Including Taiwan? :roflmao:
Including Taiwan? :roflmao:[/quote]
Well you see funkymonkey I keep meeting all these English teachers who tell me how wonderful their students are at English here, and how all these epxat run English schools do a really fine job of teaching their students to advanced levels. I alos keep meeting locals who have decent conversational skills.
We are not talking about fluency here, just the ability to communicate well enough to be understood. So laugh all you want, but unless all those teachers are lying through their teeth or you have never met anyboy here who can communicate to be understood then I’d say you are clearly incorrect.
Including Taiwan? :roflmao:[/quote]
Well you see funkymonkey I keep meeting all these English teachers who tell me how wonderful their students are at English here, and how all these epxat run English schools do a really fine job of teaching their students to advanced levels. I alos keep meeting locals who have decent conversational skills.
We are not talking about fluency here, just the ability to communicate well enough to be understood. So laugh all you want, but unless all those teachers are lying through their teeth or you have never met anyboy here who can communicate to be understood then I’d say you are clearly incorrect.[/quote]
You said, “…many Asians who do not have native English skills have good English.” That statement is obviously not true for the Taiwanese. If I went outside right now and asked 100 Taiwanese “How old are you?”, I bet 2 would answer correctly. Never mind “communicating well enough to be understood”, most of them can’t put 3 coherent words together. I want to live near you because, apparently, all the locals possess great English skills. :loco: Maybe we just have different ideas/opinions of what “good” English is.
Define “understood”. Aside from the obvious differences in knowledge levels and interests, I’d hardly say many Taiwanese are really up to the task of having a complex political or philosophical discussion in English. Northern Europeans, in particular, quite often have this ability, and I don’t have to dumb down my language or endlessly repeat myself to be able to have such conversations with them. I certainly do with most Taiwanese. I was in Sweden catching a local bus and the driver was rambling away about all manner of things in English quite fluently. I could never imagine encountering such Taiwanese bus drivers. Yeah, you’ll find guys who are dentists or high flyers who speak amazing English here, but they’re hardly indicative of the man on the street. High level English in Taiwan would be fairly intermediate in many European nations, if that. Have a look at the international tests, such as the results at the IELTS website, if you don’t believe me.
Rather than blowing Taiwan’s horn, I think people should really be hanging their heads in shame and questioning why Taiwanese are so bloody useless at English given the enormous amount of time and money they spend on it (including every shop sign, advertisement and t-shirt seemingly having (bafflingly odd) English on it, which is something I simply haven’t encountered anywhere else in the world), and given the higher proficiency levels in other nations that devote fewer resources to it.
Well that can be attributed to all the un qualified English teachers than come in droves from overseas who shouldn’t be in a classroom teaching, surely?
How many of them have proper TEFL or TESOL qualifications? Cancel all the ARC’s of non TESOL qualified teachers and then those with proper qualifications would get decent salaries here. Of course that wouldnt suit a lot of people now would it?
I’d say many native English speakers have the same problems 
Satellite TV: Indeed, I’d agree with both of your points, but the testing culture here doesn’t help at all.
Well many Europeans also flock to language schools in the UK Australia and other English speaking countries. Hundreds of thousands get working holiday visa’s for Australia and spend a significant amount of time immersed in English. It’s much easier to learn to read and write English when your own language uses the roman alphabet
IF you had been here 25 years ago then compare how far the Taiwanese have come with improving the English levels of the locals then you would perhaps agree with me that the locals have decent English. I am not talking about high formal level discussions, but the level where they could get by.
I don’t find the culture here testing anymore. I used to when I first arrived as many things are done so differently. When I arrived I opened a business and had to look for people who could speak even rudimentary English, so I poached some young lasses from some travel agents.
Culture and language go hand in hand.
I paid them better for less hours in the office and more time in nightclubs. Ah those were the days. You people now have it so easy. Don’t go around being so testy with others.
“…testing culture…” The way they do tests, the approach to testing their students. Nonce.
These poor kids spend more time having shit crammed down their throats in order to pass tests and then become bragging points for their mommies and daddies, I don’t blame them if they forget how to speak English when they’re done with it.
“…testing culture…” The way they do tests, the approach to testing their students. Nonce.
These poor kids spend more time having shit crammed down their throats in order to pass tests and then become bragging points for their mommies and daddies, I don’t blame them if they forget how to speak English when they’re done with it.[/quote]
Well you see, that’s what happens when people write in such a way they can be miscontrued and when they have also found the local culture to be “frustating”
Is it no wonder these poor kids taking tests don’t want to speak to anybody.
Shoddy unqualified teachers.
Now yes sometimes I maybe a nonce or a numpty 
but at other times I am just showing that if you expect to be teaching students your native language and then expect them to be suddenly fluent after a few short years you are going to be sorely dissapointed.
I don’t know what the urban slang for ‘nonce’ is down under, but I strongly advise people NEVER to call a guy in the UK it.
As for the topic itself; I consider my wife’s written English to be the equivalent of an educated native speaker in many ways. She does, however, make occasional errors that a child would. In general it’s better than many posters on forumosa, and the standard of English here is superior to most chatrooms.
She couldn’t hold a philosophical conversation with a native speaker because of a lack of shared cultural references. She’s also more interested in fashion.
[quote=“tomthorne”]I don’t know what the urban slang for ‘nonce’ is down under, but I strongly advise people NEVER to call a guy in the UK it.
As for the topic itself; I consider my wife’s written English to be the equivalent of an educated native speaker in many ways. She does, however, make occasional errors that a child would. In general it’s better than many posters on forumosa, and the standard of English here is superior to most chatrooms.
She couldn’t hold a philosophical conversation with a native speaker because of a lack of shared cultural references. She’s also more interested in fashion.[/quote]
Nonce is the same in the UK and Oz. I don’t take offence at it Tomthorne. But I do fear flatlandr may have a crush on my girlfriend
- A person convicted (or simply guilty) of sexual crimes, especiall paedophilia.
2) What you call your mate just because you’re jealous of him for having an attractive 16-year old girlfriend. - A common British insult - generally equivalent to wanker, twat
[quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]Define “understood”. Aside from the obvious differences in knowledge levels and interests, I’d hardly say many Taiwanese are really up to the task of having a complex political or philosophical discussion in English. Northern Europeans, in particular, quite often have this ability, and I don’t have to dumb down my language or endlessly repeat myself to be able to have such conversations with them. I certainly do with most Taiwanese. I was in Sweden catching a local bus and the driver was rambling away about all manner of things in English quite fluently. I could never imagine encountering such Taiwanese bus drivers. Yeah, you’ll find guys who are dentists or high flyers who speak amazing English here, but they’re hardly indicative of the man on the street. High level English in Taiwan would be fairly intermediate in many European nations, if that. Have a look at the international tests, such as the results at the IELTS website, if you don’t believe me.
Rather than blowing Taiwan’s horn, I think people should really be hanging their heads in shame and questioning why Taiwanese are so bloody useless at English given the enormous amount of time and money they spend on it (including every shop sign, advertisement and t-shirt seemingly having (bafflingly odd) English on it, which is something I simply haven’t encountered anywhere else in the world), and given the higher proficiency levels in other nations that devote fewer resources to it.[/quote]
Swedish is a lot closer to English than Mandarin, and the culture of Sweden is light years closer to that of any English-speaking country, so it is not such a big surprise that you would find someone there who could ramble away in English there on all manner of thoughts. Plus, I think people here are more into nuanced responses than philosophical ramblings in any case, in any language. But the main thing is that the translation barrier for locals is much steeper. Comparing ESL levels here, whether TOEFL, IELTS or other, to Europe is not a good indicator of how smart the Taiwanese are or their approach to English is. Most European languages are much closer to English, and the people in Europe have been dealing with each other more closely for much longer than Brits and Chinese, for example.
Well except for all those Chinese who died fighting a war to keep Hong Kong, British ( well at least for 99 years )
Try getting Swedes to learn Chinese, almost bloody impossible even when they do live in Taiwan.
Since most foreign teachers here are teaching children, I doubt a TEFL/TESOL cert would really help the situation at all. Some foreign teachers may have poor spelling and punctuation (I admit I fall into this category, but I am trying to dig myself out), but I honestly believe that even the poorest foreign “teacher” in a cram school with the right prep material and guidance should be able to “teach” without many problems. I have personally found that the biggest problem Taiwanese face when speaking English is that of confidence. They have studied enough English (or been forced to cram it) that they can form sentences that make perfect sense and have no problem getting their intended message across, but they are too afraid to do so. I am personally trying to just encourage any of my future students to speak more, not be afraid of mistakes and just have the courage to say something and see how it goes.
Including Taiwan? :roflmao:[/quote]
Well you see funkymonkey I keep meeting all these English teachers who tell me how wonderful their students are at English here, and how all these epxat run English schools do a really fine job of teaching their students to advanced levels. I alos keep meeting locals who have decent conversational skills.
We are not talking about fluency here, just the ability to communicate well enough to be understood. So laugh all you want, but unless all those teachers are lying through their teeth or you have never met anyboy here who can communicate to be understood then I’d say you are clearly incorrect.[/quote]
You said, “…many Asians who do not have native English skills have good English.” That statement is obviously not true for the Taiwanese. If I went outside right now and asked 100 Taiwanese “How old are you?”, I bet 2 would answer correctly. Never mind “communicating well enough to be understood”, most of them can’t put 3 coherent words together. I want to live near you because, apparently, all the locals possess great English skills. :loco: Maybe we just have different ideas/opinions of what “good” English is.[/quote]
I dispute this. In Taipei the number would be much higher. Not sure what exactly but 15 to 20 at the very least, 30 to 40 quite possibly? Obviously you exclude old crones and the like from the survey. In my opinion the level of English in Taiwan isn’t actually that bad (pidgin conversational levels that is).
I’m sorry but English schools in taiwan are probably the worst you can find in the globe.
It’s all about the sales pitch. As long as they look sexy, they get hired. You’ll frequently run into classes taught by HS drop outs or russian prostitutes with polish accents. Customers cant tell polish tongue from brittish tongue, to begin with.
Yes, Swedish is related to English in as much as they’re not only Indo-European languages, but part of the Germanic branch of that family. However, it doesn’t explain why those Finno-Ugric Finns are so good at English. If it were a cultural or lingistic thing, you’d expect the French to be better at English than the Finns, but they’re not.
Also, what the hell is with the Poles with Russian accents. I couldn’t ever imagine a Pole wanting to do a Russian accent except to play a villain.
cretzor: I don’t think many Taiwanese can form correct English sentences though. It’s more than a confidence thing. Look at the ridiculous amount of Chinglish on both commercial signs and anything put out by the government.
I’d also agree with you that no one really needs any sort of special qualifications to teach in a cram school, but probably for completely different reasons to you. Working in a buxiban is not about the teaching. Stephen Krashen could arrive in Taipei tomorrow, and he’d be fired on his first day for not doing it their inane way to their inane curriculum and not throwing a sticky ball around.
[quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]
Also, what the hell is with the Poles with Russian accents. I couldn’t ever imagine a Pole wanting to do a Russian accent except to play a villain.[/quote]
probably ex-KGB double agents.
[quote]
cretzor: I don’t think many Taiwanese can form correct English sentences though. It’s more than a confidence thing. Look at the ridiculous amount of Chinglish on both commercial signs and anything put out by the government.[/quote]
Yes, for some customers, context is more important than content. As long as they keep selling beer & sex, I don’t think they really care.
[quote]
I’d also agree with you that no one really needs any sort of special qualifications to teach in a cram school, but probably for completely different reasons to you. Working in a buxiban is not about the teaching. Stephen Krashen could arrive in Taipei tomorrow, and he’d be fired on his first day for not doing it their inane way to their inane curriculum and not throwing a sticky ball around.[/quote]
totally true. buxiban for the most part is a joke. for the amount of money they charge their students’ parents, i hope their content eventually catch up to context.
[quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]Define “understood”. Aside from the obvious differences in knowledge levels and interests, I’d hardly say many Taiwanese are really up to the task of having a complex political or philosophical discussion in English. Northern Europeans, in particular, quite often have this ability, and I don’t have to dumb down my language or endlessly repeat myself to be able to have such conversations with them. I certainly do with most Taiwanese. I was in Sweden catching a local bus and the driver was rambling away about all manner of things in English quite fluently. I could never imagine encountering such Taiwanese bus drivers. Yeah, you’ll find guys who are dentists or high flyers who speak amazing English here, but they’re hardly indicative of the man on the street. High level English in Taiwan would be fairly intermediate in many European nations, if that. Have a look at the international tests, such as the results at the IELTS website, if you don’t believe me.
Rather than blowing Taiwan’s horn, I think people should really be hanging their heads in shame and questioning why Taiwanese are so bloody useless at English given the enormous amount of time and money they spend on it (including every shop sign, advertisement and t-shirt seemingly having (bafflingly odd) English on it, which is something I simply haven’t encountered anywhere else in the world), and given the higher proficiency levels in other nations that devote fewer resources to it.[/quote]
Many Taiwanese could not have a political discussion in Mandarin either.