Here's another American holiday to discuss in a conversation class. However, since the point of a conversation class is to get the ESL (or EFL) students speaking, this topic could be a launching point to hear about holidays in your students' home countries.
I consider it a part of my responsibility as an ESL tutor to address cultural issues and especially cultural differences that enable my ESL students to understand "American culture" a little better. As most of my ESL students are very advanced, I don't often make culture the main topic of any lesson. Of course, it invariably comes up. There isn't really any way to avoid it! The student usually brings the topic to class.
The depth of our discussion about culture depends on the topic and the interest of the English language learner. I'm often able to explain the origin of many aspects of "American culture," the "why" of what we do, and a bit of history about the custom. To further our conversation practice, I also elicit information about the customs in the student's home culture.
Last week, a student stumped me by asking me the "why" of something we Americans do. She wanted to know why we often ask when receiving a present, "Should I open it now?" First, I was able to confirm that, yes, we usually do ask this question. However, the "why" of it was something I couldn't definitively answer. I speculated that it has something to do with economics and embarrassment. That the receiver of a gift doesn't want the giver to feel embarrassed about the cost of the gift, whether it is a costly or an inexpensive gift.
I'd love to hear some suggestions from other people familiar with American culture as to why we ask, "Should I open it now or later?" And I also welcome non-Americans to share their customs around receiving gifts in their home countries.
Today is one of those days in the blogosphere where bloggers around the world are encouraged to write something in support of human rights. This is a particularly noteworthy day for human rights in the state of California.
Today, May 15, 2008, the California Supreme Court overturned a ban on same-sex marriages in the state of California. This means that it is now legal (actually, it goes into effect in 30 days) for people of the same sex to legally marry each other in the state and to enjoy the same rights, privileges and responsibilities as married couples of opposite genders.
I believe that this is an issue of human rights as it is an issue of equality. And in the United States, where we are supposed to have a separation of church and state, the Supreme Court's decision helps to clarify this separation.
This is certainly an ESL conversation topic I will be addressing with my conversation students in the next couple of days.
This is an exciting time in American politics. I had never thought that there would be an opportunity in my lifetime for a woman or an African American to possibly be the president of the U.S.
For my ESL students who are visiting from other countries, they are having a great opportunity to experience this time in American history (although, I realize that this may be my ethnocentric outlook!).
These days I find myself not only being an ESL tutor, but also a "civics" teacher. And one of the most difficult things to explain is the Electoral College, delegates, and superdelegates, etc. I must admit that I've had to review some of what I learned years ago in high school (and I don't think we learned about superdelegates back then!), and I find that it's still very difficult for me to explain and for my advanced ESL students to understand.
Such is American politics.
Happy New Year to my Asian ESL students and everyone else. This Spring Festival is one of the more (if not the most) important traditional Chinese holidays. It's also celebrated by other East Asian cultures and countries.
While it is important and useful for ESL students to learn about holidays in the English-speaking countries in which they live, I believe it's also important to learn about holidays celebrated by English language learners in their home countries.
PLUS, holidays are excellent conversation topics for ESL classes. They are a great opportunity for ESL students to use their knowledge and to share it with others.
One of the easy conversation topics I use during my private ESL lessons with adults is my student's favorite movie or TV program. One student recently described her favorite movie to me. It was "The Shawshank Redemption." I haven't seen the movie in years, although I remember the setting and the main actors.
I asked my ESL student if she remembered when the movie took place. She thought it was set in the 1940s or 1950s. I told her that it was significant that an African American man and a white guy would become friends at that time. She asked why.
This topic opened the door for a conversation about "race relations" in the U.S. There's always something to talk about during ESL classes!
It was interesting to me that my student was unaware of the history of segregation and legalized discrimination in the U.S.
Today is "Blog Action Day." Millions of bloggers all around the world are writing something about the environment today.
The topic of the environment is something that has come up in many of my advanced ESL conversation topics with my students. It's often difficult to separate discussions about the environment with discussions about politics, so we usually take on both topics.
Most of my conversations about the environment have been with my Chinese students. China has such a large population and is developing economically at a very quick pace that it is easy to find topics of conversation related to the environment.
Most advanced ESL students are familiar with the term "global warming." (George, repeat after me, "global warming is real.") It's a useful term to make sure that ESL learners know because it is such a part of our world today.
Many of my advanced ESL students ask me about "small talk." Small talk is the short conversations we have with other people when we first see them or first meet them. Small talk topics include the weather, sports, and traffic. Sometimes "chit chat" is also considered small talk.
The purpose of small talk is to break the ice and for people to get comfortable talking to one another. Sometimes it's just a cultural norm that people take part in.
Many of my students make the mistake of saying "small talks." It's always just "small talk," without an "s." The verb to use is "make." For example, "It's often common for people meeting each other for the first time to make small talk."
It seems like a fairly simple thing for native English speakers to do, but making small talk is one of the topics that ESL teachers should teach their ESL students so that they can feel more comfortable with their English speaking skills.
I've never been very interested in team sports. Individual sports have been more my thing. However, a few of my private ESL students have been very interested in baseball, in particular.
As I've mentioned before, the best conversation topics for ESL classes (or private tutoring sessions) are things that your students are interested in or things that will help them with daily life or on the job. To date, I haven't had any professional baseball players (maybe someday), but I have had serious fans. There's a certain enthusiasm that some students have when talking about some topics, like baseball.
I've learned a great deal about baseball in the U.S. from conversations with one of my Japanese students, in particular. He knows more about the game in this country than I can ever hope to know!
It's another one of those cases where I'm able to learn from my students and my students are able to improve their English language speaking skills by talking about something they feel passionate about.
Sometimes my "job" as an ESL tutor is almost criminal! I get paid to have great conversations with interesting English language learners from all over the world. I get to "travel vicariously."
As a private ESL tutor, the majority of my students are advanced ESL students and mostly want to improve their speaking skills. I'm glad to oblige. I'm also fortunate that I've had a lot of life experiences and different careers throughout my life. I'm fortunate to know at least a little bit of most things. And it's particularly great when I don't know too much about something, because I can then ask my ESL students and they are happy to talk about things they know and teach me new things.
If you're considering a career change, teaching ESL or EFL is definitely a great possibility.
During my conversation lessons with ESL students who have been in the U.S. for a short while, I often ask them about their impressions about the U.S. What were they expecting before coming here? What did they expect to find? What ideas did they have about Americans? (Of course, I usually wait to ask such questions after we've established some rapport. I want them to speak freely and not worry about offending me.) I then ask about their current experiences and observations. What turned out to be true? What's false?
One of the general themes in the answers of all my ESL students is how diverse the U.S. is. They tell me that they thought that Americans were primarily white. When they come here, they see and experience our abundance of hyphenated Americans (Mexican-American, African-American, Italian-American, Japanese-American, etc.)
For the ESL or EFL teacher, one of the challenging parts of a conversation lesson is getting some students to talk! The ESL teacher has to choose a topic that appeals to the majority of students. I'm fortunate because I teach English language learners one-on-one. Sometimes it's easier to get one person to speak than it is to get a whole class of ESL students. Getting an EFL classroom to speak may be easier. The challenge there is to get the students to speak in English!
As I said, the best conversation topics are those of interest to the English language learner. The topics could be of interest because the student needs the skills for his or her job, or in order to more easily live in an English speaking culture. The best ESL topics will be those that are relevant to the student's life.
When an ESL student knows that he or she can take what is learned in the tutoring session or in the classroom and apply it in real life, then the student will be more likely to want to participate in the discussion.
Other ESL topics that could get students talking include things that students know about (e.g., their family, their home culture, their jobs, etc.) and things that are controversial (e.g., abortion, the death penalty, and other standard debate topics).
One of the important things for ESL tutors and ESL teachers to remember is that the student(s), not the tutor/teacher should do most of the talking in a conversation lesson.
Many of my ESL students are very advanced and primarily want to work on their speaking conversation skills. That means we have to find something to talk about. As the ESL teacher, it's my responsibility to introduce subjects, ask open-ended questions, and generally ensure that the ESL learner speaks.
There is such a variety of ESL speakers, not only in terms of the range of English language skills, but in their inclination towards speaking. I have some advanced level ESL learners whose total speaking time during our sessions is significantly less than the total speaking time of some intermediate level students. My total speaking time is probably the same in both cases. The difference is that some advanced learners can tend to be perfectionists and spend significant time thinking about how to very correctly say what they want to say.
In my ESL tutoring sessions with students who want to improve their speaking ability, I really try to come up with conversation topics that are of great interest (hopefully, there is even passion) to my students. The objective is to get students to talk, by any means necessary. If I have prepared a topic of conversation for the session and it doesn't seem to be productive, as a private ESL tutor, I can immediately change the subject. It's important for conversation classes to discuss what the student wants to discuss (or is willing to discuss) and not what the teacher wants to discuss. It's also important for the teacher to be quiet, even in those awkwards silences!
ESL teachers are often looking for topics for conversations for their ESL students. Current events are always popular topics, but you have to make sure that the student(s) is familiar with the topic. One way to make sure that your student, or students, is familiar with the topic is to provide a short reading on the issue before the discussion. You can then ask specific questions to prompt the ESL students for discussion about the topic.
Or you can pick timeless topics, such as death and dying. Of course, this topic may be too sensitive for some students, especially younger students, but I think I would feel comfortable using it as a topic of conversation with my adult ESL students.
Every culture must deal with death. And every culture has its own traditions, norms, beliefs, and even verbal expressions around death. I can imagine that a classroom full of ESL students from all over the world could have a potentially fascinating conversation.
I work one-on-one tutoring ESL adult learners. Many are trying not only to improve their English, but also to learn about American culture. One of the things that has recently come up is what Americans say when someone they are close to has just died, and also what to say to the person who has just lost a loved one.
As Americans, we use euphemisms for death. We say, "she passed away" or "he's gone to meet his maker." These can also be called idioms. They are simple enough to teach just as any other vocabulary. A little different is what we say to someone who has just "lost" a loved one. Perhaps the most common expression is, "I'm sorry for your loss." This is a more common verbal expression of sympathy. Perhaps an interesting discussion is why Americans refer to someone's death as a loss. The word "loss" has over a dozen different meanings.
So as you can see, the topic of death and dying can be used for at least two purposes affecting verbal skills: as a conversation topic and as a vocabulary lesson. For a long list of questions to guide an ESL conversation about death, visit ESL Conversation Questions.
