Job Discussion Forums

ecocks · Joined: 06 Nov 2007 Posts: 899 Location: Gdansk, Poland

Anyone ever heard of this guy pictured here? He apparently claims to be a "multi-millionaire" ESL teacher in China. His method is to seat hundreds of people at a time for cheap mass English lessons which appear to involve repetitive recitals. Maybe he does business as "Crazy English" or this International Language Village?

http://www.crazyenglish.com

Here's a video of him (or someone) doing a lesson to "prove" how it works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NW_PMUeMVM8

He's also selling a license to use his method worldwide so, everyone can get rich teaching English.

kev7161 · Joined: 06 Feb 2004 Posts: 5880 Location: Suzhou, China

We in China can't watch the youtube video because youtube is perpetually blocked by the government here. But I'm sure it's entertaining. Yes, Crazy English - - I'm not sure if it is still the phenomenon that it used to be but I still see the books in the bookstores.

ecocks · Joined: 06 Nov 2007 Posts: 899 Location: Gdansk, Poland

So, you've heard of it then. No comment on the method or success thereof? Would you buy the license to teach this way in Mexico or Poland?

mike w · Posted: Mon Aug 24, 2009 1:40 am Post subject:

Simple answer is 'no'.

It's not teaching. All this does is to get a group of people to memorize answers to set questions. They don't 'learn' how to converse. They don't learn how to write a grammatically correct sentence. In fact, they don't 'learn' anything.

Take the students outside of the Q & A they have memorized and they are scr%#$d.

happigur1 · Joined: 25 Jul 2009 Posts: 228 Location: USA

From my very limited knowledge of "Crazy English", I heard that it's not so much as learning grammar, etc. but building the confidence to speak English. The idea is to "yell" phrases to work on your pronunciation and make you feel more confident because you are more sure about yourself (which is what a lot of people learning a language lack).

I don't know if it works or not but I had some students who speak pretty decent English who swore by it. These students aren't shy about speaking English even though they do make mistakes. After all, practice and mistakes is how we learn (or I learn) a language. Most students are too afraid to speak because they are scared of making mistakes or mis-pronounce a word.

nobleignoramus · Joined: 17 Jul 2009 Posts: 208 Location: On the road

Crazy English has been around for well over ten years, and its creator, one Li Yang, quickly struck it rich. No doubt being patronised by the Party folks helped him along. He is married to an Usanian woman and must have powerful connections across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
What's more, he actually pays his underlings above-average wages.

As for the effectiveness of his system, there is no doubt: It's effective in swelling his wallet and bank accounts, but it is totally worthless in terms of empowering the followers to use the language appropriately.

What they do acquire is, as has been noted here, a slightly greater degree of self'confidence that may on occasion be bordering on conceit and an overbearing attitude. They cannot communicate any better in English than any middle-school leaver does, because Li Yang's approach is no different to what's being practised at all public schools in China, except that he tells his learners to shout and to ignore their own English mistakes.

The Ever-changing Cleric · Joined: 19 Feb 2009 Posts: 1523

sharpe88 · Joined: 21 Oct 2008 Posts: 226

It's a goofy, non-scientific system but I think a lot of their students are stronger than those that attend the average language mill. Students tend to be enthusiastic and work hard.

longlivetheclash · Joined: 12 Aug 2009 Posts: 6

Hello The Ever changing Cleric,

Please e-mail me at [email protected]
I've read a lot of your responses, and appreciate your positive, sound advice. Furthermore, I can not PM (less than 25 posts), and have a couple of questions pertaining to ESL teaching in China.

Many thanks,
Longlivetheclash

samhouston · Joined: 17 Jan 2007 Posts: 418 Location: LA

alter ego · Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 209

mike w · Posted: Wed Aug 26, 2009 12:31 am Post subject:

I agree that it will give them confidence - something that many Chinese students lack, but it is not, and never will be teaching, in terms of learning a language.

The students only memorize specific answers to specific questions, and in many cases they don't understand the question they have been asked, or the answer they have given. I have come across quite a number of ex-Crazy English students, and in most cases have had to teach at a much lower level than they think they have attained. This is mainly because they don't understand the sentences/phrases they have memorized.

malu · Joined: 22 Apr 2007 Posts: 1344 Location: Sunny Java

Teachers at my school are all multi-millionaires.

We earn on average 20 million per month each.

...in Indonesian Rupiah Embarassed