As EFL teachers — teachers of English as a Foreign Language — we are subject to, not only mornings full of irate teenagers who don’t want to learn anything and days spent trying to make learning fun, but also bad grammar and bad pronunciation on a daily basis. Even those of us blessed with Upper Intermediate students have to continuously correct their grammar usage or pronunciation mistakes, lest they say a word weirdly and completely change the meaning of their phrase.
Below is a compilation of comments I have collected from EFL teachers, from colleagues and from friends. Thank you to all who have contributed to this little article! And to those who have no idea what it means to be a TEFL…here’s your little taste into our world!
Maria Zammit — “My Italian students say "bitch’ when really they mean "beach’.”
Vicky Bamber — “One student said "My favourite day is Friday, because on Saturday school isn’t’. I also have this beautiful piece of literature: “It all happened in a small village. In 1973 children had Helloween and they use to do scare crow of their mothers and cut their heads. But in one family children about 10-11 years old didn’t do scare crow of their mom. They tie up their mom and cut he head and run away and noone saw them again.””
Warren Borg — “When I asked a student what Maria is in English, they answered with "Marijuana’.”
Andre Zahra — “I had a student who said "English is a mundial language’, meaning "global’ instead.”
Timothy Borg — “My favourite one was "You should get your eyes tasted’, instead of "tested’.”
Janice Camilleri — “’I travel by sheep’ instead of "ship’.”
Anonymous – “"Helmut Kohl is going to have a big erection.’”
Anonymous – “A student of mine kept saying "cock’ very loudly and with emphasis when trying to say the word "cockroach’.”
Thea Busuttil — “I had a Russian student who would put "the’ in front of everything when he spoke. "I went with the friends to the party, at the Paceville in the Malta’.”
Andrew Brookes — “Apparently, the past continuous of "go’ is "wenting’.”
Kyle Pace — “I had a Libyan student who pronounced "though’ as "t-how-g-ht’ once.”
Mark Zarb — “The only thing that comes to mind is regional pronunciation; for example saying "yellyjish’ instead of "jellyfish’.”
Kimberly Vella — “One Italian student tried to turn every word into an adverb so he came up with words like fasterly, smarterly and sleeperly.”
Gavin Borg — “Well, this one time a student asked me "What is pissed?’. I thought it was a weird question but I told him it was another, rude word for angry, but he just looked confused and said "No, pissed! Pissed!’ Anyway, turns out he was just mispronouncing priest.”