Why teaching English is an art

LANGUAGE LESSONS

Have we not learnt more English from friends, non-English teachers, strangers? Many of us will agree. What then is the problem?

There was a time when a master’s degree in English was not just to fulfil the need for a degree, but for one’s own liberal education. Students of English literature read the classics of British, Greek and Latin literature and later even read American Literature and Commonwealth Literature. We quoted Shakespeare and we acted in his plays.

Rewards of a rigorous course  
The MA English graduate had to teach English at university whether s/he liked it or not. We were the authorities of the language. Hence, we spoke dogmatically.  We did not know the rules as such, for we had acquired or imbibed the language through our vast reading and writing. If we knew it for ourselves, we did not know how to pass it on.
But admittedly, we did three years of intense study and topped it off with another two years of more intensive study. Some of us did a paper in TESOL too, as, ‘times they were a-changing’.

When modern becomes ‘modren’
But what of the new open universities and correspondence/distance education courses with ready-made notes to pass an exam and get a degree to further one’s interest in life?
These were meant to secularise education, to bring it from the ivory towers of exclusivist colleges and to the common (wo)man, but what has happened in the process is a watering down of knowledge.
With doubtful evaluation procedures and grades given to content and not to accuracy or style of expression, post-graduates today bring to language teaching a paucity of imagination and an attitude of arrogance based on these vapourish degrees.
Thus our colleges are crowded with graduates who spell as they will. Does it matter if ‘modern’ becomes ‘modren’, ‘separate’ remains ‘seperate, and even poor ‘grammar’ becomes ‘grammer’?!
Do they ever bother to teach some rules of pesky spelling? And writing letters? We thought this was easy enough but the graduates today, aspiring to be business magnates in the near future, actually write ‘Hi!’ when applying for jobs.
And, when asked at an interview, “Are you an only child?” one graduate answered “I am a child” for, after all, the indefinite article “a” does refer to the number one doesn’t it? Sound logic but sparse English.
Accent first, grammar later
Let’s face it: an MA in English Literature does not guarantee good language teaching methodology. Haven’t the BPOs and call centres proved it? They enforce rules and ways of teaching and speaking for their own purposes of communication with those back home and thus Voice Training and Accent Reduction are unduly stressed whereas grammar and usage and knowledge of language teaching methodology are ignored.
No particular approaches, methods or techniques exist here. If there is a method, it is one for survival and that too, not for the student, but for the dollar-hungry teacher
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“Why teach them the ‘gerund’ or the ‘participial adjective’?” said one cute thing to me, in an interview.

“I need to teach them to speak good English”, and so we hear, “I am very interest to learn from you”, “I am having the book you asked for”, ad nauseam, ad infinitum.

Right tools, right method
We must learn to acquire good methods of teaching before we step into this sacred profession of language teaching. We must have an approach, an attitude, a rationale for why we do what we do, and techniques and methods acquired by trial and error, or passed down to us in special courses run by language institutes.
Anyone from any discipline can teach English today, but do equip yourselves with the right tools.

Training in English language teaching is a must as training is for a doctor or dental surgeon or pilot. A master’s degree in Applied Linguistics or TESOL is the icing on the cake, but under it all we need imagination, humility and sincerity. That’s a rare combination but it can be achieved.