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Native teachers without linguistic talent | ||
Tags: Talent | Language Teaching | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| reneezelf Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 5215 days ago 6 posts - 7 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German Studies: Spanish, French, Polish | Message 33 of 106 23 November 2010 at 9:09am | IP Logged | ||
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I´ve got a problem with my German teacher and I don´t really know how to solve it. At some points I notice that his knowledge of the German grammar and vocabulary is rather poor. One example (I have a lot): Last week we checked some formal letters I had to write and he was telling me that the word ´zurzeit´ (= at the moment) was absolutely wrong. Now I´ve found this word in two dictionaries and google gives me almost 8 million results. If the word would simply be inappropriate in a formal letter, I would understand, but he was saying the word just didn´t exist like that.
Because he owns a language school himself, he send three of his teachers, when he was abroad. Those three women were really great and motivating. Of course I would prefer having one of them as my teacher, but I don´t know how to say that. Apart from the fact I doubt his teaching skills, he is really sympathetic, but his friendliness doesn´t improve my German. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5428 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 34 of 106 23 November 2010 at 10:27am | IP Logged | ||
As I worked my way down this thread I couldn't help thinking that all these observations provide a reality check about the true state of foreign language learning by adults. Rather than launch into a broad dissertation about the subject, I'll just make a couple of rather obvious points: 1. It is extremely rare that adult learners achieve anything close to native proficiency, especially accent. After adolescence, it just gets harder and harder. 2. Most adult learners become fossilized, i.e. they are able to meet their communicative needs despite an imperfect mastery of their language and stop learning. Unlike many of us here at HTLAL, not everyone is obsessed with linguistic perfection. For most people language is a means of communication and not an end in itself. 3. Learning a language at an adult age requires a lot of hard work. This is a banal statement, but we all know that most people simply give up unless there is a real motivation based on need and/or real desire. I truly believe that 90% of all those self-study methods, books and courses end up unused after a short period. 3. Native speakers are not necessarily perfect speakers of their language. Think about it for a minute. In our own languages, not everyone speaks perfectly. 4. Being a native speaker does not make you ipso facto a good language teacher. 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5428 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 35 of 106 23 November 2010 at 10:47am | IP Logged | ||
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As an addendum to my previous post, I would like to suggest that after looking at the sorry state of adult language learning, it would be interesting to look at examples of highly successful adult learners. Actually, there has been a fair amount of academic work done on this.
I personally believe that probably the number one factor in successful adult language learning is a personal (and often romantic) relationship with speakers of the target language. Just the other day I was listening to a well-known inuit singer being interviewed in French on the radio. I was really impressed by this person's proficiency in spoken French, all the more when I found out she learned it as an adult. After a bit of poking around the internet, I found out that she has been married to a native French-speaker for many years. It is also interesting to note that she worked for many years in the field of broadcasting and communications. This suggests to me a keen interest in mastering language in general. I would suspect that her Inuktitut and English are probably excellent as well. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5318 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 36 of 106 23 November 2010 at 11:16am | IP Logged | ||
Actually, I'd have said the same thing and would have been wrong too. I just double-checked it and found out that this is one of the words that was changed because of the ill-fated spelling reform. Apparently, nowadays "zur Zeit" is only OK when referring to a specific time period. BTW, most Germans were against the reform and few are familiar with all its changes. In the worst case whoever reads your letter might also think that this is a mistake. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4442 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 37 of 106 13 July 2013 at 1:34am | IP Logged | ||
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People living long enough in 1 place technically should be able to erase some of their foreign accents. I
can give dozens of examples this is not the case. Some who are not teachers pick up languages easily just interacting with people at work and on the street. Once met a teacher from Beijing teaching Mandarin in Hong Kong (mostly Cantonese-speaking). Her Cantonese is still understandable but with a thick northern Chinese accent. It depends on how conscious you are of the language you're talking and the sounds that are unique to that language. On the other hand, she was paid to teach Mandarin and not Cantonese so fluency in the native-language was not really required. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Alanjazz Triglot Groupie United States Joined 4813 days ago 65 posts - 129 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese | Message 38 of 106 13 July 2013 at 2:28am | IP Logged | ||
This point, is in my view, true and worth pointing out. In conversation, I have met foreign students who were so proud of their English that they did not want to speak to me in their native language at all. It wound up being a barrier to my practicing, and happened even though they had 24/7 immersion in English - they were studying at college in the language. For some people who have more timid personalities in the US, I can imagine how they would get less practice in a foreign language when a foreigner is insisting on showing you how good their English is. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 39 of 106 13 July 2013 at 10:46am | IP Logged | ||
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I don't mind when a foreign teacher doesn't know any Czech BUT I do mind when the teacher is monolingual because the personal experience with learning a second language is something no training,not only the 4 weeks courses but even five years at university, cannot outweight in many ways. Yes, it would be at least polite to learn the local language when you stay 10+ years but it doesn't happen so often. (But I know some adults who learnt the local language very well because they needed to learn). But expecting a monolingual to understand what the students need, that is just naive. The more when you consider how much is the language teaching industry plagued with the modern and "fun" methods that just don't work by themselves, with advertisements looking like serious research, with approach where the student's success is far bellow the priorities.
But the worst trouble is when the teacher doesn't know how to teach. I don't think a native is such an awesome solution at all costs, especially when it comes to beginners or lowe intermediates. And obviously, this teacher is killing your daughter's motivation. She cannot move to another class or change teacher by herself, could you solve the trouble with the director? Damaging the motivated and talented students, that is something very common in schools all over the world, and it is one of the worst things a teacher can do. Such a person shouldn't teach or they should be forced to learn to teach better. The trouble is not the grade. It is the principle that the teacher tries to teach your daughter: "Learn for your tests and assignments, not for the real skills." That is just ugly in my opinion. And again, not uncommon. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4620 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 40 of 106 13 July 2013 at 2:42pm | IP Logged | ||
If they speak Norwegian every day to the people around them then they are obviously able to use the language independently and make themselves clearly understood. For many people, language is simply a tool with which to communicate. It doesn't concern them if their grammar is less than perfect, so long as it's good enough to get the point across. I think pretty much every foreigner speaks with an accent. But there is a huge difference between a bit of a twang and a speech pattern that is bordering on incomprehensible. It's also easy to take a pot-shot at a teacher. Learners must also be self-motivated and not expect the teacher to provide all the inspiration. Edited by beano on 13 July 2013 at 2:46pm 7 persons have voted this message useful |
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