Discussion Groups / ESL Teaching / August 2005

Dear ...,

Your advisor probably has a good reason for this, so you should take
his or her advice seriously, as you're doing. The funny thing about
your request is that the ESL center at the University of Virginia is a
pretty good one, so it's a wonder that you weren't simply told to go
over to the Center for American English Language and Culture and put up
a note on a bulletin board there.

An average native speaker of English will probably not be able to help
you as much as someone with a real language teaching background,
especially when it comes to helping you improve your accent
effectively. You should be able to find a professional or a graduate
teaching assistant to do what you want and more for thirty tax-free
dollars a week or so. There's probably some kind of official
arrangement you can make at CAELC for private tuition at an outrageous
price, something like forty dollars an hour. Don't do that.

A regular old English major will probably not be able to really get the
job done properly, or will take twice as long to be half as effective.
I'm not just guessing about that -- I used to be one of them.
Especially in the States, there is a wide divide between what English
Language Teachers do and what English Language and Literature students
study. It's probably not the same in your home country.

Good luck!