I was sitting in my office in Seoul one day when my assistant (Korean) received a text message form one of the other students in our TESOL MA program. Her message ask that he he call her on her cell phone and speak only English with her. Being a good friend he dutifully dialed her number and a basically vacuous chat that took a couple of minutes ensued. My attention was caught by the strange conversation and after he hung up I could not help asking what it was all about. It was explained to me that she was in a coffee shop studying and in a nearby table there was a small group of Korean women chatting away in English. My student did not now any of these women but somehow felt that their use of English in an open setting like that was very snobby. Feeling like they were showing off, she also wanted to show off and prove her worth by speaking English but since she was alone she needed to elicit a friend to help her. Hence the text message and vacuous chat that drew my attention for being markedly weird.

It is interesting the attraction and repulsion the same language can have based on the circumstances of its use and the way people often react to these situations.             

Question: Which set of factors do you think has the stronger influence on language learning?

   I think motivation and attitude are the stronger influence on language learning, especially learning L2.

   The motivation and attitude comes from several aspects, such as  environment, situation and condition etc. Introducing my case and one of my stendents' case will be helpful to prove it.

   I am Korean and of course, I can use Korean fluently, but I still envy friends who can speak Korean very logically and who are very good at conversation. When I was learning L1, if I look back, I can tell that I was not that motivated to speak mother language very much. My parents didn't want me to make noise as talking too much when I was very young, and even most teachers wanted students to keep quiet in the classroom. Furthermore, I was an introvert so I didn't want to take any risk to might be a trouble maker, instead, just I stayed quietly. Moreover, there were not many friends who were at the same age in my town because my school was a bit far from my house. 

  However, it was totally different when I learnt English. As for me, learning English was highly motivated when I got a job after university graduation. I could survive in the workplace with middle school level English in Korea. However, it came to me as an alert that I needed to improve advanced English quickly when I worked overseas. Because of English, I couldn't invlove in the staff meeting, and even I couldn't promote even though my job was contributed effectively in the company's goal. Also not only working, but also I had to apapt to the different culture. Those all things motivated me to change my personality, attitude to survive in the different environment including learning language. Wow I cried often at that time.

  One of my students, her name is Nancy, was very intellegent. She is 10 years old but her written English level is almost mid-intermediate. However, her speaking is not very fluent. It means she needs to take some time to produce output if I compare with the same level students. And even she is very shy and an introvert. So I encouraged her to participate in a speaking contest in order to let her get some confidence. Oh she got a prize and once she has realized that other friends at the same ages were not that good at speaking English, she began to feel comfortable and confident to speak in public.

Therefore, many elements affect to the motivation and attidtude and I think these set of factors are the stronger influence on language learning.

In the taxi

When I studied English in New Zealand, I took a taxi to get to Laywood as my home. Because I hadnt learnt English for a long time at that time, I was afraid of pronouncing the word to the foreigner, I heard from my friend that taking a taxi at night is dangerous, but I took it. I met cultural differences, for we took a taxi at night, and its not dangerous as in New Zealand. When I pronounced the word especially w sound, the taxi driver couldnt understand my pronunciation to get to the destination. I was in panic to get lost in a stranger village, but I tried pronouncing the word right as many as I can to be more understandable. I think I pronounce the words more than 10 times. I tried saying the word Layw.the alphabet next to u with various ways. When the taxi driver understood my pronunciation, I felt content very much, and got more confidence. Later, I practiced certain words with difficult words that have alphabets like th, r, l, w sounds that do not have in Korean with my home stay parents New Zealanders.

In the café

Starbucks in New Zealand was cheaper than Korea; so I often go there to get a coffee. Strangely, a staff asked my English name to write down on a cup, however; In Korea, they just give a bell to call me to ask get a coffee ordered. I used my English name as Ruth which has two difficult sounds with R and th. There were so many people to get coffee, but I couldnt pronounce correctly and understandable to New Zealander. I felt so awkward at the first time to say different sounds in the crowd and noisy café. Normally, if a person takes for a long time to order a coffee in Korea, Korean couldnt wait and sometimes cuts the line. However; a staff was tolerant more than Korean, I felt still sorry for a staff and others. Time goes by I didnt like to order a coffee for a long time, I told a different name like Lyn or Irene, but I failed to pronounce Irene properly. I decided not to change my nickname Ruth. I asked how to pronounce to my New Zealander home stay parents many times, they encouraged me in detail. When I pronounced correctly, they were also really happy and encouraged me a lot. They taught me to practice r sound with different words like rabbit as pretending a dog barking sounds, rabbit rabbit instead bow wow. It was funny to practice the sounds with pleasure to overcome from failure experience at a café. Finally, I succeed to pronounce the word to be understandable at only 1 time, I felt fly.

Texting a message with my home stay mom

My home stay mom wanted to me text a message whenever I didnt come home for dinner before at least 1 hour. But my Korean friends and Japanese friends didnt make appointment in advance, and suddenly asked me to have dinner with me. I didnt tell my mom to text a message in Korea to let her for my dinner outside with my friends ahead. Normally, my home stay mom gave me dinner at 7, however; my friend told me to have dinner like 6:40. I sent a message to my home stay mom with polite way and asking if I have dinner out at 6:40, it was not polite. I texted a message with telling reason why I text a message not purpose of texting first. My home stay mom didnt understand my intention of my texting. It was more difficult to explain in a text, or on the phone. I was really sorry for her to say, however; it made her more get angry. I was so sorry not to have dinner at home, but she was okay if I tell her that in advance, so she can go out dinner with her friend. Later, I can text with purpose of text first, and reason later.

When I look back my memories of English classes from middle school to university, it always gave me pressures because all of English classes required good scores. English speaking class was the same. I had to memorize all of dialogue in the text book, and the scores were given depends on how I memorize the dialogue well. I kept memorizing sentences, vocabularies, but I did not know how much my English proficiency was improved or not.

Luckily, when I was a university student, I had some chances to talk to foreigners who speak English. I felt frustrated when I had talks with them because I could not catch the meaning what they were saying clearly. The real conversation went diversely, and it was different from what I memorized in the text book. Since I felt embarrassed and humiliated about asking questions, I kept smiling although I did not understand what they were saying. When my sophomore year in the university I went to English community to improve my speaking skill, and I met my English teacher John. He caught my bad habit. He advised me to ask questions when I did not understand and let me know some useful expressions when I ask such as "Excuse me?", "Could you repeat it again?"

After receiving John's advice, I tried not to keep smiling gut asking questions if I did not catch the meaning during conversation. And, I felt that way helped my listening and speaking skills because I started to concentrate on what speakers saying instead of ignoring them.

Anonymous wrote:

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Kyeongran Jang wrote:

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When I look back my memories of English classes from middle school to university, it always gave me pressures because all of English classes required good scores. English speaking class was the same. I had to memorize all of dialogue in the text book, and the scores were given depends on how I memorize the dialogue well. I kept memorizing sentences, vocabularies, but I did not know how much my English proficiency was improved or not.

Luckily, when I was a university student, I had some chances to talk to foreigners who speak English. I felt frustrated when I had talks with them because I could not catch the meaning what they were saying clearly. The real conversation went diversely, and it was different from what I memorized in the text book. Since I felt embarrassed and humiliated about asking questions, I kept smiling although I did not understand what they were saying. For example, while walking with English teacher Christina,  I saw a cute dog was passing front of us, and  Christina talked about her pet. Most of time I could not understand what she was saying. Although I wanted to ask and say about her pet, I missed timing to talk and kept smiling.  When my sophomore year in the university I went to English community to improve my speaking skill, and I met my English teacher John. He caught my bad habit. He advised me to ask questions when I did not understand and let me know some useful expressions when I ask such as "Excuse me?", "Could you repeat it again?"

After receiving John's advice, I tried not to keep smiling but asking questions if I did not catch the meaning during conversation. And, I felt that way helped my listening and speaking skills because I started to concentrate on what speakers saying instead of ignoring them.

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The moment that I learned the word 'outlet'

When I was working at a TESOL resource center, one of TESOL graduate students asked me where the outlet was. I didn't understand what she was sayinig the word 'outlet' in the libarary at that time, because I came up with an outlet which is a shop to sell outdated goods. Therefore, when the student said an outlet, I was confused at first. After asking some stupid questions to her, I realized that she was holding her laptop and kept showing me a movement to plug in the device. It was only after that I understood the word 'outlet' means, a socket. With the experience, the word 'outlet' would never be erased in my memory.

McDonalds Drive Thru Incident

I had this experience not long after I settled in New Zealand. It was a fine day and was about time for dinner. I and my Korean friend decided to have a hamburger from McDonalds. We couldnt be bothered to park the car, place an order, and have our meal there. So weve decided to drive thru and take out the meal. The McDonalds crew greeted us through the speaker phone. Afterwards, I placed an order through the speaker phone but instead of the confirmation of the order, there was a short pause and the crew asked me to repeat my order. Then, I again placed the order with my best possible pronunciation but she still couldnt understand me. I remember being embarrassed and at the same time frustrated. So I just drove thru, parked my car, walked in the McDonalds, and had our meal there. I surely have realized the importance of face-to-face interaction there. Because of the incident, I didnt drive near the McDonalds drive thru for a year. However, few years later, I even managed to drive thru the KFC drive thru. 

When I first came to Korea, I started taking lessons. I also spent quite a lot of time with a Korean family (husband, wife and two sons). The father and one of the sons spoke English reasonably well, but the mother spoke none. During the time I spent with them I tried to use my Korean when I felt the situation was appropriate. In my studies, I was having some trouble coming to terms with the fact that I'd have to change all my verbs depending on who I was talking to, due to the Korean culture of communicating with people elder or more senior to you in a completely different way. Frankly, this was a huge blow and really depressing, since I felt I was learning a lot at the time and suddenly felt like I was back at square one! Anyway, I guess I went through a period of not really thinking it was important and continued to use a mixture of medium level Korean regardless of who I was talking to. No one really objected and looking back I can guess this was simply due to me being a foreigner and not being in control of the language; the Koreans were letting me get away with language that they wouldn't have tolerated from a fellow Korean!

At some point however I had been exposed to enough of the politer forms of Korean that I occasionally used the different forms, though not always in the right situation. One night, the father and mother of the family and I were leaving the house, and I used the polite expression of "let's go" directed at the mother. In previous cases I'd just use the more informal version. This time the mother looked at me and smiled and as she walked past, and the father patted me on the shoulder and said well done. It wasn't until about an hour or so later, that I realised why their reactions were different. I think it was at that point that I realised that these different forms were important and they would actually make a difference to how people saw me. I wasn't aware of the terms of language competence that I know now, but I guess you could say I was improving my sociolinguistic competence, or more specifically, my sociolinguistic competence, in that I was finally seeing the effects that different language would have on different people at different times, something that I would never have really noticed speaking English to native English speakers since it is all so natural to me.

I can't speak Korean!

Fortunately, thanks to my three-year-elder brother, I looked over his shoulder how to read Alphabet when I was 10 years old, a fourth grade elementary student. At those times, there were not many students who had started learning English at early age like these days such as English kindergarten. After entering the middle school, I began to learn English in earnest. Everyday morning, I woke up 5 o'clock to go to a language institute since the class began at 6 o'clock. The only word that I could say was Thank you and I'm sorry that was too common and basic expressions as much as young children who didn't take any English class knew in our society. On the first day of the class at English institute, I needed to introduce myself to other students and our teacher. She wrote some useful expressions for us to use them to say hello to every one in class even though we didn't learned some vocabulary such as introduce, myself, I'd like to. However, I was quite excited that I could speak English with long sentences I had never learned before. So I kept learning English even in Winter when snow was stacked up to the extent that my knees plunged into it.

One day, she gave a task which is to pretend a foreigner or Korean American who couldn't speak Korean at all. She took us to the largest book store in Incheon and ordered to ask whether they had any Aesop's fable in the book store only using English. So we divided into two or three groups of 4 members, I remember, and headed for the information center. After catching my breath, I asked the staffs, "Do you have any Aesop story? Sorry, I can't speak Korean." I successfully threw a question although saying the Aesop story instead of Aesop fable I couldn't remember the right word at that moment. The response of one staff was too embarrassed to answer any word. Then the staff pleaded for help to other staffs next her. (I remember the staff was female definitely!) The second staff was female too and she also asked us what we were looking for, and we tossed a same question in English. She was flustered a little bit but answered slowly in English, "What? Can you speak one more?" Even though we repeated the same question for several times, the staff couldn't understand the name of Aesop. That the staff could never distinguish the pronunciation of Aesop [í:sap] was exactly what my teacher had expected because we had pronounced [ísop] in Korean. Returning to our teacher who stood behind the pole, we glibly reported our results in Korean screaming with laughter. During the whole that day, we were exhilarated with the success of our mission and pretended foreigners uttering exclamations to see some goods. This has been an interesting episode for my English learning process.

When I first came to Korea, I tried to teach myself Korean because I lived in Incheon and classes were hard to come by. I mistakenly spent weeks learning various body parts and other nouns that I would rarely need for casual conversation. Some of the mistakes I made as I tried to use my Korean were quite amusing. For instance, when at a restaurant with no chopsticks on the table, I asked the waiter for some fingers, please. Sometimes, my enthusiasm was over the top. I shocked a couple of middle schoolers walking near my academy as I excitedly shouted ooyoo at their milk as I walked by. Another problem I had was in directing taxi drivers to a place near my apartment. I was told to say Mokdong Nambububwon. They never could understand me, even after a year of trying. I have had some successes and after two years of Korean classes at various language schools, I am a competent intermediate speaker who needs an understanding interlocutor. I practiced the lyu sound for years and now feel I can say something is difficult without difficulty. One way I am truly blessed is I have a genuine interest in learning Korean. I want to know. I've had Koreans ask me why I'm 'wasting my time?' I may never be great at Korean, but everything I learn makes living here less stressful and helps me build relationships with the people around me. 

My first experience of learning second language was when my family moved into Saipan. I was eight years old and did not know how to speak English. My mother, who was worried about my school life without being able to speak English at all, made me memorize alphabet before we got to Saipan. Next thing she made me memorize was how to spell my name in English and some expressions needed in school. I still remember those expressions, those were: "bathroom please"; "phone number (I do not remember)"; and "yes and no". My mother prepared me with this simple word expressions so I would not have problem going to the restroom and know our home phone number when something happens. But, it turned out that I did not need to use the expression "bathroom please" because our teacher made us students to use sign language of alphabet 'W' to expression 'water' and 'r' for 'restroom'. And luckily I did not have any problems that I needed to contact my mother before I was able to speak and understand English. I was able to learn English from my surroundings in natural situations until fifth grade in Saipan elementary school.

A true story based on my own experience as a learner of English as foreign language

I have started studying English from my senior year of university. I mean studying English for real world communication. Learning English from middle and high school did not help me to speak for communication because English lessons were proceeded mainly in the grammar translation method which involved a great deal of vocabulary memorization, deductive lessons of grammar structures, and translation into Korean. Doing grammar exercises and translating into Korean did not bring me any opportunities to build communicative competence. Expressing my own thoughts or feelings in English was almost impossible through this secondary education.

         More to the point, I also did not realize the need of oral production of English until the English interview that I had to pass as a part of examinations to be an announcer for a TV station. In order to achieve my dream, I had no choice but to study English focusing on speaking but I did not have enough time to practice and increase my communicative competence. When I was figuring out a good way to overcome my situation, I suddenly remembered the assertion from one of my middle school teachers. He said that we can communicate in English almost freely if we memorize all the contents of English textbook for second year students of middle school. He told us the reason that the English textbook especially for the second year course of middle school has the right level of speaking that people normally use when communicating. I had no choice but to believe him for now so I did not hesitate to buy all the materials (i.e., explanation book of English textbook and audio tapes) that I need to practice English. I started to memorize all the dialogues and everyday expressions in the textbook using the script and the audiotapes. I listened and repeated sentences over and over. Now I can tell that I actually used the "Audiolingual Method" (Knowledge from MA TESOL course) by repetition drills to familiarize the sounds and structural patterns of the language. I really did my best to memorize the language but I happened to realize that this was not going to work to fulfill my goal (My goal was to speak English fluently to be an announcer at that time).

         As another way to improve my English speaking, I decided to take a leave of absence from university for a while and go to Australia for language studies. I made this decision because I thought just staying at school without any improvement for my dream was meaningless for my future. The experience of learning English and living at the same time in Australia gave me both frustration and motivation. I remember one major incident among many embarrassing moments that I underwent in Australia. It took place whenever I took a bus on the way to the language school in the early mornings. The bus driver (the bus driver was the same every morning) always asked me where I get off but he did not ask that anyone else. When I got that question from the bus driver at the first time, I was very afraid to tell him my destination because I had no confidence about the pronunciation even for one word. I answered "Pimple" (name of train station) somehow hesitantly. He asked me again with "Sorry?" but I did not know that "sorry?" was another expression of "Pardon?" at that time. I understood his "sorry" as the original meaning of "sorry" (as if someone says "sorry", he or she did something bad and says, "I'm sorry"). What I responded to him was, "it's okay!". The automatic response for "I'm sorry". This misunderstanding was happened because I think I have learned English through the "Grammar translation method" (education from middle and high school) and "Audiolingual method" (repetition drills using audiotapes before going to Australia). Without any interaction for English use, I could speak only from my memorization. On the next day, I answered "Pimple" to the bus driver's question again. This time he repeated "Pimple" many times to me and I did not know the reason why he was doing so. It was very frustrating to get that kind of question every morning without knowing the reason. So that I told this story to my homestay parents and finally we figured out the reason. The problem was on my pronunciation of /l/. I noticed that I pronounced /l/ sound to more like /r/. Carol (homestay mom) told me that maybe the bus driver asked my destination to help me to get off at the right stop. And then Carol also told me that the bus driver repeated "Pimple" many times to me because he maybe wanted to correct my pronunciation of /l/ sound. With the help of my homestay family, I finally could understand everything about the bus driver's intention. The homestay family helped me to pronounce the /l/ sound and I practiced it a lot over the night. On the next day, I took the bus and the bus driver asked the same question as usual. I answered "Pimple" to him nervously and he smiled and said, "There you go".

         In the language class on the other hand, I was totally ok in a supportive environment of classroom as a safety zone with my classmates who were almost at the same level of my English. It was even so much fun to try a variety of interesting activities such as 'find someone who', 'information gap', 'Bingo', and so on. I did not have many difficulties to talk to the teachers and the classmates in the safety zone. I think that was because the teachers spoke slowly using mostly easy words for me to understand and they also used many nonverbal behavior such as gestures and facial expressions to support my comprehension. It was an incredible experience for me to communicate with somebody in English. Even though the communication in English was very limited, I was very glad when someone understood about what I spoke in English. Interacting people in English motivated me a lot and led me to study English even much harder.

             By the time I came back to Korea after studying for several months in Australia, I changed about what I want to be and what I want to do for the future. I wanted to do something related to English since I became deeply engaged in studying English. After the graduation of university, I found a perfect job for me, teaching English. Since I enjoyed teaching and I loved children, teaching children was just right for me. More than all, teaching English was the best lesson for me to learn more English and to develop my English proficiency because I had to teach English in English which was very challenging for me and I had to prepare a lot. A great deal of interaction with co-teachers who were native English speakers was also very helpful to improve my speaking skills including pronunciation, intonation, deduction and so on.  

I'm Hyo Jeong. About ten years ago, I went to the England with my younger sister for traveling. We had a plan to stay England five days and to move to Paris, but my younger sister wanted to go Paris earlier, because the weather was not good in England at that time. The problem was we had to change the time of ticket through the telephone. It was the first time for me to call the real English person, so I was nervous and wonder if I could do this. First, I exchanged many coins in order to fail the calling. I came into the red telephone box in the street, and push the buttons, trembling fingers. First time it seemed to be easy, even if it was a little bit hard to understand their accent, because I was used to American English from my middle school. At the end of the conversation, the voice of telephone operator was changed into mechanic voice, I was confused this. The voice repeated the same letters, for example, A, apple, a I didnt catch why this process was necessary, I hang up several times, and we ran out of coins, too. In last, I was exhausted about calling, and I became automatically talk to the schedule with the telephone operator. At the end step, the idea came upon to me that the process was for the spelling check for the right ticket and name. With confidence, I pushed the buttons with the last coins, I called, eventually, I succeed it. My younger sister and I said Hooray! ignoring peoples notice. We spent many coins for 30 minutes just to change the train schedule. Can you believe this?

 After arriving Paris, I didnt want to go to the Eiffel Tower, because I had been there before this trip and I was a little bit tired and ran out of money. I said to my younger sister, You can go alone, and maybe there are lots of people who can take some pictures for you, Id better stay here until you come down. At first, she insisted on me going together, but I persuaded her to go up by herself. After she left, I found several benches which were a little bit far from there. Because of the wind, it was getting cold. I zipped up my jacket and just waited for my sister there, looking around people and the beautiful scenery of the tower. It was already nine p.m. Some police officers appeared in the square. I was getting bored. I found a woman who was reading a book just next to me. I asked her why she didnt go up to the Eiffel Tower. She said to me, If I go up to the Eiffel Tower again, I will love the Paris so much, I cant leave this city. What a romantic reason she had! We were talking for almost an hour. I got to know a little about her. Her name was Maria from America, and she was traveling with her younger sister and mother and she was also waiting for them, just like me. After her younger sister and mother came to her, I realized the Eiffel Towers service was closed. I didnt catch the voice of announcement about the closing time. I was very worried and frazzled about my younger sisters not coming and I had to go the youth hostel by the train during midnight. We didnt have cell phones to give a call each other. I thought maybe my younger sister didnt find me and went to the hostel by herself. The problem was how I could get to the hostel (at this time there were many hippies and thieves). Maria was kindly enough to ask the police officers to take me to my place. Luckily, one police officer was going to the same station like me. He was so tall and had a big nose. I was too worried about my sister to talk with him on the train. In the train, there were just few people, and some teenagers. They looked like trouble makers who were watching me. After getting out of the station, they followed me. I was so nervous and frightened, so I broke out in a cold sweat. When the police officer turned around and said to them something in French, they went away. After several minutes walking in the street with him, we arrived at the intersection of the street. He asked me, Now, can you go there by yourself? I would like to say, No, please take me to the hostel. But I said to him, Yes, thanks. because he seemed to be very tired, also its not comfortable to walk with him. After he left, I crossed the street. It was so dark and quiet in the street. There were few people and that made me frightened more. Having a deep breath, I grabbed my bag tightly and was rushing to the place as fast as I could without breathing. I never have rushed so fast in my life. At the door, with a faint breath and face, I met my younger sister who cried. As soon as we saw each other, we all cried and hugged each other. Every time that I see the Eiffel Tower in a picture, it reminds me of a faint breathing and terrified woman in the dark streets of Paris.

Vocabulary

When I first came to Korea, I had very limited vocabulary knowledge. One day for a class project my students were making rain sticks. We needed dry uncooked rice to put inside the paper towel tubes. I went downstairs to the GS25 to attempt to buy rice thinking it could not be that difficult to find. I looked around the store but could not find any uncooked rice, so I asked the cashier if he spoke English. He didn't. Therefore, I tried to use the little Korean vocabulary I knew to find the uncooked rice: and . At the time I thought these words meant rice and cold and this is what I wanted, rice that was not hot. I repeated these words a few times while gesturing that I wanted to eat rice. However the cashier always responded with no. He had no idea what I was saying. Later I told my Korean counselor about my experience at the shop, and asked her what I should say to get uncooked rice; she translated exactly what I was asking for. Essentially I was asking for cooked rice, while also asking the cashier if he was cold. I have learned a lot since this experience especially about correct intonation when speaking Korean, as well as the plain fact that sometimes it is very hard to get what you want when you cannot adequately communicate in another language.