As you've taught in lots of different places and
you mentioned the university
can you talk about why you stopped teaching at the university?
Yeah
It seemed to me, in the last few years I was teaching there
I realised that
the style, the methodology of teaching languages, in the university, in schools in general
is a bit traditional, right, and I didnt like that way of teaching
because they teach languages like they teach maths or physics, like another subject
with knowledge, right
it's thought that if you want to learn German, or Russian
you need to comprehend the rules, like you comprehend physics
and languages are different, a language is an ability, a practical ability
it's like,
it's like learning to swim, or to ride a bike or play the piano
obviously you need a basic theoretical base
but really it's practice, its practice and making mistakes
to learn to ride a bike, the first few times you're going to fall and lose your balance
and you're going to go slow, it's normal
and it's something you have to practice
In the university,
mistakes are penalised, so if you make a mistake
if you want to learn German, and you make mistakes, they penalise you, they mark you down
and it's a contradiction with how i think we should learn languages
You can't penalise people for the errors because it's harmful
because you finish your studies,
not only do you not speak the language well, but you have in your mind,
a tonne of ideas, you're thinking that,
every time you make a mistake you're stupid
or it's a really big problem, or
or it's ridiculous or terrible
and there's a lot of students that have that idea, in fact
for a while I was giving private lessons
in London, I was going to banks and offices etc
and it was interesting because
every time the students made a mistake,
it was automatic, they would say, in English,
"Oh I'm sorry"
and some said "Oh I'm so stupid"
So I think that, I don't know maybe I'm wrong, but I think that it's like a mentality
that they've created in the schools, not just in England but in general
that if you make a mistake it's because you're,
because you're stupid or it's something terrible, and it's something that
I don't know, I dont like that system you know?
I'm talking in general
of course there are amazing teachers and fantastic schools
That's the problem
fundamentally languages shouldnt be considered like another subject
like
learning physics or geography, because it's not knowledge, it's practical