Do You Know How To Read Chinese In Spanish

Sabrina Segal Alumni Experiences Language skills begin in the womb when a fetus's hearing first develops, they begin to listen to the language of their mother. Once the baby is born they recognize their mother tongue. Though, a baby is born with the ability to learn any language and multiple languages. When babies hear a word repeatedly their brain forms neural connections, which is a step towards their speech. The brain of a child is like a sponge. It retains so much information that by the time a child reaches 3 years of age, their brain has formed double the amount of connections that adults have. Young children learn language through simple exposure. It is possible to learn a language later on in life but the process is slower and more difficult. The best time for language...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas At a very early age, I was amazed by the sounds of English. I used to listen to songs in English while one of my parent’s friends was cleaning his car. He used to play them out loud and I wanted to know what the lyrics said. Several years later I had the chance to go to China to be part of a cultural exchange program to learn Chinese. My accepting interview was completely in English rather than Chinese or even my native language Spanish. All paperwork was done in either Spanish or Chinese depending on where I was. Either here in Latin-American or on the other side of the world, the medium of communication was English. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Andres G. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences I have had the opportunity to study several foreign languages, some in a formal setting, some self-taught. Through my personal experiences learning other languages, I have developed some insights into language learning. I would like to describe some of my experienc| ITTT | TEFL Bloges, and some of my thoughts on what I have learned from them, and from this course. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Kim T. My first experience in language learning began at age fourteen with French; by the time I graduated high school I had studied French, German and Spanish as part of my curriculum. The method in use then was ALM, so as a result, I learned language patterns very quickly. However, the only listening materials available were...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Leiya Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Weinan Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. I have had the opportunity to study several foreign languages, some in a formal setting, some self-taught. Through my personal experiences learning other languages I have developed some insights into language learning. I would like to describe some of my experiences, and some of my thoughts on what I have learned from them, and from this course. My first experience in...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Huaxu Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Xi'an Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. English is well on its way to become the dominant global language. Is this a good thing? A language which is spoken internationally is a global language. A living global language has a large number of speakers, a substantial fraction of non-native speakers and has an official status in several countries. A global language is used for example by international...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences As someone of mixed heritage, I have always had an interest in learning about cultures other than the one I live in America. My father is Colombian and my mother is American, so growing up I felt obliged to learn more about the Colombian background I was fairly unfamiliar with. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Catherine P. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. I never felt satisfied with the amount of exposure I had to my Colombian heritage. My mom never learned Spanish, so around the house, it was easier for my dad to speak to my siblings and me in English. As a result, we barely grazed the surface of the Spanish language and we were not exposed too much to the...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences The following blog post is about an ITTT graduate who shares his story on how learning Chinese helped him to become a better English teacher in China. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Joseph S. A common saying imparted to me by one of my professors goes like this: "What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual. What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks only one language? American." I have found this to be extremely true for the majority of cases, and, as a young student, it spurred me to want to learn as much of other languages as I possibly could. I grew up in a monolingual home, however, as a child, I spent much of my time working on my cousin's farm; his...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Huangsha Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Hanzhong Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. A common saying imparted to me by one of my professors goes like this: "What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual. What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks only one language? American." I have found this to be extremely true for the majority of cases, and, as a young student, it spurred...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas A multilingual class is a class where the learners speak a variety of first languages. A monolingual class is a class where all the learners speak the same first language. I have been working in international school setting for over 13 years. The classes are multilingual classes where students come from different cultures and English is the common language for them to communicate with their teachers and classmates. By contrast, English classes in local schools and universities in China are considered to be monolingual classes since the students use their first language, Chinese, to communicate. The teacher has to remind them to not use their mother tongue constantly during class time. Whether monolingual and multilingual, they both have...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences English has undergone many changes since its roots in early Europe. It started out as a Germanic language, and standard word order along with some vocabulary still show German roots in the modern English of today. It went on over the years to incorporate numerous words and suffixes from French during the time that England was invaded and occupied by the Normans in the 11th Century. Its most recent and well-known adoption was from Latin, whose language patterns and vocabulary dominate English. Even today, the language is constantly growing and adapting as it takes on new words from Spanish due to the large Latin American immigrant population in the United States and their great cultural influence over the last century. This post was written by our...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Learning a new language can be nerve-wracking, especially for young learners who experience a great deal of peer pressure and fear of sounding unintelligent in front of their classmates. This fear is something adults learning a new language experience as well. I have personally experienced it as a native English speaker learning Spanish. Therefore, praise from the teacher they view as an expert in the language they’re learning is vital to the learning process in many ways. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Alexandra W. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. I believe praising students is very important. It is essential, however, that the praise teachers give is genuine....  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas My interest in ESL began without the intention of becoming an ESL instructor in the first place. It was mostly born out of curiosity and interest in relocating to a foreign country which at the time (2009) was China. At the time I had been deeply contemplating a career living abroad. The contemplation came more from a cultural motivation than from a financial or career-minded motivation. Throughout my childhood and beyond, my parents were both avid travelers. Both my Mother and Father had spent considerable periods traveling in Asia, East Asia and Central Asia in particular. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Ethan J. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. It was the...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences A language is a tool that allows us to organize our thoughts as well as to communicate. Since language is unable to be separated from our conscious thought, it can be difficult to imagine how another language can function without the use of the core elements that we employ in our own native language. Likewise, it can be difficult to comprehend the function of a language element completely foreign to us. As a teacher, it can be important to understand the peculiarities of English to understand which language elements may be more difficult for the student. Some elements that may be completely new to English learners are the number system, verb tenses, and locative language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Melisa K. Please note...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Pinghe Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Bazhong Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. According to the British council, there are about 373 million native English speakers around the world, and another 500 million speak the language on top of that. At the moment an estimated number of 1 billion people are learning this language and in the future, this number will grow significantly. We are talking about a language that a lot of people speak in this...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Daxing Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Chengdu Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. English should be accepted globally as it’s the second most commonly used language in the world compared to Mandarin Chinese. This is somewhat of a biased response because this is coming from someone who’s born and raised in a country where English is the first language. I would want the world to learn English so that it becomes beneficial and convenient for me...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Grammar is the rules governing the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in a natural language. Simply put, grammar is the general rule of a language. Language is logical; grammar tells us in which order we say words. It’s about how words become phrases; how words and phrases become sentences and how sentences become language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Yang S. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Some of these rules are acquired naturally in childhood while others are acquired in the learning process under the guidance of a teacher. While most of the time, people don’t know which grammatical rule they are following when speaking, they know that what they...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas What do you know about speaking and teaching English? Well, the answer to the first part of the question goes back to early times. I started to study English when I was between ten or eleven years old. I can say that after a few classes, I was already able to say short, simple but probably still inaccurate sentences. However, teaching English appeared as a possible professional job a long time after that. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate marisol b. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. After my high school graduation, I decided to get a university degree in Tourist Business. By that time, my English skills had improved enormously. My Tourism career took me four years to...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences The topic “English As A Global Language” is an interesting one given that people in all the continents of the world are learning the English language to become apt in writing, speaking, reading, and listening even though these different countries have their different languages and mother tongue. At times it’s to the detriment of the languages or the dialects of these countries leading to the disappearance or extinction of some of these languages. This is the case with most African countries where children no longer speak the mother tongue or the dialect but the English language because it’s the language of instruction and socialization in schools. But the question is how or why have the English languages become so powerful and spreading like...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Destinations China is the largest EFL market in the world. Beijing is not only the country capital but also one of the fastest-growing cities in Asia and the world. Beijing is a commercial, educational and cultural hub in China and has a lot to offer to anyone coming to visit. On top of that, Beijing is home to thousands of foreign English teachers, many of whom are not ready to leave and have made the city their permanent home base. Beijing has been the capital throughout many of China’s dynasties resulting in a great number of historic attractions and sites to be explored in the city. The most important historic attraction is probably the Forbidden City, one of the largest palace complexes in the world. Visitors and locals alike also enjoy walks through the iconic...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences The Cambridge English Dictionary defines the word “hindsight” as “the ability to understand an event or situation only after it has happened.” That is why people tell you that “hindsight is a perfect science.” So with the benefit of hindsight and looking back after completing some 220 hours of TEFL training, I see that there are, indeed, several things that I wish that I had known before starting the course, both on the positive and the negative sides. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Desmond V. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Let me start with the positives. First and foremost, I wish that I had come across TEFL or TESOL a lot earlier than I did. Let...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences About the question of why has English become or is perceived to be the current global language, it is important first of all to take a step back and look at some context. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduateJustin S. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. As a schoolboy up to O level, I learned Latin for fourteen years. Although generally speaking, if one wishes to pursue a career in medicine or botany, for example, a broad knowledge of Latin is important as it is still used to this for the classifications and individual plant and animal names. Some might argue that this is an elitist use of the language, but Linnaeus' reasoning appears to have been simply because it had...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Japan is a country with a long history, deep tradition, and vibrant culture. Within this culture sits the Japanese language. At first, being a spoken language and then adopting the Chinese Writing System, Japanese has grown and changed into what it is today. If you look at all languages, most Western languages originate from a set family, such as Romance Languages (which became today’s Spanish, French, Italian, etc). But Japanese (as most Asian languages) was formed from entirely different roots. These fundamental differences mean that the method of learning these languages has a lot to do with memorization and repetitive practice of the Chinese symbols and the words they represent. Which means it is difficult to find any common ground between it...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas In my experience with teaching Chinese students, most pronounce the unvoiced ‘TH’ sound correctly. To account for the difference in sound between the unvoiced ‘TH’ and the voiced ‘TH’, most students seem to have developed the habit of placing their tongue either on the back of their front teeth or on the roof of the mouth immediately behind the front teeth to create a plosive ‘TH’ sound which sounds most closely like and’ sound. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Michael D. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. The student cannot correct the problem if they do not understand that there is a problem. Many students do not seem to realize that their...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Learning a second language can feel like stepping into a whole new world compared to the way you learned your first language. When you learn your first language, you take in that language in a very natural and organic way compared to the way you might obtain your second language. The first language you learn is what you hear from infancy as you grow up, as it’s the language you hear at home, on tv, at school and etc. And your second language will mostly be something you are taught in classroom which is not the same type of experience that you get from learning in your actual living environment. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Mandrell C. When you grow up using your native tongue you are not just in taking the right way to...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Whether you like English or despise it, the English language is here to stay. There is no stronger contender right now as a global language, other than English. But how did this happen, why is English now the dominant language in Education, Business and the Media. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Iain Hamilton-G. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Well in this essay I am not going to rewrite a history lesson about the global rise of the English language, many sources can provide a far more detailed explanation about it. However, what I intend to write here is from my own experiences and how I naturally became a crusader of the English Language and also my own...  [Read more]

Ron Borland Alumni Experiences When I think back to my time teaching English in Chile, I can say that it has been an awesome experience for me because of how wonderful it can be to share one’s native language with someone else. Probably the best thing about it was to see the others in gaining their experience overall in adapting to the new way of thinking. I know I had my troubles as I had to teach sometimes in Spanish what the rule was in English. For that, I relied on the help of other teachers to help with some of the grammar. When I think back to how it all started, I remember being asked to help at a local fitness center to help with swim lessons. But since I had such a knowledge of English from my years of reading and writing over the years, I was also asked to help with the...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Since my childhood, I have been frequently asked the same question "what kind of teacher do you want?" At different life stages, I have different answers. When I was a kid, I would say a teacher who dresses neatly and smiles nicely; when I was a teenager, I would prefer a "cool" teacher as a good teacher, who behaves differently from other boring and stereotyping adults; until I grow up, I think a good teacher should have sound subject knowledge, be fair and consistent with all of the students as well as being sensitive to the students’ reactions and providing necessary support, and until now I know being a good teacher has nothing to do with his/her appearances and dressings. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Feifei W....  [Read more]

Jon ITTT Destinations A TEFL qualification allows you to teach English almost anywhere in the world, some countries are more popular than others for differing reasons. Some are popular because of the salary and benefits offered to teachers, others are popular because they offer a better quality of life and others are popular because they provide teachers with plenty of opportunities. The top most popular countries are all in Asia as the demand for English is so much higher here than elsewhere in the world. China, the first country, has the largest demand for English teachers in the world and an abundance of teaching jobs for newly qualified and experienced TEFL teachers alike. As such, salaries and benefits vary considerably, but experienced and qualified teachers can expect good pay...  [Read more]

Mark Crocker TEFL Information Alumni Experiences The 20th century brought in its wake the concept of globalization, changing the dynamics of the world to what we have come to know it as today. As the world continues to move towards becoming a grand global village, many countries, people and things which once seemed so far out of reach are now more readily available and closer to home. Undoubtedly, with the advent of globalization, communication has become paramount to the ways in which we share knowledge and gather or receive information. Why? Because without this, humans will have a much more challenging time building relationships with others be it for economic, social or spiritual gains (just to name a few). This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Deidre-Ann J. In a...  [Read more]

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Jinhaozhuang Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Liaocheng Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. There are many factors that can influence the way you feel about learning or even engaging into new worlds (languages), they are following and I will categorize them into 5 groups. As we ascend further into discussion about each and every one of them i must warn you that this is my perspective of seeing things as i feel them. Number one : "Fear" This...  [Read more]