Vicki

Teacher of professional and technical English, writer and teacher trainer.

Nail Technicians in NYC

Nov 072010

I can’t remember ever visiting (or even noticing) a nail salon in the UK, but there seem to be lots in the US. It took me several years to venture into one and then several years to go back, because the smell of the chemicals is powerful. But now painted toenails are a sign that summer’s on its way in our house. (I like wearing flip flops.)

The salons are generally staffed by immigrants. I’ve often wondered about their backgrounds and lives and some have answered my questions and chatted a little, but mostly they don’t. Many seem to have very limited English, although some have lived here for many years.

So I was intrigued when one of my students on an MA TESOL course chose Nail Salon workers for a needs analysis project. It was a tough assignment because the technicians didn’t want to talk to her – I’ll let you read why. But the results were fascinating and she’s very kindly agreed to let me publish them here.

So I’m delighted to share ‘English for Nail Technicians in New York’ by Connie Sargent:

Some things that struck me in particular were:

[The ESP need to] Teach American ideas of relaxation and indulgence
[That] Interaction is made more complicated by physical contact
Every [customer] interview referred to a fear that nail technicians are talking about them to other nail technicians

Did you find anything striking too?

Hitting the road

Events 6 Responses »

Sep 062010

I will shortly be off on my travels, so please forgive me if I am slow to respond to comments. I’m looking forward to meeting some you on my travels to the UK, France, Germany and Poland.

I’m going to miss home, but here’s one of the places I’ll be visiting. So your question is: where is it?

Bye for now and catch you later!

Got any time to spare?

Teaching ideas and lessons 6 Responses »

Aug 172010

Well, of course you haven’t, but in case some turns up, here’s a great way to spend it.

It’s is a video of a management training workshop by Marshall Goldsmith. He demonstrates an activity for developing skills in giving (and receiving) feedback – useful skills for work and for life in general. It lasts a little over an hour, but seems well worth the time investment if you can then integrate the activities into your classes. Plus, he’s pretty entertaining.

Pretty girls make men dumb

Research and curiosities 8 Responses »

Jul 272010

Inspired by Evan Frendo’s really interesting post on impression management (IM), I went hunting for research papers in the University of Pennsylvania’s online libraries. Unfortunately there aren’t many linguistics papers to be found on IM, but there are stacks of social psychology ones. As I browsed through them, I came across this. (I kid you not!):

So in other words, talking to pretty girls impairs men’s ability to think. Well, fancy that! Do you have any favourite pieces of research?

A technical English lesson – machines that don’t work

Teaching ideas and lessons 3 Responses »

Jul 232010

Just a quick note to say:

1. OUP have kindly posted something I wrote on problem solving activities for technical English here. It contains a lesson idea.

2. Macmillan have allowed me to describe my key struggles with ‘merican (in their wonderful ‘merican English month) here.

Formal instruction, demonstration and something magical

Research and curiosities 13 Responses »

Jul 152010

If you want to teach someone to sing a tune, you could write down the notes and give it to them to play (providing they can read music, of course). Or you could play it yourself and get them to sing along after they’ve heard it a few times. Or you could do something rather magical like Bobby McFerrin does in this 3 minute video. Do you think teaching a language can be similar?

Syllabus

Indie publishing 5 Responses »

Jun 242010

Wehey! I’ve just written a syllabus for a possible new book. You gotta love the process!

HSBC ads

Teaching ideas and lessons 11 Responses »

Jun 032010

I’ve been passing through a lot of foreign airports recently and enjoying the wonderful HSBC ads. I’m sure you know the ones I mean. Here is an example.

Here are some more that I haven’t seen in my recent travels that come from Charles De Gaulle airport. I love the way they have localized a global ad campaign to the French location.

And there’s an ad that I haven’t seen that I’d like to propose for US airports. It would be a picture of a hand gun and it would be labeled with the word ‘death’ (or maybe coercion/tyranny/fear/irrationality) in one picture and ‘freedom’ (or maybe liberty or something else that I don’t understand) in another. I love lots of stuff about US culture, but I find the lack of gun control laws here so horrifying.

Bike theft

Teaching ideas and lessons 16 Responses »

May 182010

Bother! The Shark Tank video in my last posting isn’t accessible outside the US. Thanks for alerting me, Evan and very sorry for any frustration I caused folks.

When I first came to the US, I was amused to find people who would pop up on the TV screen after I’d watched a PBS programme and explain what I’d just watched to me. It was surprisingly low context and didactic behaviour that prompted me to ask ‘Do they think I’m an idiot?’. But it also had a sort of charm to it. And the truth is, while it was irritating and condecending to have folks pointing out the bleedingly obvious, sometimes they pointed out things I hadn’t noticed or didn’t know – and was glad to know.

The two pictures below should lead to two example videos that come from a US TV programme called ‘What would you do?’ (if you have time to click on them and wait for an annoying 15 second ad to run – sorry about that) They don’t explore culture so much as race, and gender and there’s an obvious link to the second conditional. I found the content very interesting and perhaps your students will too. I’d expect they’d need to be upper intermediate or advanced to follow the dialogue well. (I’ve run some checks this time and the videos seem to be accessible in Europe at least, so fingers crossed.)

There’s a question I find myself wondering when I watch them: do you think TV programme makers in other countries might have made them differently and how? (Oh and if you do show them to your students, please tell me what they make of them – thank you)

The sales pitch

Teaching ideas and lessons 4 Responses »

May 162010

I find it interesting to see how TV show formats get adjusted as they make their way round the world. The BBC show ‘Dragons’ Den’ originated in Japan and has since made its way to the US, where it’s called ‘Shark Tank’.

Rather than hanging out in an East London warehouse with rickety stairs, the dragons gather in altogether more comfortable surroundings and seem less intimidating. The ideas pitches are rather different as well. I wonder how this one might have been greeted by UK dragons.

The outcomes might not be so different though. I might have misremebered this, but as I recall, despite the positive reactions, Nicole didn’t get the funding she was seeking.

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