Good foreign language teachers do their best to keep their own language skills to a high standard and try to be aware of changes in language usage. An important part of that, when money allows, is visiting countries where the target language is spoken and being sure to gather information and useful materials while you are there!
Last December my husband and I visited Geneva to see the Christmas market and also to visit the well-known market at Martigny. It is many years since I lived briefly in Switzerland and I was very much looking forward to going back. Unbeknown to us, we had chosen to visit during the weekend festivities to mark “L’escalade”; the attempted invasion of Geneva in 1602 by Charles Emmanuel 1er, Duke of Savoie. The first inkling that something unusual was happening was the sight of people in 1602 style clothing. Then we were stopped by a young person in costume, keen to sell us a pin badge to mark the event. He and his accompanying adult very kindly explained about the event and pointed us in the right direction for a fantastic display of weaponry and weapons of torture. It wasn’t quite the language practice I had been expecting, but I found myself interpreting from Swiss French to English for the benefit of a couple of international tourists as a very knowledgeable man went into rather graphic detail about interrogation methods of the time! (See photo)
Luckily that wasn’t my only opportunity to brush up on my language skills during our trip. The vagaries of the Swiss Railways online booking system provided a chance for an in-depth discussion with a very helpful member of staff at the ticket office and the various seasonal market stalls gave us lots of practice with the transactional language of shopping. I took the chance to pick up lots of real-language teaching material including marketing information, tourist brochures and a couple of local newspapers.
During the rest of the year, as my teaching schedule doesn’t allow for regular trips away, I try to watch target language TV shows and read target language books. For more modern language usage I try to watch new YouTube videos, particularly on topics of interest to my students. Recent choices include news reports of the wildfires, batch cooking and ideas for saving water. I am looking for recommendations of good podcasts and will be asking my teenage and adult learners for their ideas. What do you do to keep your language skills relevant?