It's happened. I have been toeing the line with it ever since high school. I swore it would never be me, that I'd seen too much of the ugly side to every put myself in that situation. My will was too weak however. Too weak to save myself from the tumbling abyss that I tripped into, not knowing I was falling until now...it's too late. I'm teaching.
It seemed so innocent at first, so simple. Hey Steven, my friend is looking for someone to speak English with her for and hour and a half every week. She doesn't want to work on vocab or grammar or anything difficult. She just needs a speaking partner to build confidence and fluency. Up until this point in the conversation I was skeptical but considering. She'll pay you $50 every session. Alright you talked me into it.
So we met last night for our first session. I should have known better than this of course. No one pays fifty dollars for conversation. Not even Whoopi Goldberg is that desperate for friends. We began talking:
ME: "So, are you studying at a university?"
HJ: "Yes. Dentistry."
ME: "That's pretty cool. Do you have nice teeth? You have to have nice teeth if you're going to be a dentist."
HJ: "No."
ME: "Hmm. Well, where do you go to school?"
HJ: "Seoul National University."
ME: "How about in a full sentence?"
HJ: "To Seoul National University."
It went on like this for more than an Hour and a half. Ridiculous? Oh yes. It didn't take long before I felt like there wasn't a topic left in the world! I can make small talk pretty effectively. I'm not the master by any means, but I learned from the master. You'd think that I could babble for an hour and a half every week no problem, but this chick didn't want to offer anything!
To make matters worse/more stressful she paid me in advance for four sessions worth. For starters I left the coffee shop trying to look like the least muggable person on the whole subway. To top it off now I feel as though I really have to succeed and prepare for these lessons and make this girl a master English speaker. Though she didn't want to, we talked some grammar and vocabulary since this girl doesn't recognize three and four syllable words nor does she use any grammar construction outside of the standard S+V+O.
She does in fact have homework and I will be ready for her next week, but man it caught me off guard. As of yet I hadn't really encountered someone so poor in English and so embarrassed to speak it. It's not as though everyone else in the coffee shop was speaking English; I was the only white guy. Even if her English was terrible (and it was) she would have been impressive, but she wanted to speak as little as physically possible given all the prodding for conversation I was doing. She much preferred to use her dictionary and write things down, I habit which I quickly caught on to and prohibited. She also told me that next time she would prepare things to talk about. ????? Preparation is all fine and well, but this is "free talking" class. You won't have time to prepare in real conversation, so memorizing an anecdote isn't getting her anywhere. Oh well, I've got some ideas up my sleeve I suppose. Any suggestions Oh Seasoned Ones? Mom? Ren? JohnJasonBush?
Okay, here's my suggestion. Giving her homework is a great idea. She definitely needs to practice but a context will help her to stay focused. What would she like to be able to talk about easily? Probably herself, her family, her interests. Beginning her will allow her to become more fluent in asking questions about others and understanding their discussion of themselves. Choose one topic per week and ask her to prepare to answer the basics about that topic, to prepare questions that would keep the flow of conversation (definitely a skill she is lacking). Allow her to prepare a vocabulary list in advance - but limit it to 10-15 words that are pertinent to the topic. Let me know how it goes.
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