Job Discussion Forums

[JZer]

Sashadroogie, to hopefully better clarify my point:

I don't see your connection. Sashadroogie. Let's say for example that we take two history teachers. I do not believe that someone who studied history education and someone who only studied history would have much difference in their critical thinking skills or ability to get students to think critically about subjects.

Looking at history critically would be a skill most likely acquired in the same history class for education and non-education majors.

My point is that I hope that most college graduates would have critical thinking skills and would be able to help students look at text critically. After reading books, journals, and articles critically for four years, I would hope that anyone with a B.A. would have some ability to look at classroom material critically.

[Sashadroogie]

Ah OK, now that's much clearer. And I can agree with you up to a point, about history teachers anyway. However, how would you feel about EFL teachers in a history classroom? Not really cut out for it, are they? Looking at history critically is not a skill most likely acquired from a TEFL course. Maybe some individuals have this skill, but not because of their EFL training. And as for then teaching this skill to others... well....

Yet the analogy breaks down a little further when you contrast English majors, in literature or even linguistics itself, and those who trained in the teaching of EFL. The former cannot always be expected to somehow be able to teach non-natives. Someone with a degree in history, with or without a teacher-training component, stands a far better chance of being capable of teaching history for the simple reason that they are most likely going to be teaching someone from their own L1 group.

Hence my conviction, seemingly quite radical, that EFL teachers ought to stick to what they are trained to do.

[JZer]

[johnslat]

Well, a look at some "Jaywalking" videos might cause one to reevaluate the intelligence level of at least a few college/university graduates.


http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=jay+leno+jaywalking&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=1AHnSo6gD4WQsgP_v-WcBQ&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CBgQqwQwAA#

Regards,
John

[khmerhit]

shameful anti-intellectualism, John! Back to the re-education camp with you!!

Yeah I had a good chance at a gig at a new university in Phnom Penh, the Pannasastra, but when the chap asked me to teach history, business, western civilization ,etc, I balked and walked, not being a graduate of these disciplines. Then I found out later that others were not so scrupulous about their own quals.












C A M B O D I A
try it and see

[Sashadroogie]

[gaijinalways]

Sashadroogie,

Language school

Bearing in mind that Berlitz is the world's largest language school, and that they use methodology/approaches that are the same in all their branches, in both Asia and Europe, I guess mentioning language school as a place of employment is relevent.

Grammar

You seem to be fixtated on the idea that the majority of our job is teaching structural/grammatical aspects. I have met some dyed in the wool grammarians that were in fact, awful teachers. (often due to a lack of social skills, poor use of examples, unable to explain things well, etc..). I think a teacher that sometimes refers to a grammar book to explain more advanced grammar is not a disgrace.

Critical thinking skills

When I think of analytical skills, those such as observation and statistical analysis, I am thinking of nonlinguistic skills. I can't see how these would not be useful for almost any job or just life in general. Of course any skill could be added to a curriculum , but some are more useful than others (i.e. if you're a chef/cook, some cooking skills are useful unless you restrict yourself to working for McDonalds).

Therapy

You seem to believe that anyone giving advice is giving therapy. If that were the case, than a lot of people have been mistakenly giving away their money when they could have been getting advice from a family member or a kind person on the street with any degree of patience.

No training, but possession of a skillset

I think JZer was trying to pont out that someone can 'teach' something without having a background as a teacher as long as they have the proper skill and are able to demonstrate its usage. Whether the 'student' will be able to learn may have more to do with his/her observation skills than with any teaching skills the teacher may possess.

Maybe its time to take the head off that beer, I think it's getting warm .

[JZer]

[gaijinalways]

I must admit JZer, some aspects of teaching are modeling, some are trying to help someone to model what we as teachers feel is the target language. For a language teacher, it is difficult to sometimes decide which is more needed.

[JZer]

I believe that there are people all over the world who teach subjects to their co-workers and subordinates who have no training in the area of teaching.

I am not arguing that training is not useful. I am arguing that people can pick up the same skills through experience, mentors, independent reading etc.

[Phil_K]

Hear, hear to JZer! No one taught me to be a genius - I figured it out for myself.

Training, Schmaining!

[Sashadroogie]

[Sashadroogie]

[Sashadroogie]

[JZer]