The Switch in My Head
Looking back on those days, I lived in a sort of double personality.
When we moved to the U.S., my son Jack barely spoke English outside of his middle school classroom. While I used English at work all the time. So I volunteered to teach him English at home. Then I came to think I was better than him at anything about English. Then I tended to correct him whenever he spoke English. Looking back on those days, I lived in a sort of double personality. When I was outside, I often felt frustrated as my American friends often had a hard time understanding me. Meanwhile, I was so eager to teach Jack English at home. There seemed to be a switch in my head, a switch between underconfidence and overconfidence. The feeling on one side only amplified the feeling on the other. I ended up being rude to Jack while teaching him. Now I really feel sorry for him.
One day my pride took a hit. Jack said that I was wrong saying the word “world”. While I pronounced the “I” sound, I tended to stretch my tongue rather than curl it. I was irritated: Now you are teaching me? I am still your teacher! We went to check on Google Translator. It turns out, I was wrong. And I was wrong about almost all the “l” pronunciation. The tutorial showed many native Chinese speakers can’t curl their tongues properly to make the “l” sound in English. But young learners can…
