Language Trainers Blog

I don’t have children myself, but I’d like to think that if I did, I would expose them to as many learning opportunities as possible.  I was speaking to an expat teacher the other day and she said that at one British school in Shanghai (which her children are no longer attending), children only receive Chinese instruction for two hours a week.  Apparently most parents don’t anticipate their kids being in China for long enough for it to be of value.

Do you agree with this?  I can sort of see why parents would think something like that (especially if they were going to send their kids back to the UK to boarding school), but if the language education isn’t going to encroach too much on their core education, I can’t see how it is a bad thing.  Kids will learn more about the local language and culture, which has obvious social and educational value.

I am a big fan of actually living in the country you’re living in, rather than locking yourself and your family away in a mini version of your home country.  Of course, everyone needs certain home comforts, but I think children should be given more experiences and opportunities, not less.  If they are about to be sent home to experience western culture anyway, why not let them experience the place they’re living in in the meantime?

I’m sure you’ve considered a day when you would be interacting with humanoid robots on a daily basis, right?  Well, that day is coming up soon in South Korea.  The government will spend about 45 million USD on an “R-Learning” program that will put English-speaking robot teachers into preschools and kindergartens nationwide by next year.

Of course, the kids won’t be supervised entirely by these bots, but they will be involved with duties like singing songs and telling stories.  As with many non-English speaking countries, there just aren’t enough qualified English language teachers (let alone native speakers to interact with students), so this easily-standardised method is definitely a viable option.  Most of us wouldn’t be comfortable speaking to a robot, but if kids are acclimatised early, this could lead the way to further robo-education.

With all the advances in computer and robot technology, do  you think that there will soon be a replacement for real live teachers?

Source: Crave blog. Image: ocularinvasion.

It sounds like a normal-enough story: a 3-year-old born to Chinese parents in America is brought back to China and so needs a Chinese teacher because she only understands English. The odd part? The ‘child’ is a giant panda.

Because of an agreement between China and several other countries, any pandas (and their offspring) sent out of China to foreign zoos are only on loan for study purposes, and must eventually return to their homeland.

Mei Lan, a panda born in Atlanta, Georgia, is due to move to a breeding centre in Sichuan province in China this week.  As part of her welcome and orientation, the centre is arranging for a Chinese language tutor to teach her some basic phrases, as she has only ever heard English.  She will be also be weaned off the biscuits she was used to in the US, and moved on to a Chinese recipe supplemented by fresh bamboo.

I’m not sure how fast pandas can learn commands, though.  If their general behaviour is anything to go by, it will be a slow process!

Source: LA Times.

Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary in the UK, has said that every secondary school student should have the opportunity to learn Mandarin, and other ‘up and coming’ languages.

With mandatory language study for seven-to-11-year-olds coming into effect next year, this recommendation will no doubt spread to primary schools.

Even though students will by no means be forced to study Chinese (any language will do), there have been a lot of arguments against attempting to make the language accessible to every student.  For a start, where will these teachers come from?  There are very few students studying Mandarin at present, and most teachers would come from that demographic.  It has been suggested that there would be specialist language centres that students would go to in order to study, but is this a practical solution?  Another major argument is that Chinese is only the predicted most-useful foreign language for kids of this generation (although other recommendations are Russian, Polish, and even Indonesian).  When I was growing up, Japanese was the next big thing, and it wasn’t so long ago that people thought everyone would need to speak Russian. Will Chinese ever be useful to the everyman in the UK?

I think that the focus should be taken of the specific languages being recommended, and put on the fact that kids will need to do second language study.  Although I was quick to drop languages when I was younger, I did enjoy them, and wish I had continued for longer.  If we can instil a love for language learning in the next generations, regardless of the language they choose, it will never be a bad thing.

Which language do you think will be essential in the next 10 or 15 years?

Source: Telegraph.

I came across this digital media blog post about a charity organisation called Literacy Bridge that is using budget technology to try to make a difference to the lives of people in developing countries.

Literacy Bridge is utilising easy-to-use, low-cost voice recorders to help spread information and increase literacy levels in rural Ghana, where knowledge is still primarily spread via word of mouth.  The Talking Books, designed to cost around 10USD each, are already being used to help understaffed schools teach their children, and spread knowledge and news through remote communities.

Talking books can be used to record and store pre-recorded audio, as well as being connected to each other, and to central kiosks, to transfer information, lessons, and news.  The speed can be altered to suit different learning levels, and people can improve their literacy by playing audio at the same time as listening to books.  The devices are so simple that small children can use them as well as adults.

A pilot program was launched early this year, and the organisation has recently received a grant from Amazon.com.  To find out more information, or donate, visit Literacy Bridge.

It makes sense that if a language learner has a negative attitude towards their new language, they probably won’t be as successful as they could be.  But what happens when the language you are learning has extremely negative connotations within your own community?

For many Indians living in KwaZulu-Natal, Afrikaans is the ‘language of the oppressor’, and the principal of an Indian school has gone as far as to say that the language is irrelevant for his pupils, and is petitioning for it to be removed as a language option.  He says a lot of his students do very poorly at the language, and they will never use it in their daily lives.

On the other side of the argument, another principal says that his school makes a point of being positive about the language, not referring to ‘the oppressor’, and his students do very well with the language.  (Full article from Times LIVE.)

My own grandmother was unhappy about me learning Japanese as a high school student, because of her association of the language with World War II.  I didn’t have these associations, so I was quite happy to learn the language (and was successful during the semester I studied it).

Can we affect our language success by changing our attitude towards the language itself?  I think it’s a definite possibility!

When choosing a language class, it is not only important to consider the teacher, the location, and the material.

It can be quite important to think not just about the content of your language classes, but who you will learn with.  For some, working on their own is the best option, and for others, classes are preferable.  Personally, I need external motivation, so small classes are better for me (personal tutors are too easy to postpone with!).  Everyone is different, though, so here are some things to think about when choosing a language program or class:

One-to-one - This option is best for people who have changeable schedules (as tutors are often able to match their timetables to yours), those who prefer working on their own, or students who have very particular learning goals.  Obviously this will be the least cost-efficient choice, but for many people, the one-to-one attention is exactly what they need to get their language learning moving along quickly.

Two-to-one - Working with a partner can be beneficial in many ways, provided that both people are of a similar level and have similar language aims. The tutor will be able to monitor your conversations, and students often feel less pressure when they are speaking with someone who is at the same level as them.  Having a partner provides motivation to learn and attend classes.  Both students get a lot of individual attention, and there is someone to talk to about the learning material.

Small group classes - Small groups have similar benefits to two-to-one classes, with a little less individual attention, but often with a slightly lower price per person.  Again, everyone should be at the same language level, with similar needs, and, of course, be able to be in the same place at the same time.  For speaking purposes, it’s often good to have even numbers, although threesomes encourage students to have one-on-one time with their tutors as well as practicing dialogues with each other.

Large group classes - Large groups are often the best option for people who have budget limitations, or for companies with teams who have the same goals.  I find in these situations that students have less face-to-face time with their tutors, but if they support each other, they can have a lot of success.

Of course, Language Trainers provides all of these options, and even provides online classes for groups and individuals.  Everybody has different preferences for learning, though, so please let us know what works best for you.

In a time of international trade and travel, you’d think that language learning was on the increase.  It is proving to be the opposite at universities, with fewer and fewer students choosing to do pure language degrees.  Experts blame the 2004 withdrawal of mandatory languages at secondary schools, and the promised increase of language learning in primary schools has been slow to take effect.

From the full article at guardian.co.uk:

Applications to language degrees are drying up and those that are left are increasingly dominated by private school pupils, Steve Smith, who is also vice-chancellor of Exeter University, said.

Universities are dropping pure language degrees to do “language and culture” alternatives, with less time dedicated to developing fluency and mastering speaking skills. The government has commissioned a major review into languages in universities, which is due to report this month.

Smith told the Guardian: “I think there are two prongs to the problem. One is the sheer decline. The second is that language teaching is becoming increasingly an activity of the independent sector. Getting those balances right is quite difficult.

“I think the trend will be much more towards teaching modern languages in the context of the societies in which the languages are actually spoken. In other words, you might do Italian, but you might do it as part of a degree about its literature and culture. In the single honours languages, the declines at the moment are really quite significant.