Post by Rachel Dry on Aug 20, 2020 15:39:27 GMT
Although English is a lingua franca, we still teach standard English in the classrooms. There will be different accents in the classroom but teachers are taught how to teach pronunciation. I think as long as pronunciation doesn't cause any misunderstanding the accent is acceptable. In my classroom, there are a great variety of nationalities and they all speak English with different accent.
Translanguaging means moving across languages to achieve effective interaction. But can one language domineer the other one?
I agree with both of these comments, in a classroom with students from multiple countries with completely different L1's my students use English as a lingua franca. In a boarding school environment they are surrounded by others whose English accents and pronunciation is different from theirs but it rarely creates a scenario where meaning cannot be transferred. Although they may not all be perfect or speak in 'standard English' they are all intelligible and will use all their linguistic resources, including translanguaging (when possible) to converse with others. I am always in awe at the linguistic skills young learners have and, as a monoligual native speaker myself, i am incredibly jealous of their language skills.
I hope that the ELT industry continues to grow in a way which recognises the future of English and doesn't dwell on old style ownership and native speakerism ideas which ignore the huge statistics that show English is more than just the language of Inner Circle countries it is ever changing and adapting to the needs of its users, whether they are native or non native.