Not Everyone who Speaks the Language can Teach It

One of my latest undertakings is signing up for an online TESOL certificate by Arizona State University through Coursera. The course started this week, but it's a pretty laid-back course since it only demands about 2-4 hours of study each week. The downside is that it would take perhaps a year or more to get my certificate since it's going at such a leisurely pace. What I do have is time, however, so I'm not too concerned about that.

Anyway, I completed my first assignment two days ago, and felt like posting it up here. The assignment was to state my opinion in 1-4 paragraphs on the statement "Anyone who speaks the language can teach the language". Since many believe just about anybody can teach and that teachers aren't really professionals, here's my two cents about it.

Not Everyone who Speaks the Language can Teach It

My name is May, and I strongly disagree with the assumption that “Anyone who speaks the language can teach the language.” My reasons for disagreeing with that idea include the importance of mastering pedagogical techniques for effective teaching and learning to occur, and how a speaker of the language may lack a deep knowledge of the language itself.

First of all, allow me to define the meaning of “teach”. For the purpose of this assignment, I assume that the word “teach” means professional teaching, which implies effective delivery of language principles and content, and from which learners can expect to learn a language fruitfully. This definition is important because any parent can teach his or her child to speak a language through informal methods such as repeated exposure to the language or the occasional correction of grammatical forms used. However, not every parent should be hired as or paid to be a language teacher in a school because teaching a language effectively in a formal context requires solid pedagogical knowledge. Unlike informal teaching which occurs at home, language teachers are expected to produce positive results in a limited amount of time and they often do not have the luxury of one-on-one interaction. Hence, professional language teachers need to cater to a wide-range of learner needs through pedagogical techniques and theories that have been proven effective through research.

Some pedagogical techniques that are crucial include teacher talk and scaffolding. The English language is complex and has multiple grammatical forms for a single expression, thus a teacher must be able to communicate clearly through grammatical reduction. This will enable language learners to comprehend what is going on - for example, important instructions for an exercise or playing a language game. If a lesson is unintelligible to learners, they will lose interest or potentially cause disruptions through repeated questions. When teaching young learners, this is especially important because a lack of interest almost invariably leads to disruptive behaviour. Scaffolding is another skill that keeps language learners motivated. Teachers who accurately gauge the proficiency level of their students can challenge them to learn more with appropriate guidance. Therefore, the students will be less likely to get bored from a lesson that is too simple, or too frustrated from a lesson that is too difficult. These are just some examples of pedagogical techniques that language teachers need to apply, and which not just any speaker of the language is aware about.

Another factor that I believe affects effective language teaching is a deep knowledge of language structure and principles. Most speakers of a language acquire it intuitively through repeated exposure, which means that they may not have a deep understanding of how a language works or its grammatical principles. The negative implications of this include an inability to break the language down into understandable ideas for a learner or answer questions about language structure that they themselves take for granted. Language teachers, however, undergo intensive language studies that help them to get a better grasp of the language. This in turn makes them better teachers to anticipate their learners’ questions or teach digestible chunks of knowledge about a language. In conclusion, I firmly believe that not everyone who speaks a language can teach it, mainly because effective teaching requires a whole other set of skills that language teachers gain through formal training and experience.