TEFL McEwensville Pennsylvania

Teaching english in japan is fun and rewarding, but does have its share of difficulties. A few of the biggest problems for japanese people are the english language itself, the simplicity of japanese pronunciation, and the modest culture japanese people live by. english is a very difficult language to learn, even for native speakers. It comes with rules, but also many exceptions to the rules. There are numerous grammatical, spelling and pronunciation inconsistencies. Starting with very basic sentence structure, english starts to get complicated very quickly. There are many parts to sentences, and they aren't always used in the same order. Verb tenses in english are irregular and difficult to learn, for example “go, going, gone, went.” For many verb conjugations the only way to learn the tenses is just to memorize them- some don't follow any rule or logic. There are many different ways to form plurals of words. It's no wonder we have spelling competitions at so many levels in our country, as there seem to be more exceptions to our spelling then there are rules. Words like “through, cough, photograph, and school are a few examples. How about the plural of “bus?” “Buses,” pronounced like “fusses,” (as in “a toddler fusses,”) not “fuses” (as in “I blew two fuses in my breaker box.”) A few very troublesome pronunciation issues are any where the pronunciation of words with “l” and “r” come into play, like “rice” vs. “lice,” and the “th” sound, which often comes out sounding like an “s.” japanese people also often have trouble making a “b” and “v” sound different. Words that are spelled the same or similarly, but are quite different in meaning are also tricky in english, such as “wind,” “quite” and “quiet,” and “kitchen” and “chicken.” In the japanese language, there are only a limited number of sounds represented by both the written language and spoken words. Pronunciation is very predictable and regular. Although people from various areas of japan might have some amount of noticeable accent, others can understand them easily. This is not the same in regards to english. For example, British english speakers sound considerably different then people from the united states. We spell some words differently as well. When japanese people use foreign words, they often “spell” them using Katakana, which supports the same sounds as other japanese written languages. This pre-exposure to english words, but pronounced using only japanese familiar sounds- doesn't help! The culture within japan does not lend to foreign language learning, for a few reasons. One big reason is modesty. Many japanese people, especially men, simply don't want to practice saying anything they might say incorrectly. Classrooms are expected to be quiet, students are obedient and silent. The idea of several students (as in small group activities) talking at once is sometimes frowned on in established schools. Another factor is that men and women speak using different words and tones in japan. How does this transfer to english? Students also are very aware and concerned about social status issues, and may not want to talk about their family's social standing, their hometown, schools they attended, their parent's jobs, etc.