David Crystal - The Biggest Challenges for Teachers
Summary
TLDRThe video script discusses the challenges of language teaching in the face of rapid linguistic evolution, particularly due to the internet and globalization. It emphasizes the importance for teachers to keep pace with new slang and expressions, and to expose students to various English dialects beyond traditional British or American English. The speaker also touches on the complexity of language and the need for teachers to be well-compensated for their crucial role in education.
Takeaways
- 😯 The rapid pace of language change is the biggest challenge for teachers, especially due to the internet accelerating the spread of new words and expressions.
- 🌐 Teachers need to keep up with language evolution because students are often already familiar with new slang and expressions before they are taught in class.
- 🌍 Globalization of English is a significant trend, with English spoken in various accents and dialects worldwide, not just British or American English.
- 📚 Teachers should respect traditional accents and dialects but also expose students to the diversity of English to prepare them for real-world encounters.
- 🔍 It's important for educators to improve students' listening and reading comprehension by introducing them to different English varieties.
- 🎓 The traditional focus on a single 'correct' form of English, such as Received Pronunciation, may not be sufficient in today's global context.
- 📈 The variety of English accents and dialects encountered globally is vast, and teachers should consider including multiple varieties in their curriculum.
- 👂 Exposure to different English accents can help students develop better listening comprehension and adapt to various linguistic situations.
- 📝 While maintaining a conservative approach for exam preparation due to exam boards' conservatism, teachers should still embrace language diversity in the classroom.
- 💡 Teachers can utilize the internet to easily access resources and examples of different English accents and dialects for educational purposes.
- 💰 The speaker suggests that teacher salaries should be significantly increased to reflect the complexity and importance of their profession.
Q & A
What is the biggest challenge in language teaching according to the script?
-The biggest challenge in language teaching is keeping pace with language change, which is happening at an unprecedented speed due to the internet and globalization.
How does the internet influence the speed of language change?
-The internet fosters new varieties and experiences of language, allowing new words and expressions to spread globally within hours rather than generations.
Why is it important for teachers to keep up with language changes?
-Teachers need to keep up with language changes because their students are often already familiar with new slang and expressions, and it helps in maintaining relevance and effectiveness in teaching.
What is the impact of globalization on the English language?
-Globalization has led to the diversification of English, with various accents and dialects becoming more prevalent worldwide, challenging the notion of a single 'correct' English.
Why is it a mistake to teach students that there is only one kind of English?
-Teaching students that there is only one kind of English can be limiting, as it does not prepare them for the diverse accents and dialects they will encounter in the global context.
What should teachers do to expose their students to the variety of English dialects?
-Teachers should incorporate listening and reading materials that represent different English dialects and accents into their curriculum to improve students' comprehension skills.
What is the speaker's view on the importance of traditional accents in language teaching?
-The speaker believes that while traditional accents should be respected and taught, it is also crucial to expose students to the full range of language variation.
How can teachers effectively keep up with changes in language and pedagogy?
-Teachers can leverage the internet to access resources, materials, and even direct interactions with speakers of different dialects, making the task of staying current more manageable.
What does the speaker suggest about teacher salaries?
-The speaker suggests that teacher salaries should be significantly increased to reflect the complex professionalism required in language teaching.
What is the speaker's perspective on the complexity of language?
-The speaker views language as the most complex aspect of human behavior, surpassing even fields like brain surgery and nuclear physics in complexity.
How does the speaker propose to address the challenge of teaching diverse English dialects?
-The speaker proposes that teachers and institutions should choose which dialects to expose students to based on their likely future encounters and the usefulness of those varieties, while also using the internet to facilitate access to these dialects.
Outlines
📚 The Challenge of Keeping Pace with Language Change
The speaker emphasizes the rapid evolution of language, particularly due to the internet, which accelerates the spread of new words and expressions. Teachers face the challenge of staying current with these changes, as students are often already familiar with the latest slang and vocabulary. The speaker suggests that educators should respect traditional accents and dialects while also exposing students to the global diversity of English, including American, Indian, and other English variants. This prepares students for real-world encounters with different accents and dialects and broadens their comprehension skills.
🌐 Adapting to Global English and Language Pedagogy
This paragraph discusses the importance of adapting teaching methods to acknowledge the global nature of English and the need for teachers to keep up with linguistic changes. The speaker humorously dismisses his responsibility for solving this issue, highlighting the complexity of language teaching and the importance of recognizing the profession's value. He advocates for increased teacher salaries to reflect the difficulty and professionalism required. The paragraph also touches on the use of technology, such as the internet and Skype, to facilitate exposure to different English accents and dialects, making it easier for teachers to incorporate global perspectives into their curriculum.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Language change
💡Internet
💡Globalization of English
💡British English
💡Received Pronunciation (RP)
💡American English
💡Listening comprehension
💡Reading comprehension
💡Accents and dialects
💡Pedagogy
💡Teacher salaries
Highlights
The biggest challenge for language teachers is to keep pace with the rapid changes in language.
The internet accelerates the spread of new language varieties and expressions, making it crucial for teachers to stay updated.
New words invented today can be known worldwide within 24 hours through social media platforms like Facebook.
Students are often ahead of teachers in adopting new language trends due to generational differences.
Globalization of English is a significant trend, impacting the variety of English accents and dialects encountered globally.
Only a small percentage of the English population speaks Received Pronunciation (RP), challenging the notion of a single 'correct' English.
Teachers should respect traditional accents but also expose students to the diversity of global English dialects.
It's essential for teachers to improve students' listening and reading comprehension by exposing them to various English dialects.
Teachers need to decide which English dialects to expose students to based on their likely future encounters and usefulness.
Even if certain dialects are not directly useful, brief exposure can help students adjust to unfamiliar language variations.
Language change prepares individuals to encounter any form of language, moving away from the idea of a single 'correct' English.
Examining boards are conservative, so teaching for exams requires a more traditional approach despite language evolution.
Teachers face the challenge of keeping up with language changes without being linguists and having limited time for analysis.
The complexity of language makes teaching it one of the most difficult professions, requiring recognition and higher salaries.
The internet has made it easier for teachers to access and incorporate global English dialects into their teaching.
Resources and courses focusing on global English differences are available to assist teachers in their curriculum development.
Initial setup for incorporating global English into teaching requires time and resources, but it becomes reusable in subsequent years.
The speaker humorously suggests that if they were in charge of the world, teachers' salaries would be increased significantly.
Transcripts
[Music]
the biggest challenge without a doubt is
to keep Pace with language
change no question um that is the
difficulty always has been a difficulty
with teaching but it's particularly a
difficulty now given that language is
changing so fast it's changing for two
reasons one reason the internet which is
indeed fostering new varieties and new
experiences faster than ever before you
know in the old days if you invented a
new word it could take a generation
before the rest of the world knew about
that new word if you invent a new word
today and put it on Facebook everybody
knows about it within 24 hours let
and so language is moving faster and
teachers have got to keep Pace with this
because their students are already ahead
of them you must have had this
experience you know the kind of language
that you use uh all the time every day
whether it's English or any or Serbian
or whatever is often not the language
that your teachers know because they're
the generation older and they're just
not familiar with it until you tell them
and this is the sort of thing that's
happening to going to happen to your
students you see in due course New Slang
new words new expression are going to
come
in the other big Trend in language
change is the globalization of English
the fact of the matter is is that you
and your students will go out into the
big wide world and encounter F in the
English language well if you've been
teaching your students that there is
only one kind of English and that is
British English and the only kind of
accent is receive pronunciation which is
the accent of the queen and so on and
you say that's the only kind of English
you'll hear out there you are going to
be so wrong because only 2% of the
population of England speaks
RP and worldwide that proportion grows a
little bit but even so the vast majority
of the accents and dialects that you'll
hear as you travel around the world you
don't even have to travel just turn on
the television set or go to the cinema
and what you'll hear is of course a lot
of American English a lot of if it's
Indian Cinema a lot of Indian English
and so on standing any High Street
anywhere in the world where English is
an important language Oxford Street in
London I've done this I've just stood
there and listened to the variety of
accents and dialects that pass me by and
the variety of other languages too of
course and what I hear every now and
then one in a hundred passes by with the
educated accent that we are often
teaching our students to use so for
teachers the important thing is that you
retain that respect for the the
traditional accent reason being that
that's the accent probably you've been
taught or of course if you've been
taught American English that's a
different scenario but the same
principle applies there or Australian
English the same principle that there
will be one accent that you know that
you respect because your teachers have
taught it to you you've heard it more
than anything else the examiners have
examined you in it the teaching
materials are in it and if you know RP
and British standard English fine no ch
change there you'll carry on doing that
because it's a perfectly respectable
accent and dialect but but but if you
let your students go away thinking that
is the only accent and dialect in the
world then you've done them a disservice
but you've got to do is improve their
listening comprehension and reading
comprehension from the very beginning
you've got to expose them to as much of
the variation that exists in English as
it's possible to do now which VAR ities
will you choose of the hundreds that are
out there what will you choose well
that's up to you to decide that's your
main decision you or the institution for
which you will work you'll obviously
choose American English as well as
British English because that's so
obvious I mean because of films and
television and all the rest of it you
have to do that but whether you then
choose to expose your students to South
African English or Australian English or
Indian English will depend very much on
your view as to where these students are
likely to go how often they're likely to
encounter those situations are these
varieties going to be useful and even if
they're not it's worthwhile spending a
little bit of time just dropping them
into a scenario where you've never heard
anything like this before guys and you
just play them a bit of say Indian
English or Nigerian English or something
like this and just let them flounder a
bit and then sort out some of the
differences point to some of the
differences and say notice this notice
this it Tunes the ears you know it gets
them ready ready for difference that's
the point about language change it makes
yourself ready to encounter anything and
forget that old notion that there is
just one kind of thing that you would
want to call correct English now
footnote here that's the philosophy of
the classroom but when you're training
the kids to do the examination
then you have to be a bit more
conservative because examining boards
are notoriously
conservative and you know I wouldn't put
I'm loving it into an exam just yet
implicit in what you're saying is
another challenge for teachers whether
they're teaching now or teaching in the
future how to keep up and bear in mind
they're not linguists with time to
analyze all that's going on how does a
busy teacher keep up with with the
changes in the language and perhaps
changes in pedagogy I've have no
idea I mean this is your problem it's
not mine I thank the Lord every day but
I am not a teacher uh I said in the
lecture just a little while ago you know
if I were in charge of the world I would
want the the world to recognize there
are two most important jobs in the world
the most difficult jobs in the world are
not brain surgery and nuclear physics
and so on they're easy and no the two
big jobs are first of all translating
and interpreting and secondly language
teaching and the reason is
because no aspect of human behavior is
more complex than language it is the
most complex thing you will ever ever do
those of you who have learned two
languages or three or five you've done
the job three or five times over but
think what's coming out of my mouth now
you know 40 odd sounds phonemes whatever
you call them combined into several
hundred syllables superimposed there's
all sorts of intonation and Rhythm and
stress and so on combined into three or
4 thousand grammatical constructions
with how many words 50,000 100,000 words
depending upon the size of your
vocabulary but at least 50,000 words for
average speakers of English and it's all
coming out along with all the politeness
and the discourse features and the
rhetoric and the jokes and so on it's
all there you know and you do it in two
languages or three or five and you know
members 3/4s of the world's population
is bilingual to be monolingual is the
exception around the world and so here
we have a situation and you have to
teach
it well good luck you know and yeah just
briefly your recommendation what
government should do about teacher
salaries oh if I were in charge of the
world yes um the biggest bit of Applause
I got in the lecture in there this
morning was when I said that teachers
salaries should be increased by a factor
of at least four you know four times
amount but that I said I'm not in charge
of the world so that isn't going to
happen but that is the point you know
that kind of complex professionalism
needs to be reflected in salary scales
and all sorts of things and there has to
be time you see that's it you have to
find the time to do effectively the
research into the question well of
course not everybody has to do it if a
group gets together they can hammer out
a syllabus and focus on these Global
differences quite quickly there are
books out there now and and courses
called Global and things of that kind
which are trying to do this for you so
some of the job has already been done
but the job is now much easier than it
was a decade ago and the reason is the
internet so once upon a time if you
decided that you wanted to teach or talk
or expose the students to say South
African English well how would you have
done that apart from going to South
Africa or something these days it's so
easy just type South African English
into Google and up will come the latest
South African newspapers uh the audio
will be there Heck if you really want to
get into South African English you just
call up a school in South Africa and
they will have a Skype interaction with
you and you can hear the thing you know
live it's so easy now all it needs is a
bit of organizing and a bit of money of
course because you've got to get the
equipment and everything but the job is
becoming easier as a result of the
internet it will take a of time but it's
time that you only need to spend once
you know once you've done this basic
work and got the contacts and got your
materials then you'll use it next year
and next year and next year you don't
have to do it twice so I think it's an
initial problem but not a longterm one
[Music]
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