How (well) do my ideas and materials work?
One of the most important parts of a Pre-sessional, in my view, is getting the class to gel as soon as possible, with the teacher playing a crucial role in facilitating this. On a 5 week Pre-sessional with a class of 20 students there is worryingly little time to get to know the student's individually in terms of background or learning styles. Nor can the tutor do a thorough needs analysis of each student. Instead one has to make certain sweeping judgements about their aims and abilities and plan accordingly.
This obviously affects the teachers choice of materials and ideas on how to approach lesson planning. With more long term classes such as Insessionals or university preparation programmes of 3 months plus, planning and materials choice can be a more sedate, thoughtful and informed process for the teacher and can be based on formative learning and assessment which reacts to the needs and learning styles of the students. On a Pre-sessional, however, the list of discrete items to be covered looms large and dominates much planning and materials choices; I found the recurring questions to be "What do I have to get through this week?" and "What activities and materials can do this quickly and effectively?"
So, here I'd just like to share 2 activities/ materials which managed to answer both questions better than I had imagined.
Summary writing
The first activity involved summary writing and worked very well (with my class). I used the text on culture shock available from the UCKISA website (http://www.ukcisa.org.uk/files/pdf/info_sheets/culture_shock_print.pdf), put the students into teams and asked them a series of short questions about the text, with no pre-reading or pre-teaching of vocabulary. They had to skim the text to find the answers and the first student to shout the correct answer was awarded a point for their team. At the end of the questions all students had to write a summary of the text based on their answers only (I removed the texts so no reference to it could be made). After writing the summaries students compared them to the text and each other and discussed any points that they thought should be added/ deleted from the summary.
This activity was very quick and produced good results mainly due to the simple, factual nature of the text and careful preparation of the questions. As a result, I continued to use it until the students had increased in confidence and wanted to summarise for themselves without the guidance from my questions.
Presentation practice
The second activity was that old chestnut "Dragon's Den" which I used for presentation practice. As we all know, students often fail to take presentations seriously enough and are reluctant to critically evaluate their peers. Unfortunately the level of analysis required at both under and postgraduate level only becomes apparent when our students are at university and then it's too late.
So, for this version of Dragon's Den I set up 4 pairs of dragons and 4 groups of entrepreneurs with 3 students in each group. Each group of entrepreneurs had to create a product and then give a 10 minute presentation of it to each pair of dragons who then discussed and agreed together who would get the investment. While the entrepreneurs designed and planned their product, the dragons made a list of questions. The key point here was that I instructed the dragons to really act the part; there was to be no smiling or laughing, they were to interrupt the entrepreneurs often to clarify points and make their questions direct, they had to take notes and generally make the entrepreneurs feel as uncomfortable as possible.
The result was fabulous! The dragons were amazing and it was difficult for me not to burst into fits of hysterics as they rolled their eyes, peered over their glasses, exchanged knowing looks in their pairs and stopped the entrepreneurs in their tracks with phrases like, "Thanks but I think we've heard enough now." and "How exactly do you plan to market this product?"
The entrepreneurs had started with a fairly relaxed attitude to their role in the activity yet it soon became apparent that this was no fun speaking activity and the dragons meant business! The entrepreneurs' behaviour started to change rapidly; they became tongue tied and nervous but as they repeated their "pitches" to each set of dragons a new seriousness and maturity emerged. All of a sudden they seemed to want to win. As I watched this unfold I was struck by one thing: the "lift" in attitude and performance was being entirely student driven and there was nothing I could have contributed as a teacher to improve it.
Now I'd like to say that the final presentations were amazing as a result of this activity but that would of course be a fat lie! Instead I noticed an attentive audience, good incisive post presentation questions and a higher level of critical analysis. Which means that in answer to my title question "How (well) do my ideas and materials work?" I can confidently say the in 5 week course 2 of them were great!
Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
Well that was never going to work was it!
What was never going to work? Blogging, running a business and teaching full time together, that's what!
After not having taught full time for so long I guess one of the things I forgot about was how teaching, especially EAP, and the preparation involved, are ever expanding, time-consuming activities.
And on a course such as a Pre-sessional, where students are expected to learn how to write fully referenced essays and give academic presentations in 5 weeks, the hour glass of time permanently feels like it is sitting next to you, the sound of each passing grain becoming louder as you frantically plan and mark long into the night, in a desperate bid to transform your students into academic dynamos.
So, on to those questions I set myself in my last post. I would like to explore each question in a bit of detail over the new few posts in order to reflect on the Pre-sessional experience properly and attempt to reach some conclusions.
In answer to number 1 (Have I still got the old magic?) I suppose the only logical and truthful conclusion is yes, but I'm rusty.
I felt that I was able to gain the students' confidence in my ability to teach EAP fairly quickly, which ensured that they were willing participants in class. However, I also wondered how far I could attribute this to my experience as an (intermittent) teacher and course leader in another university for the last 3 years. I have built up a wide understanding of the issues surrounding international students performance and success and therefore I felt confident that I could answer the students'questions comprehensively.
Anyway, moving on, I did spend a lot of time planning during the course. I found that the perennial complaint of teachers regarding the lack of suitable material to be borne out. I suppose that this could be due to my lack of teaching experience in recent years, nevertheless this remained a constant worry for me. "What can I use for noun phrases with this class, where can I find a good example of a tourism essay with clear voice for my students, will these students be able to do these exercises?" All these questions plagued me during the course as I attempted to maintain consistency of level and delivery in my classes, while furiously typing my own worksheets and adapting those from previous courses.
Interestingly, I found that the PPP approach seemed to work well due to the time constraints. It quickly became clear that any kind of guided discovery was not going to cover all the material necessary to complete the assessments in time. And the students seemed to respond well to this approach too, maybe as a result of its simplicity, maybe out of habit. So, we settled in to a familiar pattern of me explaining something, showing how it fitted into an under or postgraduate course, a session of scaffolded study followed by a production activity. Now, I was in full swing(!) and started to relax more. The downside: marking and feedback. While this approach worked well in terms of my teaching and planning, the students' learning was more problematic since each piece of work they produced threw up persistent errors and misunderstandings which needed to be addressed the next day. This, of course, took up more of our precious time and plunged me back into the worry pit of time and planning as Thursday's and Friday's lesson plans began to slide over the weekend into Monday and Tuesday.
But it was not all doom and gloom. Using models worked brilliantly, as did including a range of more EFL style interactive tasks and we often had, dare I say it, "fun" in class as students got to know each other and I felt the "flow" returning. Our class rule of honesty at all times was a great galvanising and cohering factor and in the end progress was made by everyone, myself being no exception.
At the end of the 5 weeks I felt reborn as a teacher (with a little bit of the old magic). And shattered!
After not having taught full time for so long I guess one of the things I forgot about was how teaching, especially EAP, and the preparation involved, are ever expanding, time-consuming activities.
And on a course such as a Pre-sessional, where students are expected to learn how to write fully referenced essays and give academic presentations in 5 weeks, the hour glass of time permanently feels like it is sitting next to you, the sound of each passing grain becoming louder as you frantically plan and mark long into the night, in a desperate bid to transform your students into academic dynamos.
So, on to those questions I set myself in my last post. I would like to explore each question in a bit of detail over the new few posts in order to reflect on the Pre-sessional experience properly and attempt to reach some conclusions.
In answer to number 1 (Have I still got the old magic?) I suppose the only logical and truthful conclusion is yes, but I'm rusty.
I felt that I was able to gain the students' confidence in my ability to teach EAP fairly quickly, which ensured that they were willing participants in class. However, I also wondered how far I could attribute this to my experience as an (intermittent) teacher and course leader in another university for the last 3 years. I have built up a wide understanding of the issues surrounding international students performance and success and therefore I felt confident that I could answer the students'questions comprehensively.
Anyway, moving on, I did spend a lot of time planning during the course. I found that the perennial complaint of teachers regarding the lack of suitable material to be borne out. I suppose that this could be due to my lack of teaching experience in recent years, nevertheless this remained a constant worry for me. "What can I use for noun phrases with this class, where can I find a good example of a tourism essay with clear voice for my students, will these students be able to do these exercises?" All these questions plagued me during the course as I attempted to maintain consistency of level and delivery in my classes, while furiously typing my own worksheets and adapting those from previous courses.
Interestingly, I found that the PPP approach seemed to work well due to the time constraints. It quickly became clear that any kind of guided discovery was not going to cover all the material necessary to complete the assessments in time. And the students seemed to respond well to this approach too, maybe as a result of its simplicity, maybe out of habit. So, we settled in to a familiar pattern of me explaining something, showing how it fitted into an under or postgraduate course, a session of scaffolded study followed by a production activity. Now, I was in full swing(!) and started to relax more. The downside: marking and feedback. While this approach worked well in terms of my teaching and planning, the students' learning was more problematic since each piece of work they produced threw up persistent errors and misunderstandings which needed to be addressed the next day. This, of course, took up more of our precious time and plunged me back into the worry pit of time and planning as Thursday's and Friday's lesson plans began to slide over the weekend into Monday and Tuesday.
But it was not all doom and gloom. Using models worked brilliantly, as did including a range of more EFL style interactive tasks and we often had, dare I say it, "fun" in class as students got to know each other and I felt the "flow" returning. Our class rule of honesty at all times was a great galvanising and cohering factor and in the end progress was made by everyone, myself being no exception.
At the end of the 5 weeks I felt reborn as a teacher (with a little bit of the old magic). And shattered!
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
New class, new blog topic
This week I'm starting teaching on a Presessional course and it will be the first time I have taught full time for a few years. As someone who has spent the last few years designing, planning and managing academic English programmes, I now get to see my worth! Suffice to say there are a few distant butterflies making their way to my stomach but I'm also excited to be going back into the classroom.
So, I shall be blogging about my experiences over the next 5 weeks in order to reflect on and evaluate the following:
1. Have I still got the old magic? :)
2. How do my ideas and materials work?
3. How well do the students progress and what factors influence this?
4. What areas of EAP are the most challenging and why?
So, please join me on my journey and feel free to comment...
So, I shall be blogging about my experiences over the next 5 weeks in order to reflect on and evaluate the following:
1. Have I still got the old magic? :)
2. How do my ideas and materials work?
3. How well do the students progress and what factors influence this?
4. What areas of EAP are the most challenging and why?
So, please join me on my journey and feel free to comment...
Thursday, August 5, 2010
A stiff letter to The Times
It appears that I am about to enter that time of life where one feels the need to voice one's ire at the BBC in prose rather than just shouting at the telly or radio. I was hoping I would at least be able to hold off until I was over 40 but alas the time has come.
So here you can read my email to the BBC - which I had to send in 6 parts due to the word limit for comments! Should I expect a reply...?
Dear BBC
I am a lover of radio 4 and am constantly energised, fascinated and enriched by its programmes. However, I feel moved to comment on the utter nonsense I was subjected to on The World Tonight, Tuesday 3rd August in the discussion on language and specifically “verbing” between Felicity Evans and her guest Rhea Williams, chairman of the Queen’s English Society.
The discussion centred on whether “verbing”, changing a noun to a verb, is acceptable, in response to President Obama’s comment that American troops would be “partnering” those from Afghanistan. Now this is a topic that delights the pedant (and therefore a certain percentage of the radio 4 audience) but produces nothing short of apoplectic rage in me. It is bad enough having to listen to yet another ill-informed discussion on language change and standardisation, but having to listen to non linguists bandy about their emotional reactions to something they just don’t like and clearly have no understanding of is both fury inducing and a waste of everyone’s time.
There are many linguists in the world such as the entire staff of the department of Educational and Professional Studies at King’s College London where I studied the MA English Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics or countless other academics who would have been able to provide an informed and reasoned discussion on this topic but no, someone at the BBC decided that the appropriate body to approach for an intelligent, well informed discussion would be The Queen’s English Society. Now, while I admit that some of their work is admirable, many of the comments in the discussion served as a reminder as to why I chose the words “utter nonsense” in my opening sentence.
Some examples on the topic of whether “verbing” is acceptable and I quote from the programme:
1. Rhea Williams: ...it depends if they are ugly or not.
Felicity Evans: Yes, I’m with you on that. If it’s elegant one should be able to get away with it but the trouble with that is that it’s a question of personal taste.
Yes, is it – discussion should end here.
2. RW: to grow a company, that’s actually just vile...What’s’ wrong with we’re trying to get the company to get bigger or we’re trying to make it better?
Indeed, but what’s wrong with to grow a company? Exactly, please. What... is... exactly... wrong?
3. RW: My most favourite one is “This door is alarmed”.
Oh how droll you are – I too can hardly contain myself for laughing.
4. RW: ... I think an awful lot of them are really horrid.
And I think you’re insane.
5. FE: ... if you fail to properly communicate what you mean, the language has failed.
Or there has been a breakdown in communication between the speaker and listener which is likely to be clarified by the use of repairing strategies such as saying “What do you mean?”
6. RW (in answer to FE’s previous insightful observation): Absolutely.
How?
7. FE: Business jargon is the worst. I saw a press release about encouraging children to access oily fish. How do you access an oily fish?
Go to Sainsbury’s – they have loads of fish.
8. RW: We often turn things into a verb for speed so you could say “Are you lemonading or wining?”
Mmm. At 9 syllables it is longer than “Do you want lemonade or wine?” which is 8 syllables. So the point about speed is what exactly?
9. RW: But if you’re going to try to access a fish, that’s just bonkers.
FE: It is bonkers.
Not nearly as bonkers as you two.
I wonder whether you could get a real expert i.e. a linguist in to discuss language change and the factors which influence it, in the process debunking some of the myths surrounding the subject. I’d be happy to provide a list of names and contacts but in the meantime please remember the following:
All languages change
Change is not wrong, it is change
Communities and groups use specific language or jargon for many socio-cultural reasons – leave them alone
Most people use language in a range of social situations and change it to adapt the situation
Business is not corrupting English, it is doing business
There is no such thing as Standard English
Yours,
Outraged of South London
For the entire discussion, go to: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00t6trb/b00t6tqd/The_World_Tonight_03_08_2010/ and start listening from 25.50 minutes in.
You may not be moved to write in to the BBC in the name of sanity or linguistic rage but I would love to know your thoughts.
So here you can read my email to the BBC - which I had to send in 6 parts due to the word limit for comments! Should I expect a reply...?
Dear BBC
I am a lover of radio 4 and am constantly energised, fascinated and enriched by its programmes. However, I feel moved to comment on the utter nonsense I was subjected to on The World Tonight, Tuesday 3rd August in the discussion on language and specifically “verbing” between Felicity Evans and her guest Rhea Williams, chairman of the Queen’s English Society.
The discussion centred on whether “verbing”, changing a noun to a verb, is acceptable, in response to President Obama’s comment that American troops would be “partnering” those from Afghanistan. Now this is a topic that delights the pedant (and therefore a certain percentage of the radio 4 audience) but produces nothing short of apoplectic rage in me. It is bad enough having to listen to yet another ill-informed discussion on language change and standardisation, but having to listen to non linguists bandy about their emotional reactions to something they just don’t like and clearly have no understanding of is both fury inducing and a waste of everyone’s time.
There are many linguists in the world such as the entire staff of the department of Educational and Professional Studies at King’s College London where I studied the MA English Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics or countless other academics who would have been able to provide an informed and reasoned discussion on this topic but no, someone at the BBC decided that the appropriate body to approach for an intelligent, well informed discussion would be The Queen’s English Society. Now, while I admit that some of their work is admirable, many of the comments in the discussion served as a reminder as to why I chose the words “utter nonsense” in my opening sentence.
Some examples on the topic of whether “verbing” is acceptable and I quote from the programme:
1. Rhea Williams: ...it depends if they are ugly or not.
Felicity Evans: Yes, I’m with you on that. If it’s elegant one should be able to get away with it but the trouble with that is that it’s a question of personal taste.
Yes, is it – discussion should end here.
2. RW: to grow a company, that’s actually just vile...What’s’ wrong with we’re trying to get the company to get bigger or we’re trying to make it better?
Indeed, but what’s wrong with to grow a company? Exactly, please. What... is... exactly... wrong?
3. RW: My most favourite one is “This door is alarmed”.
Oh how droll you are – I too can hardly contain myself for laughing.
4. RW: ... I think an awful lot of them are really horrid.
And I think you’re insane.
5. FE: ... if you fail to properly communicate what you mean, the language has failed.
Or there has been a breakdown in communication between the speaker and listener which is likely to be clarified by the use of repairing strategies such as saying “What do you mean?”
6. RW (in answer to FE’s previous insightful observation): Absolutely.
How?
7. FE: Business jargon is the worst. I saw a press release about encouraging children to access oily fish. How do you access an oily fish?
Go to Sainsbury’s – they have loads of fish.
8. RW: We often turn things into a verb for speed so you could say “Are you lemonading or wining?”
Mmm. At 9 syllables it is longer than “Do you want lemonade or wine?” which is 8 syllables. So the point about speed is what exactly?
9. RW: But if you’re going to try to access a fish, that’s just bonkers.
FE: It is bonkers.
Not nearly as bonkers as you two.
I wonder whether you could get a real expert i.e. a linguist in to discuss language change and the factors which influence it, in the process debunking some of the myths surrounding the subject. I’d be happy to provide a list of names and contacts but in the meantime please remember the following:
All languages change
Change is not wrong, it is change
Communities and groups use specific language or jargon for many socio-cultural reasons – leave them alone
Most people use language in a range of social situations and change it to adapt the situation
Business is not corrupting English, it is doing business
There is no such thing as Standard English
Yours,
Outraged of South London
For the entire discussion, go to: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00t6trb/b00t6tqd/The_World_Tonight_03_08_2010/ and start listening from 25.50 minutes in.
You may not be moved to write in to the BBC in the name of sanity or linguistic rage but I would love to know your thoughts.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Linguistics quiz
I recently bought a little book in the "A Graphic Guide" series entitled "Linguistics A Graphic Guide". Written by R. L. Trask - linguistics guru from the University of Sussex, it's great on many levels - pictures, price, easy to understand. But the main reason I liked it was how it reminded me of all the stuff I've forgotten from my MA and its gem-like random language facts.
So, for all you budding linguists out there here's a quick test of your current worth. Answers coming in a few days and a prize will go to the person with the most correct, possible or hilarious answers. :)
1. What's the most recent language to have been created? (Extra point for the year).
2. The Indian grammarian Panini analysed grammar in a similar way that of Chomsky in the 1950s but how many years before Chomsky did Panini do his analysis?
3. What is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis?
4. Which of the following do all languages exhibit:
All languages have thousands of words
All languages have devices for acquiring new words
All languages have ways of modifying meanings of words
All languages have negative forms
All languages can make questions
All languages allow us to talk about different times other than the present
All languages allow hypothetical, counter-factual, conditional, unreal and fictional utterances
All languages are able to produce and understand new utterances
All languages allow freedom - the ability to say anything and nothing in any situation
5. What were Grice's 4 maxims?
6. What's the difference between a pidgin and a creole?
Answers on a postcard - or here please...
So, for all you budding linguists out there here's a quick test of your current worth. Answers coming in a few days and a prize will go to the person with the most correct, possible or hilarious answers. :)
1. What's the most recent language to have been created? (Extra point for the year).
2. The Indian grammarian Panini analysed grammar in a similar way that of Chomsky in the 1950s but how many years before Chomsky did Panini do his analysis?
3. What is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis?
4. Which of the following do all languages exhibit:
All languages have thousands of words
All languages have devices for acquiring new words
All languages have ways of modifying meanings of words
All languages have negative forms
All languages can make questions
All languages allow us to talk about different times other than the present
All languages allow hypothetical, counter-factual, conditional, unreal and fictional utterances
All languages are able to produce and understand new utterances
All languages allow freedom - the ability to say anything and nothing in any situation
5. What were Grice's 4 maxims?
6. What's the difference between a pidgin and a creole?
Answers on a postcard - or here please...
Friday, July 16, 2010
Why don’t/ won’t/ can’t British people learn languages?
I suppose two other possible titles for this entry could be “why don’t British people need to learn languages?” or “why ought British people learn languages?” as they provide clues to answer the initial question.
Now whilst we all know the answer to why the British don’t need to learn languages (see my previous blog on Globish), the discussion of why we ought to is more interesting. I’ve just been reading a couple of articles from Languages Direct and BBC Sport about the lack of UK footballers playing abroad and how this mono cultural and monolingual experience could be contributing to England’s poor performance in the World Cup.
http://www.languages-direct.com/news/are-language-skills-the-key-to-englands-future-success-at-the-world-cup/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2010/8727084.stm
As Chris Waddle says in the BBC Sport article, “My three years in Marseille taught me so much about football, which I would never have learnt in England." And his French is pretty good too. As a language graduate (French and Spanish) my language skills may not be as good as they were but my sense of the world, myself, communication, family, culture and identity were shaped by my experiences of learning other languages and, unlike the imperfect subjunctive, this knowledge and understanding brought by my linguistic experiences will never leave. For example, understanding the limits of my environmentalism was not something I expected to find out from living in Japan and the multiculturalism I discovered in Peru gave me a whole new way to evaluate the significance I had previously attached to coming from "the great multicultural London".
I sometimes wonder what we miss out on collectively as a non language learning nation. How would our national identity change if we were linguistically competent like the Dutch or the Germans? How would we be different if everyone was enrolled in a private language school desperately trying to make sense of French grammar or Chinese tones, knowing that mastering such a skill could change our lives for the better and open up a whole new world of employment and cultural opportunities for us? For this is how the rest of the world functions in relation to English.
And thinking about language in relation to England’s world cup performance got me reflecting on teachers’ language skills in the EFL and EAP industries. We are the only language teachers who as a group are not fluent in other languages. All my French and Spanish teachers were fluent speakers of more than one language, whether they were native speakers teaching their mother tongue or native English speakers teaching French or Spanish. Even in the multilingual classrooms of EFL schools in the UK being fluent in another language would be advantageous for a teacher, but as an industry we hold the native speaker of English quality very high on the list of essentials.
Yet, I can’t help wondering if, like the England football team, we would be better at our jobs if we were more linguistically capable? After all, in most EFL classrooms the teacher is the only non linguist in the room.
Now whilst we all know the answer to why the British don’t need to learn languages (see my previous blog on Globish), the discussion of why we ought to is more interesting. I’ve just been reading a couple of articles from Languages Direct and BBC Sport about the lack of UK footballers playing abroad and how this mono cultural and monolingual experience could be contributing to England’s poor performance in the World Cup.
http://www.languages-direct.com/news/are-language-skills-the-key-to-englands-future-success-at-the-world-cup/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2010/8727084.stm
As Chris Waddle says in the BBC Sport article, “My three years in Marseille taught me so much about football, which I would never have learnt in England." And his French is pretty good too. As a language graduate (French and Spanish) my language skills may not be as good as they were but my sense of the world, myself, communication, family, culture and identity were shaped by my experiences of learning other languages and, unlike the imperfect subjunctive, this knowledge and understanding brought by my linguistic experiences will never leave. For example, understanding the limits of my environmentalism was not something I expected to find out from living in Japan and the multiculturalism I discovered in Peru gave me a whole new way to evaluate the significance I had previously attached to coming from "the great multicultural London".
I sometimes wonder what we miss out on collectively as a non language learning nation. How would our national identity change if we were linguistically competent like the Dutch or the Germans? How would we be different if everyone was enrolled in a private language school desperately trying to make sense of French grammar or Chinese tones, knowing that mastering such a skill could change our lives for the better and open up a whole new world of employment and cultural opportunities for us? For this is how the rest of the world functions in relation to English.
And thinking about language in relation to England’s world cup performance got me reflecting on teachers’ language skills in the EFL and EAP industries. We are the only language teachers who as a group are not fluent in other languages. All my French and Spanish teachers were fluent speakers of more than one language, whether they were native speakers teaching their mother tongue or native English speakers teaching French or Spanish. Even in the multilingual classrooms of EFL schools in the UK being fluent in another language would be advantageous for a teacher, but as an industry we hold the native speaker of English quality very high on the list of essentials.
Yet, I can’t help wondering if, like the England football team, we would be better at our jobs if we were more linguistically capable? After all, in most EFL classrooms the teacher is the only non linguist in the room.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
The changing character of Chinese.
Here are my thoughts on: Word of Mouth Radio 4 May 31st 2010. The programme is not on iplayer unfortunately but an overview is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00s0d1d
This programme gave a fascinating insight into the future of the Chinese language, specifically Chinese written characters. As English marches on as the lingua franca of the world, the programme looked at pinyin the way of writing Chinese characters in our alphabet and the influence of this on Chinese culture.
The discussion centred on the question of maintaining cultural identity through Chinese characters versus simplifying the language and lessening the time needed to learn it by using only pinyin. This raises several issues of how language interplays with culture, identity and business. Perhaps it would benefit the Chinese economy if their future linguistic context mirrored that of Singapore in terms of its multilingualism and the clear economic benefits the Singaporeans have reaped from their four language policy. And would it help balance the global march of English feared by many if Chinese were easier to learn for foreigners whose languages use the Roman script? The worries are of course that China could lose some of the Chinese-ness that the writing style brings to the culture.
Still, it is worth thinking about what government or financially driven multilingualism means for everyone, not just those privileged to be able to learn another language at school. In Singapore the population is small therefore it is relatively easy for the government to implement a country wide language policy. And having three second languages to choose from at school gives diversity and more freedom of choice for young people, which may help to maintain the cultural mix in Singapore. China on the other hand is vast and has many dialects. How realistic is it to expect vast swathes of the population to become expert at English? The alternative could be to increase the number of Chinese speakers in the world. Would switching to pinyin from Chinese characters help a large enough number of foreigners to learn Chinese and make it a new lingua franca to compete with English? Saying that I think I remember a push in the 90s to get all business undergraduates in the UK to learn Japanese, which doesn’t seem to have been very successful!
The programme also talked about how in Singapore the dialect Singlish is banned from the media. The presenter Chris Legdard interviewed “Mr Brown” a prominent Singaporean satirist who uses Singlish as a basis for his humorous radio show. (Have a look at his website for more info www.mrbrown.com). What he highlighted in the programme was the dangers of government influencing language policy, given that those people most affected are not the elite. In Singapore, language policy is firmly in the hands of those who speak 2 or more of the official languages and not the dialect, Singlish. Would changing Chinese have a negative effect on those who most need the power of language to improve their future? Or in China would simplifying the language by using pinyin bring more foreign investment and trade and therefore more success for all?
This programme gave a fascinating insight into the future of the Chinese language, specifically Chinese written characters. As English marches on as the lingua franca of the world, the programme looked at pinyin the way of writing Chinese characters in our alphabet and the influence of this on Chinese culture.
The discussion centred on the question of maintaining cultural identity through Chinese characters versus simplifying the language and lessening the time needed to learn it by using only pinyin. This raises several issues of how language interplays with culture, identity and business. Perhaps it would benefit the Chinese economy if their future linguistic context mirrored that of Singapore in terms of its multilingualism and the clear economic benefits the Singaporeans have reaped from their four language policy. And would it help balance the global march of English feared by many if Chinese were easier to learn for foreigners whose languages use the Roman script? The worries are of course that China could lose some of the Chinese-ness that the writing style brings to the culture.
Still, it is worth thinking about what government or financially driven multilingualism means for everyone, not just those privileged to be able to learn another language at school. In Singapore the population is small therefore it is relatively easy for the government to implement a country wide language policy. And having three second languages to choose from at school gives diversity and more freedom of choice for young people, which may help to maintain the cultural mix in Singapore. China on the other hand is vast and has many dialects. How realistic is it to expect vast swathes of the population to become expert at English? The alternative could be to increase the number of Chinese speakers in the world. Would switching to pinyin from Chinese characters help a large enough number of foreigners to learn Chinese and make it a new lingua franca to compete with English? Saying that I think I remember a push in the 90s to get all business undergraduates in the UK to learn Japanese, which doesn’t seem to have been very successful!
The programme also talked about how in Singapore the dialect Singlish is banned from the media. The presenter Chris Legdard interviewed “Mr Brown” a prominent Singaporean satirist who uses Singlish as a basis for his humorous radio show. (Have a look at his website for more info www.mrbrown.com). What he highlighted in the programme was the dangers of government influencing language policy, given that those people most affected are not the elite. In Singapore, language policy is firmly in the hands of those who speak 2 or more of the official languages and not the dialect, Singlish. Would changing Chinese have a negative effect on those who most need the power of language to improve their future? Or in China would simplifying the language by using pinyin bring more foreign investment and trade and therefore more success for all?
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