Post
by mrandmrsjohnqsmith » Fri Sep 22, 2006 5:25 am
Among all of my students, there have been a handful who truly spoke English like native speakers despite the fact that it was their second language. I have asked each of them how they became so fluent. "Watching English movies" has been the #1 response.
This applies even to students who had never spent time in an English-speaking country, and had never dated English speakers (not admittedly, anyway). Empirical this data ain't; rather it is merely the sample from my own personal experience (a puny three years' worth). I don't doubt that other factors were involved, such as drive and genuine desire to learn. I cannot, however, allow myself to dismiss this as mere coincidence, either. Maybe learning can be fun, after all. I have not stopped prescribing movies as a useful learning tool, though I do add some qualifiers. First, don't use subtitles in the learner's native language, because the translations are often misleading or just plain wrong. Second, do use English subtitles, but with caution;. They can also be treacherous, but not nearly as much. English subtitles will sometimes simplify the true dialog (or dialogue) for the sake of brevity or clarity. Third, use the "pause" and "rewind" buttons frequently, and take notes. Ask your teacher questions. Use the films as a study aid, rather than just sitting back like an audience member. Finally, be particular about the kind of movies used. This is very important. I had one student come to me with a stack of questions after having been to the theater (or theatre, if you prefer, God save the Queen) to see one of the Lord of the Rings movies. Naturally that kind of film will be fairly useless; Tolkein was a linguist who invented fictitious grammatical structures and vocabulary for his characters!
I disreccomend period pieces for the obvious reasons, and action movies as well, because the characters often use slang and crass language that can get an unsuspecting English learner into trouble. (You talkin' to me?!?) Romantic comedies are usually a safe bet, I hate to say, because I usually hate them myself. I have nothing against romance or comedy, I just hate most of the drivel that passes on celluloid under that category. I guess that's where the part comes in about "doing the thing you hate the most." But the language in romantic comedies is relatively clean, and the situations and themes are more likely to be those that students can relate to (as opposed to, say, the jargon peculiar to sci-fi or espionage thrillers). Maybe you guys can think of some better suggestions.
I challenged the hell out of one of my students with Raising Arizona, which is rife with Midwestern U.S. dialects, but she was very advanced and was ready for that kind of excursion. I didn't just tell her to go watch it, either. We got the DVD and covered a chapter a week. I watched the chapter that she would be assigned to view the following week at least twice, looking for teaching points and for dialogue that might have given her difficulty. I gave her pre-viewing questions and post-viewing questions as well.
Blame the artist, not the tools. Everything can be used or abused.
