Summary of One of the Topics in IATEFL and TESOL
International Association
Joint Web Conference
Topic:
Identity, discrimination and the non-native speaking professional in TESOL
Most
of Professional Association prefer to hire Native Speaker as an english teacher rather than
Non-Native Speaker. L1, ethnicity and place of birth are often confounded.
Advocates for the profession reject L1 background as criterion for employment
as language teacher. Is it called discrimination toward non native speaker?
In
this talk, David Nunan says that discrimination is the unjust or prejudicial
treatment of different categories of people, especially on the ground of age, race or sex. Regarding
with the teacher identity and discrimination David gives examples of job vacancy of English Teacher in
China, Saudi, Arabia and Japan. One of the criteria is the candidate must be
people from UK/US/Canada/Australia/New Zaeland. What do you think about that
condition? Does it discriminate non-native speaker? In reality, the students’
own language has no role when it comes
to learn other languages. So, bilinguals have nothing special to offer. In
addition, according to Davies A. (2004) being a native speaker native speaker is
no guarantee of facility in the language. From the research, 420 University
students in Hong Kong had positive attitudes toward NNESTs, though they thought
as effectively and preferred them (Heung, 2002). In Hungary, 400+ university
students, 83% felt, it is important that their teacher could translate the L1,
82 % thought the ideal was to have both NNESTs
and NESTs, 5 % only wanted NESTd (Medgyes, 1992). So, it is important to
use L1 in the L2 classroom. The benefits are more effective vocabulary
explanation, more effective clarification and feedback, more effective grammar
explanations, greater rapport with students, better classroom management, time-saving in setting up task, useful in
helping individual students (Mohebbi & Alavi, 2014).
Knowing
those realities, professional association need to consider that English
language learner have the right to be taught by qualified and trained teachers. But, native speaker
proficiency in the target language alone
is not sufficient qualification for such teaching positions, the field of
teaching English to speakers of other languages is a profession that requires
specialized training (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, 2003).
So that in this situation, professionalism should be referenced against teacher
standards.
What
I can learn from David Nunan is that as a speaker we need to prepare anything
before giving speech. We also need to
know who the audiences are. In this
presentation, David had prepare material
for his presentation, and he used familiar words so I am as a native speaker can understand
his speech easily. He also used Power Point to support his presentation. Furthermore,
I am so glad knowing that David Nunan is a former president
of TESOL, and is currently a trustee and executive committee member of The
International Research Foundation for English Language Education (TIRF). He has
published over 30 books on curriculum development, language teaching
methodology, research methods, and teacher education. I am so motivated.
Hopefully, I can meet him someday, share and discuss knowledge together. Aamiin
Written by Ummy Khoirunisya' Masyhudianti
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