Can they handle the truth?

[Stephen Jones]

Answering in monosyllable is considered curt in English, if not downright rude.

I believe we can teach alternatives - "yes, OK" "yes, that's right" but "yes" or "no" on their own are not normally satisfactory answers in British English.

I doubt if there is any overload in teaching, or better still simply using, natural alternatives.

[Scott.Sommers]

My interpretation of this problem is somewhat different and probably coloured by the fact that I have been teaching in Asia for so long. I have always presumed that detailed answers based on grammatical prescription should be left for teachers preparing students for examination - almost all of whom are local teachers . The role of native speaker teachers, on the other hand, is to introduce students to natural usage.

[fluffyhamster]

Our purple haired East-Asian charges are not desperate to tell us about their weekends. We are not desperate to know about their weekends. Yet we both ask them, I suppose, since we enter that boxy room each day in order to elicit speech, and when they answer naturally, "uh, you know, not much" it's a pain in the rectum. It's sometimes tough to get people making sentences which will stretch them. We should use every trick in the book.

Actually, my charges, when they are of the age to want to be dyeing their hair purple, aren't allowed to (although homeroom teachers don't always seem to notice subtle brown highlights), and even if they did come in looking like Sid Vicious, they aren't at heart rebellious enough to act like it all the time (that in itself would become wearing, even for them, the little sweethearts); and I can't honestly remember a time when a middle-aged bank manager or housewife came in splattered with assorted hair products. Anyway, if they don't have anything to say about their weekends, that is their problem, and not immediately mine (people who lead very boring lives or who have no deep or even immediate thoughts or opinions will ultimately thwart any curriculum, even one specifically designed to meet their "needs" - classrooms aren't comfy enough for sleeping in, for example).

Answering in monosyllable is considered curt in English, if not downright rude.

I believe we can teach alternatives - "yes, OK" "yes, that's right" but "yes" or "no" on their own are not normally satisfactory answers in British English.

I doubt if there is any overload in teaching, or better still simply using, natural alternatives

I suppose I have made it seem like I am a champion of just saying 'Yes' or 'No'. Perhaps I should clarify: what I am opposed to is a mechanical repetition of the words in the original question (even just the pronoun+auxiliary), like that is somehow going to make a student into a decent conversationalist. What the student says after that 'Yes' or 'No' (if indeed they choose to say anything) is ultimately up to them, and a decent course should be trying to show how creative and unpredictable speech can be beyond the predictable, boring "certainties" (Is it any wonder you have boring lessons, then, woody!? ). If they consistently ONLY use 'Yes' or 'No' in a "rude" manner, obviously the teacher will need to nudge them along a bit, but by the same token, mechanical answers aren't necessarily saying very much either.

Besides, since when did a decent course confine itself to such boring questions for long! ('Are you a student?' - 'Yes, I am, indeed! This is a classroom, or that presumbly was a classroom in the textbook drill, so the character and I also are "obviously" students! Maybe your question would be more appropriate if I were hanging around, looking shifty, in the reception area, or worse, the teachers' room...shouldn't you more be asking me What I do, in which case, a yes-no question guessing game could take quite a while, that'd be fun!' etc etc).

Even the simplest things require a lot of thought and reasoning to make it appropriate to say them...context, context, context! If we can't be bothered thinking about what we say to students, perhaps we shouldn't say anything and just shut up - or only say what comes naturally. I'm interested in appearing to be natural with whatever I say (well, at least the important points, we have to wing a lot of the rest!), and it takes time, planning and effort beforehand to do this in a seemingly "effortless" manner in class. Being a native speaker isn't enough, and why are we so keen to browbeat the students over what they say when we pay so little attention to what we ourselves are saying before and after the student's "turn"?

I suspect that if we gave more thought to what we should be saying and expecting as teachers, the student's task/role/lines would follow on a lot more smoothly, and some real learning might actually occur not only for the students but also the teachers. Don't you ever want to do everything you possibly can to help a natural conversation unfold before your very eyes, to see that happen?!

[lolwhites]

The danger with the "yes/no I + [auxiliary] is better" school of thought is that it could also lead to inappropriate language:

Shop Asst: Can I help you?
Customer: Yes you can
Surely the appropriate response here is Yes, please or No, thanks

How about this one?
A: Will you help me with these bags?
B: Yes, I will (A thinks "OK but when?")
Appropriate response - OK, sure, no problem...

Finally, one I mentioned on another thread:
A: May I open the window?
B: No, you may not (A thinks "No need to be like that, I was only asking!)
Appropriate reponse - I'd rather you didn't; it's cold outside

These examples may sound facetious, but I hear this sort of thing all the time from students whose well-meaning teachers back home taught them it was more polite.

[fluffyhamster]

Great examples, lolwhites. They don't seem that facetious (well, not in the context of this "debate", anyway!).

It would be better in the first example especially to (just say 'Yes' and) immediately follow on with something more essential and pertinent e.g:

A: Can I help you?
B: Yes (please), can I look at that.../Yes, do you have...>Yes, I was wondering if you had...

Regarding the window, one could also say, 'Yes...but it's a bit cold outside!' etc.

Woodcutter will probably now say, 'Well, in these contexts I wouldn't teach the way I (usually) do...', to which, all I can say is 'Good, nice to know you're now thinking a little!'.

[JuanTwoThree]

To the question "Shall I open the window?"

the answers "Yes, you shall" or "No you shan't"

might not be entirely desirable either!

But bear in mind the whole matter would have been dropped long before such intricacies as "May?" or "Shall?", in the hope that S.s would have picked up a repertoire of other answers by then.

Though I take the point about "Can?" and "Will" in the contexts you mentioned, maybe it's the negatives that are the problem. A cheerful "Yes, you can" or "Yes, I will" could be adequate coping strategies, it's "No, you can't" and "No, I won't" that really grate in the circumstances you describe.

[fluffyhamster]

Though I take the point about "Can?" and "Will" in the contexts you mentioned, maybe it's the negatives that are the problem. A cheerful "Yes, I can" or "Yes, I will" could be adequate coping strategies, it's "No, you can't" and "No, I won't" that really grate in the circumstances you describe.

Now, that's being facetious!

I think we can assume that anybody in a shop is there for a purpose (or, if not, they will say something like, 'No, I'm just looking, thanks' - again, notice the pertinent information following on directly from the 'No'), or that people in obvious need of help will have it promptly given (and will probably ask only those who appear to be friendly and helpful types, rather than the opposite, unless absolutely desperate).

[JuanTwoThree]

"Can I help you"

"Yes, you can. How much are the beans?"

Now, I don't say it's ideal but the putative long-suffering Cambridge shop assistant will hardly bat an eyelid. Shall I google two hundred examples of where "Yes, you can" is used by impeccable literary sources?

[fluffyhamster]

"Can I help you"

"Yes, you can. How much are the beans?"

Now, I don't say it's ideal but the putative long-suffering Cambridge shop assistant will hardly bat an eyelid. Shall I google two hundred examples of where "Yes, you can" is used by impeccable literary sources?

Google away, JTT, Google away. It still doesn't change the fact that this putative long-suffering shop assistant would bat even less of an eyelid were our "windbag" of a student to gain some sort of executive control of at least one of their sphincters, and simply ask, 'Yes, how much are the beans?'.

[fluffyhamster]

I hope I am not starting to sound like Strunk and White or whoever - 'Less is more' and all that. I'm just trying to say that 'More often makes no difference in the immediate context'.

[fluffyhamster]

This next bit should perhaps be put on the 'What the H is a sentence?' thread. It's also somewhat repetitive.

Woodcutter is ultimately saying that to not expand "whenever" possible is a missed opportunity for further practice, inefficient, "patronizing", what have you. I can see and do appreciate the point he is making, but as lolwhites has observed, "politeness" isn't a particularly convincing reason to add the "obvious" elements (drawn from the question).

The challenge as I see it is to think of the less obvious things that might be said as an answer. These range from alternative and often more appropiate/effective functional exponents (e.g. 'Sure' replaces 'Yes') to sentences that contain lexicogrammar differing substantially if not entirely from that in the question (e.g. Are you a student? - Yes, I'm taking the Discourse Analysis evening classes with Professor Lalo Schiffrin. I could just say, 'Yes, I am [a student]', but that wouldn't be telling you much...although we could perhaps pretend it is still there, unseen, but got ellipted...).

That isn't to say that the type of answers woodcutter likes to hear aren't ever said, but an analysis of their relative frequency is revealing (see the Richards paper on the form of answers to Y/N Qs).

[woodcutter]

It seems to me that some of you have a basically behaviourist view. If the students come out with great natural stuff, then they have already learnt it, and they don't need you. Your own great authentic natural stuff will not be absorbed in huge chunks. If I do a directed, perhaps "unnatural" exercise, such as the one I am happy to see Revel back talking about, it is designed to expand the linguistic tool box, which is an imperfect thing, stuffed full of weird interlanguage.

Can students handle the truth that they are in a classroom to do exercises to help them learn? Yes.

Can they handle all the aspects of usage, based on logic, context and convention in one fell swoop? Is the "truth" useful when such luminaries as Lewis and Huddlestone do not agree about it? No. (He said, curtly, breaking the class rules).

[lolwhites]

I don't think anyone is seriously proposing expecting the students to understand everything in one fell swoop. Simply a few basic principles like

1) Restrict the input to things native speakers actually say.
2) Don't give students exercises that require them to produce totally artificial, unnatural utterances. They don't need you to help them do that; they need you to help them stop doing it.
3) When the students produce inappropriate, unnatural utterances then tell them; this doesn't mean correcting absolutely every mistake but it does mean saying "native speakers don't say that, they put it like this" or "that sounds rude".

You may feel you're giving students an insight into the language system and they won't use grammar book English in real life. To that all I can say is "come up to my college and meet my Advanced group". Half my time is spent correcting the most bizarre language which the students swear blind their teachers told them was "correct".

[LarryLatham]

Are you a student? - Yes, I'm taking the Discourse Analysis evening classes with Professor Lalo Schiffrin.

Now you're showing your age, Fluffy. I thought only old farts like myself would know who Lalo Schiffrin is, not to mention apparently appreciate his stuff. I've got some great old LP's with some of his best work. I know he's still around, but suspect few people under the age of 40 have heard of him.

Larry Latham

[Metamorfose]

1) Restrict the input to things native speakers actually say.

That's a challenge when you are in an EFL environment, it's reassuring but too time consuming the research on real language to adapt to the classroom.

2) Don't give students exercises that require them to produce totally artificial, unnatural utterances. They don't need you to help them do that; they need you to help them stop doing it.

I remember when I started teaching (sorry people, if I met you again I would re-teach you, or rather, I would teach you this time ) I had one of those famous 'make the sentence negative and interrogative' and there I went writing on the board: She was my girlfriend. , well, I wrote the negative statement She wasn't my girlfriend. and finally: Was she my girlfriend? one of the student raised his hand and told me that it would be someone suffering from amnesia who would say so, I agreed and felt like an idiot from that very moment I became aware on some of those exercises, now tell me, someone who writes books could at least be a little aware about such oddities.

3) When the students produce inappropriate, unnatural utterances then tell them; this doesn't mean correcting absolutely every mistake but it does mean saying "native speakers don't say that, they put it like this" or "that sounds rude".

It wasn't long I became aware of this kind of correction, for example, lip service is paid to pronunciation and intonation in communication, as I read somewhere a properly and poisenously 'good morning' can do more harm than a punch.

Half my time is spent correcting the most bizarre language which the students swear blind their teachers told them was "correct".

Hey lolwhite, can you show us some examples? What kind of terachers were these?

José