Mameha Posted December 20, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 20, 2015 6 hours ago, OmniHead said: A friend of mine is not only reluctant about teaching his language to others, but also refuses to make corrections when someone is speaking on writing the wrong way. I never understood why of this, however, and with the pass of the years, I thing to have the clue about; he doesn't want to hurt people's feelings making them see they are wrong when it comes to corrections, and doesn't want to take responsibility when someone who he could taught would be evaluated and found non proficient in that language. I do not only agree with this, but I found it to be a completely wrong approach. On the one hand, you can teach your language, but proficiency at the end depends on the learner. Many people want to be taught a new language, but they don't take seriously and with a few newly acquired words are okay, while others ask, get additional resources and do their best to earn such proficiency at the end. On the other hand, by not correcting someone, he does more harm than good because the person talking to him or emailing him may believe to be doing it right, when not, and keep going through life dragging the error because a native speaker never made them aware of it. Moreover, all of us who are learning languages sincerely appreciate when native speakers correct us, and there is not harm or hard feelings, I won't get mad if someone corrects me, but will thank as many of your for sure will also do, hence some of the reasons we all are here I think that is all about the way people correct a person. If they are rude obviously it's not correct, but i think that someone can correct people gently and maybe with a smile, at least i would do this OmniHead 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OmniHead Posted December 21, 2015 Report Share Posted December 21, 2015 Yes! Now that you mention, this can be the souce of the problem my friend has. Himself, as learner of a second language, found people criticizing and teasing him when he thought to participate in a community where that second language (don't remember if Irish or Scottish) was the main language in use to communicate one another. This happened in the very early days he came online long, long years ago. Later he quit online communities focusing on his business development and then after, having people wanting to get him teaching them his own native language, but finding he refuses to do it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trellum Posted December 22, 2015 Report Share Posted December 22, 2015 On 11/30/2015, 11:26:10, Mameha said: I have this problem. In addition to Korean and Chinese, i wanted to learn Spanish because it is more similar to Italian, i like it and it's really spoken in the world. I have a friend from Sud America who is here in Italy since when she was young, in fact she considers Italian her first language and she speak spanish only with some Sudamerican friends or with her family sometimes. I asked her many times to teach me Spanish because it's a great opportunity to speak with someone who's near you and to have a conversation, it would be a luck! But unfortunately she avoids this and it seems like she would not teach me Spanish. When i think of this, i compare myself to her, if someone near me would ask me to teach Italian to him i would be really happy to do this because it's beautiful to share my own language and culture. Why some people are so reluctant to teach a language to a friend or anyone? what do you think of this? By teaching you mean really ''teaching'' or just having conversation with you in Spanish? Because you should know that a friend doesn't have to teach you anything, I'm a former teacher and teaching is a really hard work... I spent a lot time preparing my lessons every single day, but I was getting paid. So I don't think it's fair someone asks a friend to do that for them, some people don't mind this, but most do. I think that she is a bit afraid that by agreeing to teach you she will end up adding more work to her schedule, and if she ever feels like wanting out she might also be afraid you guys might have an argument. If you want to learn Spanish do it on your own or go to a school. If you got any doubt or questinos regarding to the language I' sure your frend will be glad to hel you with that, but don't ask her to teach you the language. That is a very daunting task Wanda Kaishin 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mameha Posted December 22, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 22, 2015 30 minutes ago, Trellum said: By teaching you mean really ''teaching'' or just having conversation with you in Spanish? Because you should know that a friend doesn't have to teach you anything, I'm a former teacher and teaching is a really hard work... I spent a lot time preparing my lessons every single day, but I was getting paid. So I don't think it's fair someone asks a friend to do that for them, some people don't mind this, but most do. I think that she is a bit afraid that by agreeing to teach you she will end up adding more work to her schedule, and if she ever feels like wanting out she might also be afraid you guys might have an argument. If you want to learn Spanish do it on your own or go to a school. If you got any doubt or questinos regarding to the language I' sure your frend will be glad to hel you with that, but don't ask her to teach you the language. That is a very daunting task If you read my other posts on this topic, i specified what i was searching for Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheers100 Posted December 22, 2015 Report Share Posted December 22, 2015 On Tue Dec 01 2015 02:26:10 GMT+0800, Mameha said: I have this problem. In addition to Korean and Chinese, i wanted to learn Spanish because it is more similar to Italian, i like it and it's really spoken in the world. I have a friend from Sud America who is here in Italy since when she was young, in fact she considers Italian her first language and she speak spanish only with some Sudamerican friends or with her family sometimes. I asked her many times to teach me Spanish because it's a great opportunity to speak with someone who's near you and to have a conversation, it would be a luck! But unfortunately she avoids this and it seems like she would not teach me Spanish. When i think of this, i compare myself to her, if someone near me would ask me to teach Italian to him i would be really happy to do this because it's beautiful to share my own language and culture. Why some people are so reluctant to teach a language to a friend or anyone? what do you think of this? Probably she just wants to be relax when she hangs out with you. Teaching would be a tedious job to her, and she will have to be patient to explain the grammar rules and the meticulous usage of the language. I never try to bother my friends who are native speakers of some languages I was learning or intended to learn. Mostly I post on the forums. I don't want to occupy the leisure time of theirs. However this is just my assumption. I think real friends should share their thoughts to each other instead of being speculating. Why don't you ask her on your own? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mameha Posted December 22, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 22, 2015 Like i already said in the other posts, i will ask her again, i just wanted to make little conversations or maybe ask her some doubts, obviosly she can't teach me the entire gramatic rules, etc! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trellum Posted December 23, 2015 Report Share Posted December 23, 2015 On 12/22/2015, 8:01:04, Mameha said: If you read my other posts on this topic, i specified what i was searching for I'm sorry, I got a bit confused because you used the word ''teach'' instead of ''practice'' In that case I have no idea what could be crossing your friend's mind. A friend once asked me to send him 5 new words every day with pronunciation, but he did it in a time in which I was super busy with my own exams D: I got so stressed thinking about it, maybe your friend is also very busy right now? You should really ask her, if you are good friends she will surely understand Mameha 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wanda Kaishin Posted December 26, 2015 Report Share Posted December 26, 2015 On 12/1/2015, 10:26:37, Mameha said: i remember she even answered me "if you teach me some english", but in reality we didn't talk about it anymore Ok, since some people here still seem to be upset about friends not jumping at the opportunity to "teach their language", let me recap. The op said she asked her friend to teach her Spanish. To a native English speaker, this sounds like a big imposition, but the op says we misunderstood her, and that her friend knew she meant she just wanted to occasionally ask a question about Spanish. The op said her friend avoided this request and wouldn't "teach" her Spanish. But later, the op admitted that her friend answered "if you teach me some english". I had no intention of bringing this quote up, because I was sure people would see it and stop replying to this thread. But I see the op continues to complain about people "not understanding" her posts. I'm through with this thread now, and I'm not coming back, but I just wanted to let people know that, intentional or not, there's definitely some misrepresentation going on here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roger1003 Posted March 21, 2016 Report Share Posted March 21, 2016 I don't understand why a friend would not teach their friends. I'm thinking it could be because of the level of friendship. If he is your best friend, I would doubt if he would not teach you the language. Teaching a new language is hard so that could be the reason why. I'm sorry for saying this but that's how I really feel. I know you feel bad and that's okay because I would feel bad too if that happened to me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kaiiren Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 I would personally be reluctant to teach Japanese to anyone for the following reasons: 1) I'm not a good teacher. 2) I'm not that great at the language yet. 3) It's a MASSIVE amount of time to invest in something. Perhaps your friend is thinking along one of my talking points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sillylucy Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 I do not think that it is a cultural thing, but I think for her it is because it takes a lot of time to teach someone a new language and she might have too many things going on for her right now. She will be more helpful if you agree to pay her for her services. Maybe if you agreed to pay her by the hour. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reverserewind Posted March 25, 2016 Report Share Posted March 25, 2016 When it comes to my friends, I'd rather do a Q&A session rather than a lesson. I've noticed that it works way better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baburra Posted March 25, 2016 Report Share Posted March 25, 2016 Maybe they are just not that interested in doing so which I think is understandable because we all have our different motivations. I think I would also be a little too lazy to teach anyone my languages because it takes quite a bit of effort and if I'm spending that much effort then I think I would rather be paid for it. I've had friends who spoke Japanese and I never thought of asking them to teach me because I always thought they had a lot of other stuff to do and aside from the few words I get to learn here and there I think any more would not be worth their time and effort if I didn't end up paying them for it even though they are my friends. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miya Posted March 25, 2016 Report Share Posted March 25, 2016 Maybe your friend is embarrassed. Believe it or not, even if you are fluent in a language, it's hard to teach it. Sure, you know how to speak fluently and you can read/write/comprehend fine in that language but when someone asks you a grammar question and you don't know how to answer it, it's embarrassing. Maybe instead of asking your friend to "teach" you, you can just converse with her freely? There'd be less pressure that way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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