I'm re-visiting this topic because of a report on last night's Singapore Tonight.
The report was entitled 'Hiring native speakers not the only way to improve English standards'. Sounds promising, right?
Ah, but when I watched the report, it was about how 'native speakers' can contribute to improving English standards. It featured a Mr Hamilton who was quoted saying that he was doing 'realistic, authentic and creative activities' with his students, such as 'debating, discussions and presentations'. I'm sorry but I think I snorted when I heard that. With all due respect to Mr Hamilton, who is probably just doing his best for his classes and who maybe didn't realise that what he said would come across the way it did, I'm very sure local English teachers are not doing unrealistic, inauthentic and uncreative activities in class. If he really did mean to imply that, then I wonder what he thought teachers were doing in English class before he came to Singapore!! Even in my time, we had 'debating, discussion and presentations', and also, if I may add, role play, dramatisation, choral speaking, mini and maxi projects, multi-disciplinary activities and what not. And grammar lessons too. Not authentic and creative enough?
(By the way, I also consider reading and writing authentic activities. And actually, I hated choral speaking and don't think it's very realistic. I mean, who actually goes about speaking like that in normal, real circumstances?)
Then there was this boy, currently being trained for public speaking by Mr Hamilton, who said, 'In speech, especially persuasive speech, you need certain words that can give you that edge to convince the audience. He knows those words, coming from his native England.' This also made me want to snort. What did he mean by 'he knows those words'? Is he saying his previous teacher had a lousy vocabulary? I don't for a minute doubt that many 'native speakers' have great vocabulary but I also don't doubt for even a second that many local English teachers, local teachers of other subjects, local non-teachers and non-native speakers all over the world also have great vocabulary.
Well, I suppose this 16-year-old boy may not have realised what his words implied. If it were indeed true that his previous teacher was lacking in vocabulary, then why did the school assign that teacher to public speaking? If not true, then this boy needs to learn some tact.
Now that he has said what he said on national television, imagine what his previous teacher is going through. His students might be going, 'Golly! (OK, of course they wouldn't say 'golly!' Where got Singapore students say 'golly' one, right? Replace 'golly' with any suitable word derived from any local language/dialect, or Singlish word, or whatever) This, Mr So-and-So, ah, he doesn't know THOSE WORDS, man. Our English sure fail, lah.'
And poor Mr So-and-So has got another half a year or more with his current students and the poor guy is going to be asked, 'Are you sure that's the right word?' whenever he corrects his students.
The report was entitled 'Hiring native speakers not the only way to improve English standards'. Sounds promising, right?
Ah, but when I watched the report, it was about how 'native speakers' can contribute to improving English standards. It featured a Mr Hamilton who was quoted saying that he was doing 'realistic, authentic and creative activities' with his students, such as 'debating, discussions and presentations'. I'm sorry but I think I snorted when I heard that. With all due respect to Mr Hamilton, who is probably just doing his best for his classes and who maybe didn't realise that what he said would come across the way it did, I'm very sure local English teachers are not doing unrealistic, inauthentic and uncreative activities in class. If he really did mean to imply that, then I wonder what he thought teachers were doing in English class before he came to Singapore!! Even in my time, we had 'debating, discussion and presentations', and also, if I may add, role play, dramatisation, choral speaking, mini and maxi projects, multi-disciplinary activities and what not. And grammar lessons too. Not authentic and creative enough?
(By the way, I also consider reading and writing authentic activities. And actually, I hated choral speaking and don't think it's very realistic. I mean, who actually goes about speaking like that in normal, real circumstances?)
Then there was this boy, currently being trained for public speaking by Mr Hamilton, who said, 'In speech, especially persuasive speech, you need certain words that can give you that edge to convince the audience. He knows those words, coming from his native England.' This also made me want to snort. What did he mean by 'he knows those words'? Is he saying his previous teacher had a lousy vocabulary? I don't for a minute doubt that many 'native speakers' have great vocabulary but I also don't doubt for even a second that many local English teachers, local teachers of other subjects, local non-teachers and non-native speakers all over the world also have great vocabulary.
Well, I suppose this 16-year-old boy may not have realised what his words implied. If it were indeed true that his previous teacher was lacking in vocabulary, then why did the school assign that teacher to public speaking? If not true, then this boy needs to learn some tact.
Now that he has said what he said on national television, imagine what his previous teacher is going through. His students might be going, 'Golly! (OK, of course they wouldn't say 'golly!' Where got Singapore students say 'golly' one, right? Replace 'golly' with any suitable word derived from any local language/dialect, or Singlish word, or whatever) This, Mr So-and-So, ah, he doesn't know THOSE WORDS, man. Our English sure fail, lah.'
And poor Mr So-and-So has got another half a year or more with his current students and the poor guy is going to be asked, 'Are you sure that's the right word?' whenever he corrects his students.
Comments
Yeah, I agree with you that our use of language tends to be very functional. Wonder if it's the result of the heavy emphasis on exams. You know, so many years concentrating on answering certain types in questions in certain ways and too little emphasis on 'creating' with language.
I think you may have misinterpreted what I was saying. I was not making a comment about the kind of teaching that already takes place - at all! I had only been here a couple of months at that point and had no opinion about what goes on here educationally. So, by 'authentic' I did not mean that what normally happens here is inauthentic. I meant authentic as in the sense that the language activities were authentic to everyday life (I did not mean that I, or my pedadgogy, or accent, or use of English, was more authentic; rather, that we discuss real as opposed to hypothetical issues). Again, I was not saying that existing activities were inauthentic either. I was simply describing what we were doing in class.
I hope that clears up that one.
If I see that you have a car, and I compliment you on it, it does not mean that I don't like other cars, or your previous car. I was making one point. Not two.
BUT I agree that arrogance - or the semblance of arrogance is something to be wary of, and that staff from overseas have to be wary of making the right impression. The last thing I want to do is appear superior; certainly I don't feel that way. There is a lot in the way of best practice here, no doubt about it.
My email is okasur@hotmail.com if you want to reply.
Robin