[etni] EFL-ESL-HSL-HFL-ASL-AFL etc

Amal and All, greetings from Boston!

Amal, you pose excellent questions! All the initials point to learning the 
various languages in various environments. SL is being in an environment that 
offers the TL (Target Language) for real and useful practice outside the 
classroom. FL does not have that luxury. 

I think our focus on EFL, and secondarily ESL, comes from the fact that most of 
the teachers on ETNI are indeed teachers of EFL. On Internet lists for other 
populations of language teachers, I would imagine the focus would be something 
else. In Israel, I would strongly suggest that the HSL teachers and the ASL 
teachers create their own discussion lists. It would cut down the isolation of 
the individual teachers tremendously to be able to interact with teachers 
facing the same challenges.

Unfortunately, most of the professional literature doesn't make the distinction 
between ESL and EFL. The result is that new EFL teachers are given procedures 
that make less sense than those same procedures do for ESL teachers. When 
these procedures tend to fail in EFL situations, the EFL teachers are 
frustrated and befuddled. 

Here in Israel, we are a bit more lucky in that we have some local publishers 
who present us with truly EFL material, rather than having to use ESL material 
from the UK or US.

Jimmy 

Date: Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:13:40 -0700 (PDT)
From: amal higazi <amalhigazi1@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [etni] ESL

Dear all teachers,
 
I have a question in my my mind and I want to share it with you.
Why do we speak of ESL and EFL but not, say, HSL or HFL, or, perhaps 
ASL or AFL? Why is the focus on English?
Waiting for your response.
 
Have a nice weekend,
Amal



      
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