My English students LOVE idioms. I think they would be OK if I started teaching just those and not much else. I am not sure that would be very good curriculum, but it would get me out of having to teach grammar. The book I teach is a communication/conversation course and so obviously you have to include a bit of the dreaded grammar in there, too. Today it is on relative clauses. One of my recent lessons included gerunds and if I am gonna be honest, I don't remember every hearing that word and I am still not exactly sure how to explain what that is. I am sure I studied it years ago, but I had to sit and study in preparation yesterday. I even had to get a lesson from one of the Khmer teachers so that I could understand. Have I mentioned that I am not a fan of grammar? It does not equal my dislike for math, but it is up there. I am very grateful that this part of the lesson was a review of things they have learned already so I wasn't teaching it to them for the very first time. I just read the sentences from the book, had them repeat after me to work on pronunciation, and then happily went on.
Grammar is just something that I innately know how to use, but I can't explain the rules. I am asked a lot of questions because it would serve to reason that since I am a native English speaker, I should understand all these rules and terms and exceptions. Sorry, friends, I do not. I can tell you if something is grammatically correct or not, but not always the "why" behind it. My students are very gracious when I smile a bit embarrassingly and tell them "I don't know, but I can find out for you." I do appreciate how eager they are to learn and improve in their language skills. They practice and are faithful to learn.
I could learn a few things from them...practicing language and being faithful to learn. I have been here in Cambodia for nine months and I should be speaking a lot more Khmer than I do. I hear it all the time and am not completely lost in the world around me. I understand some...but it should definitely be more. I get some of the words and can piece together the main idea of what is being said. People say things or ask me questions in Khmer and I respond in English. I joke that I am being self-less, allowing them to practice their English skills. And while that may be the result, that is certainly not the motivation. I am a bit of a perfectionist and do not really enjoy looking foolish. There is no graceful way to learn a language. You sound foolish. You stumble over words. You mispronounce. You WILL be laughed at. You make mistakes in grammar. You "say" things you had no intention of saying. I once asked someone to make sure the guard opened the gate for me at 6:45 the next morning and they somehow got that I was asking for someone to make me breakfast at 6:45 the next morning. Those words sound NOTHING alike and I never mentioned anything about food, but that is what they got. Luckily the cook was informed of the mix up before actually making me breakfast (...or maybe that is unfortunate). There have been more embarrassing mispronunciations than that, but suffice it to say, there are some words I try to avoid saying just so that I won't accidently say the wrong one.
No comments:
Post a Comment