Native teachers without linguistic talent (General discussion) Language Learning Forum

Native teachers without linguistic talent
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Language Learning Forum : General discussion

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Solfrid Cristin
Heptaglot
Winner TAC 2011 & 2012
Senior Member
Norway
Joined 5333 days ago
4143 posts - 8864 votes

Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian
Studies: Russian

Message 57 of 106

27 July 2013 at 1:27pm | IP Logged

karaipyhare wrote:

Solfrid Cristin wrote:

I think I am perhaps too deamanding, since I used to be a
language teacher myself, but Friday I was furious, and really had to control myself in
order not to call up and yell at a teacher.

My daughter had an oral Spanish exam, where she and her classmates were to act out a
little dialogue, and she had been told that the criteria she would be judged by would
be:
- Speaking loudly and clearly
- Use the manuscript as little as possible
- Good acting skills
- The group must speak at least 4 minute

Now already before the test I was a bit sceptical, both because my daughter, who was
playing the waitress, had to juggle three plates and three glasses as well as remember
her dialogue and because I am also unimpressed by the teacher who keeps making spelling
errors not only in Norwegian but also in Spanish. She is from Colombia and not from
Spain, and does not hear the difference between z and s and obviously makes little
effort to learn it(she had asked the pupils to learn the word "gaspacho" for the last
class).

So I had coached my daughter because she was nervous about the test, and she felt it
went very well. When she got her grade, she was given an A-, the minus being because
the teacher said she had talked too fast. She admitted that my daughter had had a
perfect pronunciation, and that she had spoken loudly and clearly but claimed that she
had spoken so fast that she could hardly understand her. I must admit that this really
made me mad. I can accept that she is told off for speaking too fast in Norwegian
and English, which she knows pretty well, but she is only in her second year of
Spanish, and speaks fairly slowly as far as I am concerned, and I suspect that it is
simply because the teacher is not used to a Spanish accent.

An A- may not seem like much to complain about, but my daughter is so dedicated, and
has in her 18 months of having had Spanish made exactly 1 error in her written tests,
(she wrote "ser" instead of "estar") so when she is is downgraded, I expect it to be
because she actually made a mistake, pronounced something wrong, messed up her grammar,
something tangible.

On the other hand, I don't want my daughter to be dissatisfied with a A-, and I do not
want to come across as one of those overambitious mothers, so I guess I'll just keep my
mouth shut.

I agree with you on everything except on implying that the Colombian accent is somewhat
"wrong" for not distinguishing between the /s/ and /θ/ (represented by z or c). Latin
American speakers just don't do that at all but that doesn't make the Latin American
dialect(s) any less perfect. Keep in mind that the majority of native Spanish speakers
in the world don't pronounce the /θ/ sound, Spain accounts for only 9% of all
hispanohablantes.
If you want your daughter to speak the Spanish variety spoken in Spain due to the
geographical proximity to Norway then that's great but I think she should be aware that
the other varieties are not "wrong" or "misspronounced"

I am not quite sure where you got the idea that I felt a Latin American accent is wrong. Like Mrwaper said,
there is a wide range of differences just within Spain, something I have no problem with. I am also often
mistaken for a Latin American myself, inspite of my "ceceo". Just a few days ago I spoke with a Cuban that
said that when she heard me speak, she could have sworn I was from Santiago de Cuba. And I loved that.
What I do take issue with are the following points in the teacher:
- Actively trying to force a child who speaks Andalusian to speak with a Latin American accent
- Not being able to spell correctly - in Spanish or Norwegian
- Proving by example that she is unable to learn a foreign language properly, even after several years in the
country
- Downgrading a beginner for speaking too fast, in defiance of the criteria previously given
- Generally being a bad teacher who is extremely demotivating.

- And I could have added some of the many things my frustrated daughters say about her, but I will refrain
from doing that.

It is not that I do not respect her right to use her variant of Spanish - she does not respect our right to use our
dialect. And it is irrelevant to me how many percent of the total Spanish speaking population who use other
variants, when 100% of the people my daughters are in contact with use theirs. I make sure that they
understand other variants by exposing them to people from Chile, Argentina, Colombia and Cuba, and my
friend from Peru is practically their second mother. But I do demand the right to use the dialect I have spoken
since I was a child, and that they have also learned. I know Andalusian does not have the highest status, but
it is my dialect, and their dialect, and I will be damned if I let some non trained teacher who happens to be a
native speaker bully any of us into dropping it.

Edited by Solfrid Cristin on 27 July 2013 at 1:29pm
4 persons have voted this message useful

I'm With Stupid
Senior Member
Vietnam
Joined 4172 days ago
165 posts - 349 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: German, Vietnamese

Message 58 of 106

27 July 2013 at 2:05pm | IP Logged

Cavesa wrote:

And why would I strive for knowing the best method in general? And why would the teacher? Every generalization brings some flaws and just believing the papers by the researchers without taking the proper experience more into account isn't a solution. Especially considering how huge part of the researches is financed by the industry or just biased by the popular idea that all that is old is wrong and all that is new and different is automatically better. No offence meant, but I think you overestimate the value of the researches.

It's not financed by the industry. In fact, a lot of the research turns out to be very difficult to get into a textbook format, so why would the industry be in favour of it? Furthermore, it often comes from completely separate fields of study, and usually from publicly-funded universities. The whole "Visual/Auditory/Kinesthetic learner" theory was disproved by neuroscientists, not by the ESL publishing industry. Corpus linguistics massively changed the way we think about language learning thanks to advances in computer science. If anything, the evidence shows that the publishing industry resists change, and is slower to react, not leading new methods for the sake of it. Why go through an expensive overhaul of your entire range of material when you can keep rehashing the same old stuff?

Cavesa wrote:

All I ask is that the teacher doesn't believe bullshit (which is partially present of both old and new methods and even the researches) and knows what kind of trouble the learner faces from the exactly same position. And while this experience won't make him/her know all that is good and all that is bad in language learning (which you wrongly assume I expect),they'll know much more about it than just from monolingual language teaching education.

I'd agree that it's entirely beneficial for a language teacher to learn another language (not necessarily the one of the students he's teaching, incidentally). I just don't think it's particularly informative when it comes to the most effective teaching/learning methodologies. But just out of interest, why would a teacher not want to know the best method in general?

Edited by I'm With Stupid on 27 July 2013 at 2:08pm
1 person has voted this message useful

Stelle
Bilingual Triglot
Senior Member
Canada
tobefluent.com
Joined 4143 days ago
949 posts - 1686 votes

Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish
Studies: Tagalog

Message 59 of 106

27 July 2013 at 3:12pm | IP Logged

I think that "native speaker" becoming synonymous with "foreign language teacher" is a
major problem. Teaching is both an art and a science, and the ability to speak a language
simply isn't enough to make a person a good teacher.

I do think that language teachers are more effective when they've experienced being
language learners. Language learning leads to its own very particular issues and
struggles, and unless you've experienced those yourself, I don't think that you can
really understand what your student is experiencing.

Solfrid, I think it's terrible that your daughter is losing interest in Spanish. Maybe
you can cultivate that interest outside of school? Can you set up a language exchange for
your daughter, either with someone locally or over Skype?
3 persons have voted this message useful

tarvos
Super Polyglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
China
likeapolyglot.wordpr
Joined 4706 days ago
5310 posts - 9399 votes

Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans
Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish

Message 60 of 106

26 August 2013 at 1:40pm | IP Logged

My problem with the original question is that I don't even know how to define talent in
this context.
1 person has voted this message useful

Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5008 days ago
3277 posts - 6779 votes

Speaks: Czech*, French^C2, English^C1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

Message 61 of 106

26 August 2013 at 4:23pm | IP Logged

I'm With Stupid wrote:

But just out of interest, why would a teacher not want to know the best method in general?

1. There is no one best method. Those who believe in one best method (and I have met a few) usually hurt part of their students by forcing on them something that is by far not the best method for them.

2. Most language teachers don't care much anyways.
They either work for state schools and the standard education system in which they are badly paid, forced to a lot of bureaucracy etc. Part of them is just burnt out, others are required to teach for the tests and exams, not for real skills and so on. Only few good language teachers stay there.
And those in the private education need to care for methods that are best for the school (=bring the most money), not best for the students. So they need their methods to be fancy and not overwhelming, not requiring any homework as that is not popular even with adults and they need the methods to take years before the students reach good enough level not to need the language school anymore.
3 persons have voted this message useful

pesahson
Diglot
Senior Member
Poland
Joined 5727 days ago
448 posts - 840 votes

Speaks: Polish*, English
Studies: French, Portuguese, Norwegian

Message 62 of 106

27 August 2013 at 9:21am | IP Logged

Cavesa wrote:

And those in the private education need to care for methods that are best for the school (=bring the most money), not best for the students. So they need their methods to be fancy and not overwhelming, not requiring any homework as that is not popular even with adults and they need the methods to take years before the students reach good enough level not to need the language school anymore.

I haven't had normal classes in a language school in years, but I talked to someone who is in favor of them, and apparently in PL it takes three semesters to move from A1 to A2! (It was about French)
I know they're designed for people who study/work and aren't language lovers but this is super slow.

Edited by pesahson on 27 August 2013 at 9:21am
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beano
Diglot
Senior Member
United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 4621 days ago
1049 posts - 2152 votes

Speaks: English*, German
Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian

Message 63 of 106

27 August 2013 at 9:51am | IP Logged

If you remove English from the equation and skim off the top 5% of kids who excel academically in all subjects and who will study accordingly, it must be a tough job teaching languages to teenagers. People say that youngsters learn faster than adults but I don't think that generally applies to the 13-16 age group.

Edited by beano on 27 August 2013 at 9:51am
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Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5008 days ago
3277 posts - 6779 votes

Speaks: Czech*, French^C2, English^C1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

Message 64 of 106

27 August 2013 at 3:16pm | IP Logged

I actually think part of the problem is dumbing down the curricula. Of course the average teenage Joe or Jane doesn't see much point to learning a language when the school curriculum combined with the teacher doesn't give him any useful skills for a year or two or even longer. If the people were actually lead to learning more and would be actually able to get basically understood on a holiday (just an example of a useful skill) after a reasonable amount of time, more would surely be interested in further learning. I've met so many people dissappointed with what they had learnt. Of course they give up. Either as the "I don't have brains for languages" people or those "Other subjects are much more important than classes with no results".

I just googled what is the expected result of these teenagers. So, they are to start learning English (usually the first foreign language) at 9 years of age. At 15, when they leave the school to go to highschool, they are required to have A2/B1. Six years during the time when they are supposed to learn much easier than later and they get such limited skills. No wonder most are not interested.

So, it is surely a tough job teaching the mediocre or worse teenagers (but funny how often some teachers complain about the students at top highschools). But I don't think most of it is the teenagers' fault. Would you be excited to do meaningless job rewarding your efforts with too little results? You at least get paid, no matter what kind of job you are doing. The teenagers are supposed to get knowledge and skills. The foreign language is actually one of the few subjects which can awesomelly pay off and prove to the young people the value of the education but it often fails.

Edited by Cavesa on 27 August 2013 at 3:17pm

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