English Teacher Workshop ~ January 30, 2018
<< Sean’s website to help to you study English: www.seanlaurence.com >>
- Pronunciation: word stress and question intonation in English
- How to speak naturally in English and some common mistakes that Vietnamese may have in English communication
- How to teach English through English and encourage children to speak English
A few things to remember about this workshop –
- This is an interactive workshop. Ask questions or share your thoughts anytime. This workshop is for your improvement.
- Share your knowledge with each other. If you have an idea about teaching or speaking English, please share it.
- Making mistakes is ok. It’s better to make one now instead of in the classroom. Learning from your mistakes is powerful.
8:30-9:00 – Work in two groups. Read the paragraph that you prepared out loud. Andrew and Sean will help you.
9:00-9:40 – Andrew and Sean will talk about word stress, question intonation, how to speak naturally and some common mistakes Vietnamese people make.
9:40-10:00 – Sean will talk about how to teach English through English and encourage children to speak English.
10:00-10:30 – Practice, questions and discussion.
* Word Stress *
Unvoiced versus voiced plural sounds [ KS (parks), TS (cats), PS (groups) vs. DZ (friends), GZ (dogs), SZ (classes) ]
* Question Intonation *
Rising or falling intonation. Rising intonation for yes/no questions. Falling intonation for any other questions.
* How to Speak Naturally *
Listen Carefully – Take the time to listen to yourself speak English. When you are child you learned Vietnamese from your parents and teachers. When speaking English, sometimes you will combine Vietnamese and English together. The sounds of the Vietnamese language are inserted into the English you are speaking. Changing your old speech habits takes time. Listen to native English speakers carefully and copy how they speak.
Vinglish – Sometimes when speaking English, you take some of the principles and rules from Vietnamese and put them into English. English has a different set of rules and principles that is really different than Vietnamese.
Wrong: “My brother is studying in German.” / Right: “My brother is studying in Germany”.
Wrong: “I’m a Vietnamese.” / Right: “I’m Vietnamese.”
Wrong: “I’m from Hanoi City.” / Right: “I’m from Hanoi.”
Practice with native speakers – Teachers should always be improving themselves. Find an online language partner to video chat with. Use websites like InterPals and My Language Exchange to find a language partner. Set up a schedule to meet with them regularly. Choose a topic to talk with them about before you meet.
Don’t think of yourself as a English learner – Think of yourself as an English SPEAKER! The right attitude can make the difference between failure and success. Stop thinking of yourself as someone who is learning English, and start thinking of yourself as someone who speaks English. It’s a small change, but it will make you feel more confident and help you to use the English you already know more effectively.
Start thinking in English – You need to start thinking in English. If you want to say the word “apple” in English, for example, right now you probably think of the word in Vietnamese, and then try to think of the correct word in English. Instead, try imagining a picture of an apple, and then just think the English word “apple”. Real fluency happens when you stop mentally translating conversations.
* Common Mistakes *
Not knowing that you’re making a mistake – Be aware that you might be making a pronunciation mistake and not know it. For example, say the sentence “It means a lot to me.” Sometimes you will misplace the S sound in the word “means”. You will move it to the word “it”. In your head it sounds like you are saying it correctly but when a native speaker of English listens to you, they can hear your mistake.
Asking questions the right way – Be careful to ask questions correctly. Most questions start with the question word (can, do, does, who, what, etc). For example, “You can speak Vietnamese”. This is not the right way to ask if someone can speak Vietnamese. You should say, “Can you speak Vietnamese?”.
How to use the word “meant” – When you make speaking mistakes in English (big or small mistakes), you will often repeat what you just said but without the mistake. Sometimes you can try many times to say the right word or sentence in English. Instead of repeating, you can say “What I meant to say was…” or “I meant…”.
Word Order – Here are 3 examples of word order:
* How to Teach English through English *
* How to Encourage Children to Speak English *
Feedback ~ What did you learn? What can we do differently next time? What did you find most useful? What did you find least useful? Please answer any of these questions and/or share your thoughts about the workshop. It helps us improve the workshop. You can send me a message on Facebook or email me. My email address is: firstname.lastname@example.org