University Degrees And Certification To Teach

[Lordfoul]

As PeaceBlondie eluded to there are people in the US who don't speak English at all. So do you find it odd that a US citizen can speak English so clearly yet a Thai can not?. Of course not. Because the US is a country that heavily uses English. The Philippines use English nearly as much as they use Tagalog. It is also the language of Education and Business, It is just part of their system. The Philippines is a Country closely tied to the US and is more media influenced By the US and American English than countries like Thailand. The Philippines was also where large call centers for American business were located before they moved to India. People were trained to have pitch perfect accents, their lively hood depended on it.

A Singaporeans ability to speak English against that of a Philippino might be a more even comparison. There are however interesting differences there also.

That's silly. English is an Official language of the Philippines.

I think it's fair enough, English is an official language in India, there are millions who can't speak it...

And my point would be that if standards were applied consistently and bad students failed then you wouldn't have situations where someone can become an English teacher and speak awful English.

[The Dan Sai Kid]

But there are countries where English does not reach officialdom whatsoever, and the citizens can achieve a good level of spoken English.

Holland?

[Lordfoul]

Absolutely, And I know Thais who speak excellent English also. You must know some also.

But there are countries where English does not reach officialdom whatsoever, and the citizens can achieve a good level of spoken English.

Holland?

[Ulysses G.]

The textbooks I'm talking about come with-wait for it-cassettes/CDs/DVDs. (more evidence of North American narrow-mindedness and cultural impoverishment )

These textbooks usually have a British English version and an American English version and the acccents that are presented in the CDs or tapes for both are very simular. The British versions are no better and do not have a wider spectrum of English accents than the American ones.

'

Have you ever compared ' The Cambrige Skills for fluency series, The 'Listen Carefully' series and the 'Natural English' series all with a range of different accents, used in FE colleges in Britain and The British council with 'American Hotline', 'Person to Person' 'Let's talk' and 'Get Real' among others and you'll find they are very different. They use only the 'standard american' accent. Furthermore these books also often seem to use the same actors which don't give the student a range of different voices. My argument is something like having a radio which instead of playing a rich cocktail of sounds from all forms of music, plays only MOR stuff like the Eagles which for the teacher and more importantly the student can be deadly dull after awhile.

I take it that your newest argument is that British Language learning materials are better than American ones, but there are perhaps 100s of different companies competing in this field and some are better than others on both sides of the Atlantic.

I have never used any that only have American accents, so I would suggest that maybe you need to just spend a few more quid on a better brand before making any rash decisions.

[Ulysses G.]

A Singaporeans ability to speak English against that of a Philippino might be a more even comparison. There are however interesting differences there also.

It seems like most native Singaporeans can speak English fairly well, but a good numer of Philippinos can't speak it at all. I've never met anyone in Singapore that could not communicate in English, but in P.I. such people are fairly common.

[Lordfoul]

I would agree with that, but they are still more comparable with each other than with Thailand.

A Singaporeans ability to speak English against that of a Philippino might be a more even comparison. There are however interesting differences there also.

It seems like most native Singaporeans can speak English fairly well, but a good numer of Philippinos can't speak it at all. I've never met anyone in Singapore that could not communicate in English, but in P.I. such people are fairly common.

[BlackArtemis]

In my experience elementary students go blank once they hear a non white North American Accent.

I played a bunch of clips with fill in the blanks for many different movies. They scored fine until they listened to British, Indian, and Black American's (which were all very clean accents).

Perhaps this isn't true for all schools, but my students have had American, Filipino, Dutch, Australian, and Canadian teachers.

My reaction of course is "You are expected to understand it, so listen up. I have to understand people from all over Thailand if I live here, so if you want to study English, you can't just listen to one type".

[Ulysses G.]

I would agree with that, but they are still more comparable with each other than with Thailand.

A Singaporeans ability to speak English against that of a Philippino might be a more even comparison. There are however interesting differences there also.

It seems like most native Singaporeans can speak English fairly well, but a good numer of Philippinos can't speak it at all. I've never met anyone in Singapore that could not communicate in English, but in P.I. such people are fairly common.

Very true.

[Mapguy]

"Whoa!" That is colloquial American (maybe elsewhere) for "Please wait a minute!"

I offer my sincerest apology for having a bit of fun in the OP. I had absolutely no intent in starting a dogfight, just as PeaceBlondie understood.

My intention in the OP was to start off a discussion on the problems that are apparent in hiring qualified teachers of English in Thai schools. UG then made a couple of very good posts, and the conversation has gone off in somewhat different directions. I have no argument with that. But I do worry that what in many ways remains a very interesting conversation doesn't deteriorate into mudslinging.

Now, on tho something more substantive...

At a time when English is spoken and taught throughout the world, one really can't say that there is a "standard" correct spoken English any longer. I will hazard the guess that written English is more "standardized," although grammar rules do change with usage. What Samuel Johnson thought no longer goes. Few people, for example, will ever understand the "proper' use of the semicolon! And, if you read Shakespeare, you will have problems understanding it all without very serious study.

English has always been a remarkably flexible language permissive of different vocabularies and accents that even today send the French Academy to the barricades in anticipation of a linguistic demise of a pure French tongue!. If you are from England, you will know that sometimes English (traditionally) has been spoken with different accents and vocabulary from one side of a valley to the other!! It rather depended on who settled where, Anglo Saxon or Norse, for example, way back when. With the advent of mass media --- and, of course, as a result of a boy on one side of the valley and a girl from the other being more interested in kissing than talking --- this variation has diminished, but it is still there.

The problem today isn't a lot different, really. To focus on Thailand, once again, I wish to say that Thais, even with English degrees (including advanced degrees) obtained in Thailand generally have problems. I encounter it often. If a Thai lives or studies abroad, especially at a young age, then he or she might understand and speak understandable English very, very well. Now --- forgive me --- but I have to make an exception. If that Thai learned English in Yorkshire or in the "Deep South" of the USA --- to give two (hopefully neutral) examples --- there might still be, regardless of knowledge of grammar, some difficulty in understanding. Those accents are very "heavy." An example in America is found in the name of a city, where the "native" accent is really quite distinctive: New Orleans. There is is properly pronounced "NAWlins."

Again, apologies. I have no problem with the conversation going off in different directions --- English is a fascinating language with some good and some bad teachers, textbooks, and the like. I for one would benefit from specific references to specific material. Some of the material that I have seen that is generated in Thailand to teach Thai students to teach English is truly awful!

Like it or not, English is now the world's lingua franca, and I would at least like to identify the best material to teach and learn it for Thailand.

Otherwise, of course, pity us farang who can neither speak, read, nor write Thai well.

[richard10365]

What is this thread about?

[keddy]

What is this thread about?

I think most of it can be described as rhetoric though some others might call call it horseshit, especially from the mustangs posting on here