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Q: why is it so impotant to be native speakers to find a Teaching job??
10 years 35 weeks ago in Teaching & Learning - China
When i learn a foreign language, a native speaker as teacher is always the best. Proper pronunciation and understanding of how the language is used correctly, cultural concepts and idioms. By listening and practicing with a native speaker you can really reach your potential in that language. and if you have the opportunity, it should be taken.
nicholasba:
proper pronunciation? Actually as a non-native english speaker I always had difficulties to understand the Australians, new zealand and british English, while i had no issue at all with Americans and then the spanish, the french and everyone else.
Actually I would go so far to say that sometimes is better learning from people with different accent, also those with strong accent, so to train your listening and being open yourself to a more wide audience. Considering that chinese are not only doing business with people where english is the first language, would be much more useful to them.
Besides, I do believe that in teaching grammar non-native could be better teachers and way more motivate as native.
nicholasba:
being said that who should be entitled to posses the proper pronunciation? Irish?Scottish?Aussies?
sorrel:
when learning a European language I always had native teachers. listening to their 'regional' accents helped with understanding and practicing the language as spoken by natives. This also helped when meeting people from these countries: the accent variations were then more familiar.
nicholasba:
sorrel, the motivation behind learning an eurppean language different than english are very different than those behind learning English and so your final audience. it could be said that english became almost a chore. And while an european language would be used basically to communicate with people coming from that area, hence very little differences in prounanciations, english opens your to almost every nation (hence different prounanciations) of this planet. So, expect indian-english, middle-east accent, russian and so on.
While studying english if you learn it from a scottish, an irish, an american, a british is BS when it comes to an european, an african or an asian accent...useless
sorrel:
As an English teacher, I encourage my students not to become fixated on any one English accent, as I remind them they shouldn’t assume all foreigners come from America (for example). In addition, if they are taking an exam like the IELTS, I tell them that their oral examiner could be from ANY country in the world, so get a much practice listening to the many different accents as possible. A common concern I heard from some students was that there was an examiner from India. I reminded them that I had advised them well in advance that this was a possibility. In addition I provided samples of the different accents of spoken English in my class. The foreign teachers in my school came from 5 different countries. That was 5 different accents that were available for them to listen to and practice with. In my experience, hearing a different accent for the first time takes a bit of concentration on the part of the listener. ‘vive la différence!’
sorrel:
yes, these were the IELTS preparation classes I was told to stop giving by my department president - go figure!
IrvineWelsh:
being said that who should be entitled to posses the proper pronunciation? Irish?Scottish?Aussies?
Nicholasba- what the hell is wrong with Irish, Scottish or Australian accents?
They are all perfectly valid and in most cases clear and understandable. If you cannot fathom certain accents that is a failure of your listening skills due to lack of time with native speakers.
dom87:
edit: uhm thread was too old, didnt see it. no comment anymore
yeah but there are other countries that the native tongue is English but they can speak other languages. I am a Mauritian and for me it is not easy to get job because i am not from AMERICA, CANADA. USA, AUTRALIA OR NZ. But even having a Ba from cambridge university they dont accept. for them only white skin colored people. sorry but as far as english is concern its not only native speakers that can prove to be good teachers.
rabiya1102:
it was just a question.. these are chinese rules.. im sure you are not
Hefei:
I am totally agree with you, not only to be a native speaker means= teacher, it is a wrong concept.
If somebody wants to be a teacher needs something else, not only being from those countries.
Your written English is not good enough to be teaching it. Mauritius is not an English speaking country. French is the predominant language. Newspapers and media are in French, and English language TV is dubbed with French. The English spoken in Mauritius is a Creole, and would be difficult to understand to other non-native speakers outside Mauritius.
99Silva:
Totally agree with you Traveler I've seen plenty of non foreigners who couldn't spell...thumb up
Would you have a Teacher from the Phillipines teaching you or would you rather have someone from the United States of America? Ask yourself this question and I'm sure 99% of the time the answer would be the latter one. You know why too.
Hefei:
The answer is simple, I would like to have a GOOD English teacher, from Philippines or from other countries. And of course, I would appreciate if the teacher can speak other languages, NOT ONLY English, like most of American teacher I have had.
listen, this is what I am telling you now. native speakers are having the correct sentences. many other people be telling it wrong. also many non native also be having pronunciation difficulties and adding sounds. Theya saya almosta everya worda wronga, soa thea studenta learnsa toa speaka likea thisa.
It is never wrong to go native.
nicholasba:
tell me pleaze than, who should represent the proper English pronunciation?
Traveler:
Nicholas: Pronunciation is not one of the six main skills of language, so I don't know why you mention it. The six main aspects are: reading, writing, listening, speaking, grammar and vocabulary.
dom87:
met a lot of americans with a terrible pronunciation not to speak of all the easy grammar mistakes they made.
Its like you would ask me to teach german, nope I am terrible in teaching german because we leave out some important rules of our speech
nicholasba:
i wouldn't have mention it (at all) if someone earlier didnt point this out as the most important requirment when choosing a teacher.
TedDBayer:
All the Chinese English teachers I met added "a'' to words or pause.Very gooda.
You can use the EDIT button to correct all the English grammar mistakes that you have made in your posts.
sorry but learning from native speakers is probably the worst thing you can do especially if that native speaker cant even speak their mother tongue.
i learned english for like 15 years and never had a native teacher (yep in germany we dont hire native speakers unless they have proper qualification AND can speak german fluent proved with tests)
especially in the beginning you just need the translations or why do you all have those creepy assistants who translate half wrong?
native teachers or native experience makes sense if you have learned all the english stuff and then go a year abroad to improve your understandings and speed (hard to understand those british and australian folks :/)
always prefer a non native over a native. In china its just no choice because the locals cant pronounce anything nor speak good at all. And then they have the choice between native speakers with 0 chinese or non native with 0 chinese... of course they pick the natives.
But really do you need to be english native to teach 3 year old kids "hello" "nice to meet you" " how are you"?
studied non native english majors in education >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> native rnd teachers who are just here for fun
just for records I am not an english teacher and i dont care a lot about my "internet english"
nicholasba:
well i think the whole obsession with hiring native teachers (and possibly white) is basically again just the old silly obsession that chinese have with :"face".
Just for the records: In my university we had 4 teachers to teach us oral chinese, from:
shijiazhuang, shanghai, tianjin and taiwan.
For oral English and learning how to use it correctly a native speaker is best, however I find that learning the grammar rules is best coming from a non-native as they have studied it in depth unlike native speakers.
dom87:
how you wanna teach oral english if the students can even say a sentence?
Thats exactly what most teacher do here.
Not even the school itself considers foreign teachers as teachers here. They are white monkeys to entertain the kids with retarded games.
Did you play in uk/usa english games in school? lol
i did that only the last day before summer vacation when every stuff was finished
nicholasba:
i agree but just on a business english level. Indeed, the guy or girl replying you got a point. How much do you really think you can improve someone with such a low language level? And i say it again: some native english speaker's accent just S U C K.
I met yesterday a guy claiming to be from NY. well i though he was turkish...no offence to any turkish people here,..huh
hiddenjelly:
@ dom87: Oral English from a native teacher is of course best after the students have learnt some basics but as experience as taught me even teaching with zero language ability is viable albeit tough.
The UK/USA game I do not know and if you are in a school that treats you as a "white monkey" then that is something you need to work out, most teachers are afraid to stand up for themselves through fear of losing a job, me however I always make it clear what I will and will not do and being the "white monkey" is one that I will not do. Professionalism usually wins.
@nicholas: I couldn't agree more, if he claims to be from NY and looks/sounds Turkish I guess that is possible given the mix of nationalities who are from NY, you need to remember that some immigrants have arrived in only the last couple of decades so his parents could have been born in Turkey/Middle East and he was born in the USA.
Going further on that point is every language has it's dialects/accents Arabic is a big one if you hear an Egyptian speak then an Iranian you will hear clear differences, Chinese is the same. I remember when I first came here I would ask people where they are from for a while I thought that Hunan, Funan, Fulan where 3 different provinces (Some people from Hunan and southern Hubei sometimes have difficulty pronouncing the H and/or N). Doesn't make them wrong in their Chinese but it isn't standard.
It's because someone from China understands how things work and can't be so easily manipulated. An English teacher that can actually speak Chinese is to be feared... Especially if they know they have rights.
sam239:
What kind of rights? I always wonder about this, but in my experience natives (as in natives to this country) always get treated worse than us farangis because they can't just take a taxi to the airport and leave like we can.
happywanderer:
It doesn't matter! The important thing is that you are believe you have none...
eye thunk its someting too due wyth knowwing watt u r saayin. all so dey doo liked us whiter type guys,, cuz we r unussually hansome and r inteligent tu. whale, dat is jest ur too sents,,, oooopsey daisy, i ment My tree sents worht of belevin. dey aslo hard some werds that i was in posssesoin of an very larger typ of male chicken beast.
Because the assistants are all ugly. That's why it's so impotent to be a native speaker. 
i agree i've made some mistakes while writing here.. it was 5 in the morning and that conversation about native speakers was troubling me.. So since i am not native my BA in English is not valid???. My oral English that Cambridge gave me an A is not good??? All the Cambridge certificates i have are not valid?? i've been working with Canadian people that did not even went to high school and were working in bars in Canada.. only because they are native speakers and white they can teach?? is that good ?? hahaha..so from that point native or not ,everybody can teach?? i don't really think so.. Anyway I've been working as teacher for 1 year now in china.. it's not a problem for me.. it was just a question.. because for them only skin color is important not certificate.
sorrel:
I agree, it is crazy that those qualified to teach are discriminated against because of nationality or skin colour. I have also been discriminated against it due to the fact I am female. I was told 'not to teach.' But when it is all about appearance, not ability, it defies common sense. But then again 'this is China'.
nevermind:
Did you go to thee Cambridge? Because if your oral English is so good then I would imagine your written English would be much better. BTW, any high school dropout in Canada still speaks English better than you, from what I've seen. You're getting tenses wrong all over the place and I would not entrust you to teach the language. Sorry. That has nothing to do with your not being a native speaker, is has to do with you not speaking (or writing) well enough.
rabiya1102:
nevermind : i can see that you behave just like chinese. Just judging people. I did not even talk to you.. you have not even listen to my pronounciation but you can know that they speak better than me..
dom87:
its even worth that people judge someone on a forum for not writing proper english. welcome to the internet!
does anyone cares how you write in a forum? i leave out capital letters and also ' just because i m lazy
JustinF:
Want to guess which other country has "caucasian" as the only professional requirement for foreigners teaching English? I'll give you a small spoiler: India
If Native speakers are the good for Chinese Students, then
why all Chinese HAVE SO BAD ACCENT/PRONUNCIATION?
As you can see, those native teachers ARE NOT GOOD TEACHERS.
THEIR RESULTS ARE SO POOR.
A bad teacher is a bad teacher it does not matter where he/she come from
or if he/she is a native or not.
A good teacher is a good teacher, even if he/she is not a native.
sorrel:
I agree that foreign teachers can be both good an bad, but for most of their english learning, students here in China have had Chinese teachers and very little speaking in class.
Englteachted:
How the hell can you blame FTs for what Chinese English teachers taught them?
Add to it that Chinese are taught to be distrustful of foreigners, plus they believe they know English better than native English speakers, and the way they are taught makes it nearly impossible to undo the effects of the poor teaching.
Not to mention, the poor structure of most schools negates the abilities of good FTs or they hire based on looks.
@ rabiya, I'm from West Africa and I've been teaching English in China for the past 2 years. The secret is that, you have to take your mind off your certificates because you are not going to land a job with them. If you really want to find a job, i suggest you start small, work hard, justify your inclusion before you can land a big job.
I started as a part-time teacher, i didn't care about how much they paid me because i had bigger plans than "now" and one day my friend who is from England got sick, he called his headmistress and told her that he cannot make it to school in a day or two. His Boss asked him if he can get a friend to step in for him until he recovers. He asked me and i agreed to cover for him. I went to the school and the headmistress introduced me to the staff and told them I'm stepping in for my friend. Every student and teacher in the school liked me because of the creativity, enthusiasm, eagerness and the passion of my work. My friend recovered after the second day so i didn't go to the school. I was sitting at home watching TV and he called me " hey buddy, what the fuck did you tell my students, every class i walk into don't wanna see my face, they don't follow me in class anymore. I went to report them to the headmistress, she came asking them why? and they all shouted, 'we want the black teacher'". so i told him, i went there to teach not to gossip and i hanged up. We didn't live together so it wasn't much of a problem. The next day, the headmistress called me and told me to come to the school, to my surprise, she had paid my friend his three months salary and fired him as stated in his contract. She said to me " I do not want to lose students". So she gave me a contract to read. she didn't even ask of a CV left alone qualifications. i love the terms of the contract and the wage was handsome so i took the job. If i had walk to the school with my CV and certificates or still apply to them online for a teaching job, she wouldn't have hired me.
SO IS NOT ABOUT BEEN A NATIVE OR NON-NATIVE, IS ABOUT YOUR CAPABILITIES, HARD WORK AND THE PASSION FOR THE JOB. GOOD LUCK
Hefei:
And of course, because you found a job by lack! It is not easy like you say, although it is nice you flatter to you like that.
Luck in your job!
It's not important to be a native speaker but it is vital that your English is up to scratch. Based off the writing here, I'm sorry but I wouldn't give you a job, rabiya, but I would give scrappy a job. His written English (at least) is good enough and his attitude is spot on.
And ignore dom's dumbass comments - I have students who could barely string a sentence together six months ago who write better than that, and I'm scratching my head to work out how a native speaker can not speak his/her own language. A mute person, perhaps?
Hefei:
Not, unfortunately many people can´t speak correctly their own languages, that is a fact.
