For those of you for whom English is your second language

How did you go about learning it? Like what did you find to be difficult about the language? What helped you learn it? And what do you suggest to those who are trying to learn it?

A friend of mine wants me to tutor them in English but I don't exactly know how to go about doing it because I learned English like any other native English speaker. Trying to explain some concepts to non-native speakers is pretty difficult for me when there aren't equivalent concepts in their native tongue that I can draw parallels between and also because English is so natural to me that I don't even think about why things are spoken the way they are. They've always just been that way for me.

 

Spanish is my native language. I learned English thanks to an English teacher in elementary, but I don't remember exactly what she did.

 

Do they wanna learn it spoken or written, primarily?

 

Both but at the moment, we're just going to focus on writing and reading because she wants to learn English more for academia. She plans to write some research papers and there are certain parts that have to be written in a foreign language and she decided to go with English.

 

talk to them only in gibberish.

 

Begin with the familiar (in terms of grammar/syntax/etc.) to get them a grounding in the language and then you can flesh out focusing on the differences, perhaps. It can give them a good basis. Vocabulary helps. Conversations with them would also be extremely helpful as it would let them think in the language more easily.

 

Just expose them to a lot of English, it's the best way to learn. I learned how to speak English by watching English telly shows and writing English by being on here. Actually, I learned the basics of writing at school, but I improved it quite a bit on here. Then you just have some professional fix the rough edges, and in a couple of years you have a natural!

 

Basically, what C said. I' m affraid the basics have to be learned the boring way (grammar, irregular verbs ...), but once I got that behind me watching movies or playing games was much funnier for me so I learned quicker that way. I started watching everything in English, with English subs (French subs would have ruined the point) until I figured out I didn' t need the subs anymore.

But then I' m an intuitive learner and I have a good memory. I Iearned how to write just by reading a lot, but for some people that' s not enough. I' ve seen What? joke about French' s deep orthography, but it looks like English is even worse in that regard : http://www.dundee.ac.uk/psychology/external/

Unfortunately there' s no universally "good" method to teach a language, you should attempt different approaches, try to make it fun, and see what sticks. If your "student" is not familiar enough with English yet to bypass translations entirely then I suggest to make him read/watch/play something he loves and already went through numerous times in his own language, he might be surprised by the amount of jokes or nuances that weren' t translated.

 

It always surprises me when some people on here say English isn't their native language. I've nothing to offer on how to teach it, though. I'm worthless when it comes to foreign languages, hah.

 

I learned the language with video games, TV and books.

In 5th grade everyone was amazed with my English skills (I was also surprised with how people couldn't speak English, but it really depends on the person).

And I'm gonna go to university next year to become an English teacher :D

 

More importantly, why do you all speak better English than most people who were born into the language?

 

Victory of the internet grammar nazis?

 

If they were victorious, idiots wouldn't exist in the area of language.

 

Because they want to learn?

 

Thanks for the advice, guys.

Because while native English speakers learn the language by growing up with it, they also learn the spoken informal language first which usually breaks some rules but it is still understood by the majority and then they learn the grammatically correct and formal version of their language in school. Since they're already more accustomed to speaking informally, they stick with it and only speak formally when necessary. A non-native speaker usually learns it the other way around. They learn the formal version first to understand how the new language works and since it's the first thing they learned, they're more accustomed to it and they stick with it. Like a lot of my friends who are learning English don't use contractions, don't use slang or idioms and try to speak as properly as they possibly can and whenever I talk with them, they have difficulty understanding me because I don't talk like that at all. This doesn't only apply to English either. Native speakers of any language tend to speak very informally as well.

 

I don't know what is the primary language of that friend of yours.. depending which english can be easier or not.

But from all languages that I have some notion english is the easiest so If he/she is surrounded by it, eventually your friend will learn, there aren't that many "flexion to gender in substantives", I found more troublesome to teach an american why does the word chair is female in portuguese as It doesn't have sex.

My tips are: Teach the verbs -> To be, and "Get" (all uses, get up, get down, get over here, get going, get it, etc...), give your friend some notion of grammar, show your friend movies with subtitles, first in his/hers language than only in english. Even after I learned english I couldn't understand what some people were saying or singing (the hardest thing).