Teaching a foreign language | Whose responsibility to learn anyway?
One thing I have learned about learning and teaching language is that there is a large amout of diffusion of responsibility when it comes to learning a language. Many students simply delude themselves thinking that if I take a class I will learn. They will teach me. No, this is wrong. No one teaches you a language, classes and books etc are just tools. The students I have that do the homework, learn a language. The ones that do not do the homework do not learn their target foreign language. There is very little abstract reasoning here with languages. Learning a language is about using it very little is about having it explained to you. You can use your target language in class, you can use it by reading, listening to mp3s over and over (which I recommend and even make for my students), by doing homework or listening to the radio; however, the responsibility is 100% on the student. Not even 1% on the teacher, because if you have a bad teacher you can still learn as all language learning is self learning. So if you want to learn a language it is easy, study and use the language. The teacher can give you a systematic approach which is important or inspires you to learn, but no one can put the language in your head, except you.
Tags: How to learn a language, methods to learn languages, Teaching languages
3 responses to Teaching a foreign language | Whose responsibility to learn anyway?
One exception is with children, if you have a friendly teacher you will learn, if you have a hard teacher that makes you scared you will not learn the language as you will be afraid to speak and stress will block the learning process.
I think that this brings up some excellent points and it is a pretty good attitude for the student to have but not the teacher. If this is true, what do we pay teachers for? If all that is truly necessary is to present information to the students, give them assignments and grade those assignments then why do we not simply use computers for all teaching? It would be cheaper in the long run. Are language teachers truly free of ALL accountability if their students fail to learn?
I have been teaching Spanish for about 13 years now and find that when I do my best to keep my class exciting and engaging, my students do much better. If I simply present the material because I am sick or tired, my lack of enthusiasm seems to directly affect the amount that the students can absorb and then use in context. While I agree that students ultimately are responsible for their own learning, we as teachers are not without responsibility for making sure that our classes are not boring. We have more tools at our disposal now than ever before in history, and many of them are free or very cheap. makingstudents.blogspot.com Is my own blog on teaching languages if you want to check it out.
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