It was hilarious last night. I needed to teach some pronunciation. I went into this exercise with the understanding that I would have to try to understand British pronunciation. The very first word was 'bull' I was supposed to pronounce it as if it had the same vowel sound as 'good' A clear travesty as far as someone from the USA is concerned. I was sweating.
I kept looking, until I saw several other examples--DUH! I was pronouncing 'bull' incorrectly as far as the book is concerned. "Oh," I said to the class, hitting my forehead with the heel of my hand, "I'm pronouncing 'bull' wrong." I crossed out 'bull' at the top of the column on the board and wrote 'good.' I can pronounce that with the British-ly proper vowel sound.
Don't even ask me about 'dance' having the same sound as 'car.' I’m not kidding! With their noses firmly in the air, when they drop the final ‘r,’ the British end up saying ‘dance’ with the same vowel sound as ‘car.’ Wow!
During class, we listened to a short story about a fortune teller. After each paragraph, I would ask questions and one of the students would softly ask Oleg (in Russian) for explanation. He would give it to her. If he wasn't telling Olga stuff in Russian, he was calling out the correct answers before everyone else--often even if I had specifically asked one of the other students. The low point was probably the moment when I said to them that I would rather she ask ME her questions in Russian. She promptly asked Oleg what I said.
As we continued, however, things became better. Olga never shut down like a child (as I was afraid she might do) and participated throughout the class.
Maybe next time, things will be better.
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I had my first lesson with the young woman near Pushkinskaya today. She and her husband are planning to go to the US in a couple years so she has no problem with me teaching her an American accent AND how things are done in the US--different spellings, different numbers, different date construction, etc. It was pretty easy money...
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Last night, I was teaching 'non-defining relative clauses'
I came across this sentence in the exercises: “The Ferrari, which can go at 320 km/h, has a 5.5 liter engine.”
I sent this to an English-teaching colleague: <<We would NEVER say such a sentence! Whoever heard of the phrase ‘go at’?!? How ridiculous! Is this the proper way of talking in Great Britain? I think they have really gone off the deep end if this is how they are speaking.>>
She said she would ask her British friends about it.
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Last week, I came across the sentence in the book: "The team are hoping to win the cup this year." I asked an English-teacher friend of mine about plural nouns. I told her I would never say something like: “The Avalanche are hoping for a win.” In my world, a team is singular. She wrote back that even here (in Colorado) they talk about such nouns in the plural for sports teams like ‘the Avalanche’ and the ‘Fry’ for a band. I guess I don’t know everything.
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