Job Discussion Forums

[Professor]

My friend came here from China and lasted only two weeks. Why? Many reasons but one of the top ones was the lack of interest in learning English. In China (according to him) people who even hated the States wanted to learn and to know how to SPEAK English,yet here in DF the only concern is where the next party will be.
Let's see...it's the universal business language and they live right next door to the world's only superpower,yet English doesn't seem to matter to a lot of people here. Why?
Here's another crazy mentality...few will STUDY the language here but they never seem to understand or want to practice USING the laguage.
Grammar ALONE will not make it possible for one to SPEAK a language. My friend told me...once you go to asia and teach,you'll NEVER want to teach in Mexico where the mindset is to not care about too much.

[Phil_K]

My experience is that people say they are interested in learning, but are not prepared to do what it takes, other than turning up for class - as if I had a magic wand! Surely if you really want to do something, you put everything into it.

[TheLongWayHome]

It's a mix of a lot of things, here are a few that I've noticed over the years:

Education in general is not high on the list of priorities. Why bother to excel when the name of your school is what's going to get you a good job, or not.

A complete lack of independent learning or any kind of educational self-reliance.

Language school marketing - "Bilingual in One Year!", "Speak in 3 Months!" I paid. I turned up. Where's my English?

English is kind of a filler subject in high school and even university. Just as French is in the UK or Spanish is in the USA.

Believe it or not there are entire states in Mexico where you don't need English to get a good job. Some are still self-reliant. Other states go to the opposite extreme and ask for 'x% English' for practically any job.

English is pretty badly taught here on the whole. Whether it be almost entirely in Spanish in most high schools and unis or by some barely qualified party teacher in a language school. The chances of you getting a good teacher here are pretty slim.

I hate to say it but language schools, high schools and unis for the most part are businesses here. Education is not the driving force.

Don't blame the students though. Yes they're kind of lazy sometimes but they really don't know how to learn a language - it's not an easy task, even for a language teacher.

[Tretyakovskii]

Professor, there's a lot of possible reasons why your friend didn't stick it out here besides the one he seemed to attribute it to: he may have just missed China, making everything seem better, there.

You were right to be a little skeptical of the way he represented the students, there. The reality is that Chinese university students are required to study English, or another foreign language, just as people in the west are, and with a similar result- little language learning. In fact, it's even less likely to take place in China where language classes can have 50-80 students in them.

In going about your daily life there, you would encounter few, if any, people who speak English at all. The exceptions tend to be those who work in specialized fields and have been selected for their knowledge of English, those who teach English, and those who are studying English and are serious enough about it to show up at popular "English Corners" in which people gather, seeking others to practice English with. (Visit a large city in China and you could easily be led to believe a lot of people speak English as you're approached by groups of young people eager to chat with you, in parks and other public places.)

People are learning English there, just as people in the west are learning Chinese, and for the same reasons- to connect with each other, later, in some career they hope to follow. These people will tend to be the serious among the students, and will manage some progress, even under difficult conditions.

China is a fascinating country, but the challenges language teachers face, in general, are little different there.

As for the students here, I suspect the level of seriousness will vary tremendously, depending on what type of school or institution you are teaching in, and what background your students have, making comparisons difficult. In my university there are a significant number of students who speak English very credibly, and many of the rest are trying to get there: it's clear they haven't been sleeping in class, up to this point.
____________________

Much of what was said by PhilK and LWH points to reasons for particular examples of indifference to learning English: even here in Cancun, where a city of almost one million lives or dies on tourism, most of it English speaking tourism, surprisingly few people speak English, outside of those who work in the hotel zone.

Among the professionals and high level administrators I've dealt with, almost none have been English speaking: they just haven't needed it in their work, or in any future vision of their work. Since learning a new foreign language well is a huge task, I can't say I blame them for not giving it a shot: they've been content with forcing me to speak Spanish- painful as that's been for both them, and me!

[leslie]

bye

[JakeJakeJake]

i guess some teachers just suck

[wildchild]

[TheLongWayHome]

It's not all bored students counting down the minutes to the end of the lesson. I have some students that are interested (what a difference that makes!) but their major is foreign languages and teaching so they should be or why else would they be there? Interestingly they study Spanish so explaining grammar to them using grammatical terminology actually works! This is probably the exception though.

[geaaronson]

Long Way Home has said most of what I perceive to be the case as well.
As a teacher at a university in the USA before coming to MX, I had dozens if not hundreds of foreign students in my classes. I had students from Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Bulgaria, Russia, Ireland, Senegal, Mexico, Haiti, Venezuala, Columbia, the list goes on. After a while you begin to see the cultural and educational differences between the students. I found that some nationalities had better students than others and there was a wide range of maturity. I can�t help but make comparisons as in some cases the differences were so strong that it became so very noticeable.
For the most part, I found students from Eastern Europe and the Pacific rim to be the most industrious and grade conscious. The Latinos were a mixed bag, but generally were more lackadaisical, particularly the Colombians. My samples for each nationality were small so my insights may be skewed, but I also found the Haitains less than ideal students.

Living in Latin America, I note there is a greater amount of indulgence towards children, much more so than in the USA. Parents frequently buy their children candy when entering the store, more so than I have ever seen in the States. There is much more interaction between child and adult in a playful manner in Mexican culture than in the US. As the trend in American culture for the past 40 years has been for the male to recognize his feminine side, here in Mexico, the adults are already very much in tune with their childish side. I have had lawyers in their 40�s wax ecstatic over the cartoons of their youth and even imitate their favorite cartoon characters voices in class in front of other students.

The goals in education here in Mexico are more attuned to career development than in intellectual pursuits. When I first came to Mexico, I was taken aback by the lack of reading even among the educated populace. When I read the statistic that on the average, A mexican reads 1 to 2 books a year, I decided to further query my professional students, at the time, biochemists at Coca Cola, lawyers and doctors. The statistics held up. I was not able to find anyone who had read any more than 4 books a year.

[Phil_K]

This situation is strange in Mexico, given the system of education, where it is necessary to pass each year to advance to the next grade. This doesn't exist in Britain (or didn't, who knows? The British system is getting more Americanized), at least in my day you just followed the course each year and if you didn't learn anything, too bad. Yet, the British education system is widely admired and many world leaders were educated in that system.

[Prof.Gringo]

Many Mexicans seem to think learning and speaking English makes them less "Mexican" and Mexico more "Estadounidense".

I've met many Mexicans that simply refuse to learn English even when it's needed in their majors while in a university. Of course they feel the pain when they can't find a job for their lack of English.

Many students are simply lazy. True all over but even more so in the Latin culture which places a low emphasis on education in general and learning languages (English anybody?) in particular. Young adults often stay at home till they get married and they seem to have a total lack of responsibility (coming from a US perspective of 18 and you're out the door). Kids are spoiled by their parents and often have a muchacha to clean up after and wipe their noses (even if they're 25 and in a university).

Many teachers simply "pass" their students regardless of their knowledge or ability in a subject area. It's especially problematic in the private colegios and uni's when the Ss pay to pass as much as they (well... their parents) pay to learn. And this expectation to pass without learning the subject naturally carries over into the English classroom where the teacher often teaches English in Spanish and is content to teach grammar instead of conversation as many (most) Mexican English teachers are themselves deficient in being able to speak English.

Another reason why a teacher who was in China would dislike Mexico is there's really no premium to being a native speaker in Mexico as there seems to be in Asian countries.

And Mexico doesn't exactly roll out the welcome mat for Americans... Other Latin American countries seem much more Gringo friendly (Peru or Costa Rica for example).

[geaaronson]

the principal problem as I see it is block scheduling. Should a student fail a single course, he is kicked out of school for a year before allowed back in. thus puts pressure on the teachers to pass all the students as the penalty is so high.
consequently yeachers will dumb down the courses so they don�t end up with too many failed students on their own records

[TheLongWayHome]

[wildchild]

on the other hand, at the uni where i worked last semester, all students are required to pass the TOEFL with a minimum score.

the more they fail, the more they pay.

[TheLongWayHome]