Monolingual Ruins the Trick

Monolingual Ruins The Trick

So you speak English-only, right?

By Sydney Weng

One of the first few things you’ll encounter in a SLA (Second Language Acquisition) course is that it is generally ideal to have bilingual instructors rather than monolingual ones. Which is why it is particularly bemusing for me to read comments that seem to elevate monolingual native speakers of English and put down non-native-speaking English teachers on Facebook forums for English Teachers in Taiwan.

Surely, if you didn’t at least read something about SLA you must have realized after ‘years and years’ of experience that being a native speaker doesn’t guarantee effective teaching methods. It simply means that you speak relatively fluent English than those who haven’t mastered the language. It also proves that unlike your bilingual peers, you probably do not have the faintest idea on what the brain has to go through when acquiring a foreign language. Nor do you understand how grammar from the first language may affect acquisition of the second language. Thus attesting to the fact that monolingual native speakers are more likely suited for children who are prepped for successive early bilingualism than students with other needs.

Unfortunately, Taiwan is by no means anywhere near providing curriculums or programs that ensure early bilingualism for children under the age of seven.

There are two main trends that dominate ESL classrooms in Taiwan at the moment. The most dominant one includes institutions and programs that focus on student performance in standardized tests, while the second most dominant trend features classrooms that aim to provide immersive teaching environments for children under the age of seven. The former features bilingual teaching methods and is widely implemented in public and private institutions. The latter favors monolingual teaching methods and targets children who are young enough to learn language with both hemispheres of the brain.

That being said, it’s rather obvious that the necessity for native speakers mostly exist in monolingual classrooms for children ‘under the age of seven’. Yet, if we take a closer look at the resources and hours put into implementing immersive learning environments in Taiwan, one may realize that very few institutions actually do provide programs that ensure effectiveness through a concentrated and secluded environment for students to gradually absorb the emotional and cultural nuances in a foreign language. Thus, allowing us to reexamine the paranoid obsession over favoring native speakers over non-native speakers in any ESL classroom.

It’s incredibly true that many bilingual or ESL instructors do not speak flawless English. It is also painstakingly unfortunate that SLA teaching standards in Taiwan are shamefully low for both bilingual and monolingual classrooms. Plenty of TESOL-trained instructors can barely string a simple sentence while a lot of native speakers speak worse English than professionally trained and experienced bilingual teachers. Nonetheless, the purpose of my argument is not to contradict hardworking and qualified teachers or to fuss over who makes the least grammar mistakes, but to invite an understanding that native speakers aren’t always the most ideal choice when it comes to hiring ESL instructors.  Or even so, to point out that monolingual native speakers are the least ideal for teaching English as a Second language.

Growing up in the so-called ‘bu-xi-ban (cram-school)’ industry for two decades of my life has taught me two things about being an ESL (English as a Second Language) instructor: 1) Your nationality or mother-tongue has nothing to do with with your effectiveness as an instructor. It’s mostly based on effort and experience. 2) If you happen to be white and come from a country where English is the official language, people assume you’re qualified to ‘teach English’.

The result of these choices often lead to a stubborn preference over Canadians, Americans or British citizens with a polished Oxford accent. In many cases, a lot of these ‘teachers’ do not have much experience in acquiring a second language themselves. Let alone understanding the lexical and syntactic struggles native speakers of Mandarin suffer from while learning English. This is completely understandable because English can literally get you anywhere in the world. Furthermore, as long as there is one person in the room incapable of communicating in anything but English, it is often considered polite in Taiwan to drop the Mandarin and start speaking in English.

A lot of parents or students are under the impression that hiring someone with a passport from the UK or the US ensure them with a qualified English instructor. Unfortunately, blue passports don’t guarantee good teachers . Those come with time spent training, money spent on degrees and a general ability to communicate effectively. By ignorantly endorsing ‘stereotypically foreign-looking’ native speakers for the sake of speaking relatively ‘proper English’ not only discourages experienced bilingual teachers, but also invites racism and supremacy in the industry.

The problems with bilingualism, where many tend to nit-pick on, is that for those who fall into the category of ‘early bilingualism’ often go through systematic glitches where their brain borrows words or phrases from both mother-tongues, thus creating an illusion of imperfect grammar. Those who are part of the ‘late bilingualism’ group may suffer from occasional grammar mistakes when producing authentic content. In spite of these minor misgivings, which can be avoided with hard-working class-prep, bilinguals are a lot more capable of introducing a second language to a student due to their inherent knowledge on both languages. Thus providing them with the advantage to further explain, pinpoint and solve problems most ESL students encounter while learning a second language.

So for the parents who have trust issues with experienced bilingual teachers and monolingual native English speakers who have the intrinsic need to act as grammar nazis to belittle non-native speakers: There are many things to consider beyond ‘flawless’ grammar. So before one shoots a comment like “perhaps you should teach your own native language”, think again, because teaching is a process of communicating and problem-solving. If an instructor’s only attribute and value to the classroom is ‘proper grammar’, it’s best we turn to Siri instead. I bet you she’s smarter than the most of us.