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Teach English in Zhaidian Zhen - Yuncheng Shi

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Zhaidian Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Yuncheng Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.

English is considered a global language. But what is a global language actually? Aren’t Chinese and Spanish global languages too? First there is no official definition of ‘global’ or ‘world’ language, but it is commonly agreed to refer to a language that is learned and spoken internationally. It is characterized not only by the number of its native and second language speakers, but also in how many countries it is spoken and its use in international organizations and politics. A global language acts as a common language that enables people from diverse backgrounds and ethnicities to communicate on an equal ground. In this essay I want to investigate the English language as a global language. There are more than 50 countries that use English as their official or primary language. Some of these countries are the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Ireland,… There are 840 million people who can speak English around the world. Whether as a native language or as a second language. Research shows that 350 million people are native speakers and that 430 million people speak English as a second language. There are about 1.3 billion Chinese speakers and the vast majority of them native speakers. Spanish is used by 409 million people, 400 million as native speakers and 9 million as a second language. English might not have the most native speakers or not even the most speakers in general but people all over the world won’t start studying and speaking Chinese just to communicate with one another. One reason for that might be the fact that English is a much easier language to learn instead of Spanish or Chinese. For example, you do not have to study complicated characters like in Japanese or Chinese and there is no grammatical gender like in German. English is the most taught language in nearly every country. Most schools offer English as a second language. Certainly here in Europe. Apart from school people get in touch with English through the internet, news, music, movies, video games,… That is how I got introduced to English. English is considered the language of music. If you look at the Billboard Music Charts nearly every song is English spoken apart from some Spanish or French songs. Some foreign languages such as Korean are on the rise in the music world but nothing will ever beat English spoken songs. Before I learnt English at school, I learnt it through video games. Back in the day video games were rarely translated into your own mother tongue. My mother tongue is Dutch. Out of all the games I played only one or two were translated. All the other video games were in English. I had to fight my way through all these weird words and sentences to understand and finally play my game. Sooner or later I could understand and speak it. I even started communicating with other people online. As I have said before people from diverse backgrounds who speak different languages need a common ground to communicate with one another. That’s where the English language comes in. Two individuals who each speak another language but cannot speak the native language of the other will communicate in a language that is understood by both. Most of the time that language is English. I can relate to this too. I have several online friends and we have different mother tongues. We talk to each other in English. This is also a good way to practice English. The only way to converse is by using a language that is understood by and feels comfortable to both. So why is English considered a global language? English enables different people all over the world to communicate with one another. It is the most widespread language throughout our globe. The English language is the most taught language nearly everywhere and is easy to learn for many people. Apart from a global language it is also the language of music. All in all English is a beautiful and important language that brings people together. Sources: -, -, ’Chinese language’, internet, 2019-07-14, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_language) -, -, ‘Spanish language’, internet, 2019-07-14, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_language) -, -, ’The hot 100’, internet, 2019-07-14, (https://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100) -, -, ‘How English became the global language’, internet, 2019-07-14, (https://englishlive.ef.com/blog/english-in-the-real-world/english-became-global-language/) -, -, ‘Language teaching on the rise, English still dominates’, internet, 2019-07-14, (https://www.euractiv.com/section/languages-culture/news/language-teaching-on-the-rise-english-still-dominates/)


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