or not) is a great way of improving upon your teaching skills. I'm doing an MA at the moment and I'm amazed at the poor teaching skills of some of the (highly-paid and obviously extremely bored) teachers of my classes. They are all EFL teachers aswell as MA Applied Linguistics teachers, but some of their classroom skills are shocking! It's been a real insight into how not to teach - hardly what I expected when I signed up for the course....All good experience though.

[JZer]

[yaramaz]

I never struggled much with languages until I came to Turkey. I studied French all through school to the point of being bilingual by highschool, and as an adult picked up Afrikaans/Flemish from a long term South African boyfriend, and also was able to fairly easily pick up enough spanish and portuguese and dutch to carry me through my travels. But Turkish has been a huge challenge, and I do think that my struggles with Turkish have really given me a lot more empathy for my adult students. Before, because I just picked up languages without much formal study, I had a lot more... laissez faire attitude towards teaching. I thought that they'd just, well, pick it up too. I was just there to guide them. But I know now that it's a lot more complicated than that. Especially for adult students.

What I hadn't factored in before attempting to learn Turkish were my very mixed levels of motivation, which are quite closely linked to my emotional states-- I had a rough year last year and the language actually p!ssed me off because of outside bollix unrelated to actual formal language learning- bad breakups from Turkish boyfriends, unpleasant office politics with Turkish staff, people condescendingly refusing to speak Turkish with me because their English is obviously better (even if it wasnt), etc. I still learned during that year- it's hard not to when you are immersed in the country that speaks it- but it was almost like a mental block that prevented me from wanting to sit down and study. I had too many negative associations with it.

I speak Turkish well enough now that I know where my students will struggle and where they will get confused. More importantly, I can also more clearly understand how they might feel as adults learning a new language from the beginner level and feeling powerless and unable to communicate or understand what's happening. I know what I'd feel comfortable or safe with when learning Turkish (patience is key, and not being constantly corrected, and a teacher's ability to be intuitive when I do end up speaking gibberish). I can't say any of my 12 years learning french ever gave me that insight.

[dmb]

[JZer]

[dmb]

You are correct JZer, I was being flippant as usual. However, if you have access to ELT journal, Litsearch, etc you will see that a lot of research is by people whose L2 is English.

[guty]

A couple of points to add here:

1/ I used to work with a writer of EFL coursebooks and textbooks. A well known and well respected figure in the field of EFL and second language acquisition. His books were good, and his theories seemed reasonable.
He was as monolingual as they come. A real case of do as I say, not do as I do!

2/ I think we need to separate the knowledge of language from the study of it.

By this I mean that, while I am not a particularly good foriegn language learner, I have twice spent enough time in a place to pick up the local language. And that is exactly how it happened, I had no formal classes, but a huge motivation (just surviving in general, new girlfriends, etc etc), and plenty of opportunity, i.e. I lived there!

I could see how this sometimes disheartened some students, who had struggled in classes with English for years, and along comes Johhny foreigner, who picks up their language with no apparent effort. My advice to them was that I am having 12 hours of classes every day, every time I step outside the class I am exposed to your language. You only ever see mine for 4 hours a week.

My point is that I imagine most EFLers have learnt their other languages by being in country, like ESL, more than in a classroom. And, unless you are teaching in an english speaking country, this clearly does not parallel the experience of the students.

So, why might it be relevant to classroom teaching?

Isn't that like saying I can play golf, so I must be able to coach tennis?

[dmb]

Nice post Guty. However

[guty]

DMB,

What happened to Southampton when Clive Woodward took over? Relegation.

Had I put 'a figure asleep in a field' it may have been Bing.

[zorro (3)]

What is Clive Woodward doing now anyway? Has he become an ESL/EFL teacher? Probably. Oh no. More competition for those cushty jobs!

[JZer]

guty wrote:

[SueH]

Guty, there are at least two Southampton supporters on this board - don't send us off topic! �. The sporting anology is worth picking up on. Here in Italy ski instructors have to do a speed test. This has precious little connection with actually imparting knowledge to most of the skiers that are to be taught. They are the effective equivalent to mother tongue speakers and the idea of skiing being difficult is completely alien to them.

I sometimes think I should try and learn a non-latin language, like Yaramaz, purely to remind myself of the difficulties students experience. Then I realise I lack the motivation. This in turn reminds me that the student�s motivation is probably the biggest success factor of all!

[ls650]

[JZer]

[JZer]