Posts Tagged ‘Humour’

“…great powers do not go to war against other heavily armed great powers just to settle… linguistic rivalries” (more…)

Here are some actual sentences taught in the Lonely Planet Korean phrasebook which, while not quite “My hovercraft is full of eels”, tickled me once I realised that trying to find silliness was another whole motivation for using language learning materials. If it doesn’t amuse you so much first off (and you don’t have the more sensible motivation of learning Korean), try picturing saying these things to immigration or the receptionist in your hotel:

p’ibu e t’ongjung-i issoyo = I have a pain in my skin
 
maengjangul umjigilsuga opsoyo = I can’t move my appendix

chon changnogyo indeyo, kohoenun chal annagayo = I’m a Presbyterian, but I’m not practicising

imshinjung ishin-gayo? = (more…)

What elements of your dreams tell you about your TEFLing future:

Suddenly realising you have no clothes on - you will realise halfway through your next improvised grammar explanation that it doesn’t make any sense
 
Water - You will desperately need to go for a pee halfway through your first lesson the next day
 
Falling and falling then waking up - you will be rescued from a difficult question by the end of lesson bell
 
Doing the same thing over and over - your school will again refuse to switch to New Headway next year, even though the rest of the world is on the Third Edition
 
A cold wind - you will walk into class with your flies open

Being chased - one of your housewife students (more…)

Innateness hypothesis- The theory that studying English is inherently boring, so why bother with games. See also “Inaneness hypothesis”*

Input- The theory that the language we expose students to should be as carefully chosen as when programming a computer or doing data input, although most experts agree that the metaphor works best if we picture the teacher trying to type with a couple of sledge hammers

Input enhancement- Using a gold plated jack on the classroom tape recorder

Intercambio de Lenguas- Spanish for “exchanging tongues”, often involving conversation exchange and its more literal translation

Interface- Also known as “innerface”, the internal cringing (more…)

45. ”Our incompetent teachers will make you feel better about yourself”
46. ”Certificate of achievement for all students who are actually still around at the end of the course”
47. ”Guaranteed students who are a much higher level in each class to explain anything the teacher can’t”
48. ”To guarantee an English-only class, we only employ teachers who have been here for years without learning a word of the language”
49. ”Guaranteed smaller class sizes by the end of term 1″ (more…)

1. “Officially the blondest teachers of any school in Japan/ China/ Taiwan etc”
2. “We’ve never changed because we are perfect”
3. “Come and see the new batch of teachers, fresh off the plane”
4. “The youth of our teachers makes up for the age of our building/ methodology/ technology/ wallpaper/ receptionists etc” (more…)

If you don’t believe me, before you buy one of language courses for just 100 dollars* have a free trial of one of our other “…in just three months” ® courses, for example:
- Anyone can learn to run 100 metres in 10 seconds in just three months
- Anyone can learn good taste in just three months
- Anyone can learn to speak in a squeaky or ridiculously gruff voice without being embarrassed in just three months
- Anyone can learn to accept a language that assumes different gender roles in just three months
- Anyone can gain a Meryl Streep- like ability to mimic accents in just three months
- Anyone can learn to settle down for self-study every evening rather than turning on the TV in just three months
- Anyone can train themselves to learn something just because they are told to in just three months
- Anyone can become charismatic in just three months
- Anyone can overcome memory loss in just three months
- Anyone can expand their vocabulary in their own language by 5000 words in just three months
- Anyone can learn perfect pitch in just three months
- Anyone can become interested in inane chatter at house parties in just three months
- Anyone can train themselves to prefer books and films they don’t understand in just three months
- Anyone can learn to abandon Hollywood films and news from back home in favour of knowledge of the local obscure culture in just three months
- Anyone can stop preferring a good book to pointless small talk with strangers in just three months
- Anyone can learn delayed gratification in just three months
- Anyone can lose the desire to express complex thoughts in just three months
- Anyone can overcome their natural human weaknesses in just three months
- Anyone can learn to relate to people who they have nothing in common with in just three months
- Anyone can drop all their cultural baggage in just three months
- Anyone can learn to be word perfect in reciting a 5000 word book in just three months
- Anyone can reverse their ideas of what it means to be polite and impolite in just three months
- Anyone can learn to prefer vocabulary lists to ice cream or sex in just three months
- Anyone can learn how to never give up on something once they have started it in just three months
- Anyone can learn never to doubt the usefulness of what you are being taught in just three months
- Anyone can learn to sustain an interest in something they chose on a whim in just three months
- Anyone can learn to reverse all their normal body language in just three months
- Anyone can learn to never be distracted in just three months
- Anyone can learn to resist all temptations that could get in the way of studying in just three months
- Anyone can learn to never think of excuses for procrastination in just three months
- Anyone can learn enough Physics to enter an undergraduate course in just three months
- Anyone can learn to be a saint in just three months
- Anyone can find a meaning to life in just three months
- Anyone can learn to be a perfect parent in just three months
- Anyone can drop all their annoying personal habits in just three months
- Anyone can learn to enjoy studying in just three months
- Anyone can learn to stop asking for colour, decent illustrations, lack of typos and other reasonable production standards in their self-study materials in just three months
- Anyone can learn how to spot an outrageously ambitions claim for self-study materials in just three minutes
- Anyone can learn to stop trusting a newspaper that has advertorials for this kind of crap in just three seconds

* Price of monthly payment when paying for the course in the usual 360 monthly instalments

1. Only write in phonemic script
If you have to teach everyone else the script before they can read your will, medical reports etc, all the better!
 
2. Limit everything you write to Elementary level vocabulary
i.e. make sure your diary, wedding speech, job application letter, thesis, suicide note etc only use the simplest 300 English words
 
3. Never forget your worst lessons
There is no better way of motivating you to improve your future lessons than re-experiencing the embarrassment, discomfort and humiliation of the time when 20 minutes of Silent Way miming was met with silent stares then one student asking “Can we check our homework now?” If you don’t naturally have the kind of personality that dwells on such experiences, you could try and organize a teaching confessions workshop
 
4. Become a Buddhist
Not, as you might think, to help you relax through meditation (feeling paranoid about your next class is a great motivator), (more…)

Sandy MacManus, who turned 72 on Friday and will be confirmed this week as the oldest first-time TEFL World President nominee in history, has shot himself in the foot while attempting to inject some youth and a feminine touch into his flagging presidential campaign by choosing some 23 year old random posh bird, a self-confessed “jolly hockey-sticks, like my Mum” with a degree in Women’s Studies from Exeter University as his running mate. A source as close to Sandy as anyone could bear to get said that in private he gave his reason as “I’ve been out of the country too long and don’t know how to deal with those scary English women anymore, so I didn’t know how to say no.”

This is a historic day, however, as for the first time it is certain that there will be a female or a carrot top in the TEFL Presidential Office (”the White Room”)* next year
TEFL World Presidents through history: 

W D Minor
Wilfrid Owen
Rex Harrison
Dick Van Dyke- for his amazing ability with accents
Sean Connery- ditto
Mario Rinvolucri’s beard (he was in a delicate time in therapy at the time, and not talking to the rest of his face)
Sandy MacManus (disputed/ retired)
*Actually, the second cubicle from the left in the 3rd floor toilets  

Positive messages to chant to yourself in front of the mirror or record on your iPod include:

1. “I will make my students love English so much that they cry when they can’t come to class”
2. “Having no money is good for my karma and the environment”
3. “I am totally psyched about teaching adverbs of frequency”
4. “The Present Perfect Continuous is all part of God’s great but mysterious plan” (more…)