Search results for 'tag:Negatives tag:Teaching English' matching tags 'Negatives' and 'Teaching English'

Re: The Callan Method

Anonymous — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 18:20:08 GMT

Hi everybody,

I strongly disagree with the views mentioned on behalf of the Callan Method. Just because it promises to get the student where he or she wants to, doesn't mean the Method deserves criticism. I've been teaching English both the traditional way and the Callan Method way for about a year and a half now and I find that the Callan Method is much more productive (great emphasis on 'much') because it forces the student to cope with real language and real life situations, not just nonsensical vocabulary (words like 'juggle' or 'juggler', etc which I believe are to be found in almost all elementary books, not the Callan ones, though).

The Method completely fulfills every single promise it gives to the student provided that a skilled and well-educated teacher (not necessarily a native speaker) holds the classes. The problem is that many language schools actually applying the Callan Method do not have well-trained teachers. To make matters worse, many teachers who claim to be teaching the Callan Method way are no more than common frauds who are likely to fit into the groups they are teaching - but not as teachers, as ordinary students who have great gaps in their knowledge. Their only goal is to make money. Thus, they knowingly bring shame on their well-qualified colleagues and the Method itself.

As far as the qualifications of lectors teaching the Callan way are concerned, I must emphasize the great need that is placed on their in-depth knowledge and practical understanding of grammar as well as vocabulary. Every time a non-professional teacher is confronted with the grammar in the Callan Books, they find out they are not suitable for the position of a teacher. In short, they do NOT understand what defective verbs are, they have difficulty in comprehending the various nuances of the verb have - used either as stative or dynamic, for that case, with or without DO-support, using the marginal modal auxiliary verb DARE, keeping pace with Robin Callan's explanation of the sentence structure which is broken down into sentences - clauses - clause elements - phrases - words and phonemes (which is, by the way, something that is an acknowledged fact supported by Quirk and Greenbaum and other leading grammarians), etc. As a result, they commonly give up teaching English the Callan way and turn towards teaching the traditional way because there they are not required to understand any such 'high' grammar, ie they are limited to simple terms which put as little effort on the part of the teacher as possible. Laughable, wouldn't you say?

To comment on the vocabulary used in the books, I personally find it well chosen, though I'd fill in some more lexical items in the higher stages, mostly in the stages 11 and 12. Apart from that, the vocabulary is often witty and easy to remember. I've grown to like the way it is proportioned in the books, though I still find that stage 1 is quite difficult for beginners who start learning English from the scratch. Nevertheless, what one might describe as sexual harassment or hatred towards women, I consider a witty and hilarious approach to teaching. I've asked my students on many an occasion about their personal feelings when being confronted with such chunks of language and ALL of them agreed that it was something unusual but not in the negative sense. As the words and phrases are groupped together in witty sequences, it was easy for the students to remember the words not only for a couple of hours or days but for long periods of time - without learning them at home again (!!!) which is something students normally do after finishing a course which uses the traditional approach of teaching.

So much to my comments, though I could still write much more than just those few paragraphs.

To conclude, for those students who are still thinking whether to take up learning English the traditional way or rather try the 'English-in-a-quarter-of-the-time' method ... well, I'd go for the latter.

Elvis' Music

Old Man Gordon — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 10:55:49 GMT

Elvis is one of the most popular and famous American Rock stars. Which of his songs would be best for learning/teaching English, and why?

For example. 'Hound Dog' is good for teaching double negatives, which are completely wrong, yet are still commonly used.

One problem with some of his songs is that his pronunciation is often slurred, so it makes things difficult for a non-native.

Re: Teaching english in china

Anonymous — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 01:22:50 GMT

Dear Shu Wang,

Your volunteer English teaching `program` sounds interesting. However, you should avoid using the word `scheme`. It has negative connotations. A person should not put their trust in a `scheme`.

Good luck with your program.

Sincerely,

Patrick J. deSilva

Would you please correct my composition?

a_hi2004 — Fri, 24 Dec 2004 15:10:45 GMT

In five-paragraph essay give your reason for objecting to the new initiative of the Educational Ministry introducing English language into primary schools.

In our country where teaching English has not yet consolidated in guidance and high schools as an important part of educational programme, it seems that introducing it as a foreign language at the level of primary schools is a very problematic issue. In implementing such a crucial project Educational Ministry should recognizes and takes into the account all of the relevant aspects and the possible threats which can influence on the process of conducting the programme. Unfortunately, it seems that this project with its all deficiencies and problems should be implemented by Ministry of Education in primary schools. Three major problems that have been not properly considered by educational experts can be categorized as educational, cultural and economical aspects of the project.

It is evident that young learners acquire a foreign language or second language more easily and effectively than adults. But it should be noted that the setting in which this acquisition is taking place is also an important matter. In this case the setting is a formal educational setting where most of the people who are involved in are those who do not master on their mother tongue properly. In this period of their lives when they are engaged in a very complicated discovery process of the world around imposing on them learning another language, which is taking place in a very different way of their first language acquisition, should be considered an unprofessional implementation that can negatively influence on students first language acquisition process.

By looking at this problem from a cultural perspective in a country with a multicultural background like Iran, it will be certainly revealed many other negative aspects of the work, which also have been not yet taken into the account. In our country, Iran, with confidence we can say that majority of the children until entering to schools do not know Farsi, because of the cultural and ethnical differences. Thus in this multicultural condition how can we expect of a child to learn two new and completely different languages, when his/her mother tongue as mentioned before has not yet figured out? Whit respect to these considerations implementation of the plan will have unpredictable consequences for the multicultural context of the society, which can be considered as a threat for their unique status.

At last but not at least anyone should ask that, how much budget is allocated for this project? Is all of the expense estimated? Any changing that happens in the educational curriculum imposes on the government a great deal of expense. Is the governmentâs budget sufficient for realization of the project? Making changes in the textbooks, preparing experienced and well-informed teachers who should conduct the project and preparing required technology are crucial things for achieving to anticipated goals.

According to the objections that proposed in the educational, cultural and economical grounds, we can come to this conclusion that this initiative of the Education Ministry around the issue of introducing English language teaching into primary schools is not a well-prepared programme and its implementation could have unpredicted negative effects on our educating system and multicultural context of society.

Re: Older teacher-medical English?

meg2589 — Tue, 02 Nov 2004 11:52:21 GMT

Hello liz!

Welcome to EF!

I read your post. I am a non-native speaker of English, working in Japan as an English teacher. I have only 3 years of experience in teaching English and Science. I did my degree (BSc) in Medical Science. Later I studied B.Ed and M.Ed. to become a teacher. In my country our education is in English medium and English is very common in use.
I came to Japan about 2 years ago. My first year of job search was very much frustrating here as I always got a negative answer for not being a native speaker. Anyway, now I am working at a school. After reading your post I was lost in my past days. I don't know if your degree is valid as a degree for your working visa in Japan or not, but if you try your luck here perhaps you can get good chance to teach English here (perhaps medical English too).

Thanks for reading my post

Regards,
Meg