Job Discussion Forums

[basiltherat]

Had half a group yesterday because of the Christmas break The section of the material that we were covering was on phrasal verbs. As it was an adult cass and the trainees had daily contact wth expariates in an industrial setting, I thought it would be an ideal opportunity to explain some uses of the F word in phrasal vebs (f@@@ off, f@@@ up etc). I stressed several times that they should under no circumstances ever use these words, either at work or socially.However, I did stress that they have heard and will again in the future, hear these expressions from foriegn workers and should be able to understand what is meant by each one. In other words, not to stand around if someone says ""f@@@ off"" and to understand what the guy means if he says ""Well, gents, this generator is well and truly f@@@ed !""
It went quite well and then we moved onto other more tradtionally taught phrasal verbs.
Would you teach these kinds of vulgar expessions ? Just interested.

[khmerhit]

I used the F word with my young students on a daily basis-- it was quite inexcusable and wrong, but it made me feel a bit better and kept them quiet. They didnt seem to care, but maybe they didnt understand.

You have a duty to teach it to adults, you did the right thing--- treated them as adults.
merry Christmas
kh

[denise]

I agree. They're going to hear it, they need to (and quite likely want to) understand it, and they're adults.

If I could find a meaningful way to include such lessons, I would--they just haven't seemed to fit in anywhere. I think my own philosophy is that if the students ask, I will of course tell them. Sometimes I swear in class if we're just chatting (before or after class, or during breaks), because I want them to hear a different style of language (a style that they already hear in movies, etc.).

I gave my listening class an eavesdopping assignment and asked them to listen to and take note of, among other things, different slang expressions/idioms. One of the students came back to class with a few very common swearing expressions--don't remember which ones--and I was delighted! He had gone out and brought back examples of natural language to the class, and I didn't have to worry about whether or not swearing was relevant to the lesson--he did it for me!

d

[struelle]

[dmb]

I don't need to teach it as they already know it due to the fact that they spend their freetime listening to Hip Hop and watching hollywood films. If only their classroom English was as fluent as their swearing
Sometimes it cracks me up. Last week one of my students was patiently waiting for his colleauge to join him for a pair work activity. His patience run out and beckoned him with 'Eh nigga, get your f***ing black a** over here now.'I should've have disciplined him but I cracked up, It's hard to tell someone off when you are laughing

[leeroy]

I use "flip" as a code-word - students can (and sometimes do) insert "flip" into a moderated "coursebook" sentence, which I then give them feedback on.

"Mary was 15 minutes late" = "Mary was 15 flipping minutes late"
"Where had you gone?" = "Where the flip had you gone?"

etc...

[guty]

To borrow from leeroy,
I have used this sentence, which I overheard whilst camping in Wales, for discussion of types of words in English

The flippin flipper's flippin flipped,

[shenyanggerry]

I did a class on the words you WILL NOT use. It included the 'seven words' and more. They picked up on the concept right away. Every language has obscenities well known even to those who would never utter them.

I told them that when they knew the language well enough to understand why these words/terms were obscene, they'd know when they could use them. Until then, avoid. Some students thanked me afterwards as nobody had bothered to explain this before.

The emotional baggage of obscenity is learned in childhood. Few L2 speakers really understand when to use 'making love', when to use 'f*cking'.