The real distinguishing feature of the best English students is that they know how to “make it real.” Rather than accept whatever their schools give them in the way of classes, they put themselves in a situation in which English has to be used in real ways. When they do that, their learning takes off. When I talk with these students, I always wonder which comes first, an active approach or better English? In fact, they go together.
The older I get, the more amazed I am at how much energy students have. More than that, though, I really appreciate how well some young people channel that energy into constructive engagement with the real world. For the students I teach, that engagement means more than just doing homework and assignments, it means getting out to the real world. For English study, they “make it real” in three important ways: going abroad, taking private lessons, and making friends.
Whenever a student stays after class and asks me, “Where are you from?” I guess they are planning on going to study abroad. So, I tell them and then ask, “Why do you ask?” “I’m thinking of going…” is always the answer. Of course, they just want to ask some questions about their plan to travel or study abroad, but mostly want to talk about it because they are so excited. Sometimes this conversation is a retroactive one; they’ve already been abroad to get their dose of reality during their high school years.
They should be excited. Going abroad puts them where many students have never been before—in English reality! They have to navigate in a strange environment, feed themselves, study in new ways, and generally take care of themselves. For many over-protected Japanese students, that alone is enough of a lesson. But, that self-care is also deeply entwined with serious study of English. Ironically, they study harder when the environment is newer and more confusing than when they are immersed in the comforts and familiarities of home.
Those who stay inside Japan make their studies real with private lessons. “It takes five of my part-time hours to pay for one lesson!” one student wailed to me. “Welcome to the tough world of economics!” I said her, though clearly, she was happy to make this exchange of working time and learning time. Many students at universities take private lessons from foreigners. Some may see this as a condemnation of the failure of universities, but I see it more as expressing a need for personal attention. Individual time with a native speaker is rare at Japanese universities, where class sizes can often be huge and foreigners few.
I think, too, that the most active students take private lessons because they get bored in classes where other students are passive. So, they take themselves to a real place where they can really speak freely and get immediate feedback, and lots of it. A ninety-minute class of 30 students averages out to just three minutes each with the teacher, while a private lesson is one on one for an hour. Calculating the effect is not too hard. The conversation lessons, too, are not about grammar, but about fluency, opinions, questions and, of course, the reality of a real conversation.
More and more, I hear students say things like, “My friend told me that…” or “One of my friends used this phrase…” or “I heard that…” about some issue or topic. What these students mean is that they have heard some English when talking to foreign friends outside class. The funny thing is that they often want me to explain to them what they heard outside class as if outside school is real and inside school is only a place to have things explained. I feel amused that the students’ remember so carefully and pay such close attention to their out-of-school experiences, and tend to downplay school experiences, but maybe that’s natural.
Sometimes, though, I do wish they got as excited about what goes on inside school as they do about these outside experiences. However, students are often burnt out on classrooms and studying. They want something more, and more real, even if it’s buffered by the computer distances of internet blogs or email chat rooms. Ironically, these days, students can get more feedback by posting a comment on a website than they would get in class! Schools have failed them in some ways, and they are educating themselves.
I admire this keeping it real, even though I cringe at their, indirect, criticism of the university system. What I think students are searching for is an escape from the testing, dictionary-using, textbook-limited world of school. They want to feel the vitality of real English in a real context. Maybe too they know that they have to take responsibility themselves to create a stronger learning situation. They are not satisfied studying English like some animal in the zoo, but want to experience English in its natural habitat, with all its dangers and excitements. They refuse to have their wings clipped and stay inside the cage of school. They want to fly freely outside.
These keep-it-real students also want to escape the limitations of the cognitive, rational approach to English most common in schools. They know that real language is deeply emotional and immersed in the entirety of human experience. The English presented inside schools is often drained of feeling and passion, just words on a page with no living force. Outside school, English always has phrasing, intonation, context, and emotion because it is always in a real context. To students who make the break from their dependency on schoolroom English to search for real English outside school, it must seem like two entirely different languages.
Students who “make it real” with English outside school discover and create a true love for English. They start to feel how language works in the real world without getting stuck in all the drills, dry material and pressures that make English in school seem like some ancient, dead language. Outside of school, they do not learn English; they experience it. The difference is a remarkable one, and very important. “Making it real” is the first active step towards making English an authentic part of one’s life and one’s very existence.
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