Conversation 48 - Excerpt

But if you fill their lessons with rules, if your students are always worrying about being “right” or “wrong” instead of relaxing and just focussing on communicating, then those rules really get in the way of the learning process, of the process of language acquisition.

But then.when– or how– do we.?

Discourage double negatives? Get them to say “between you and me”? By example, mostly. You need to have confidence in your own English as a model– you’re a native speaker, after all– a college-educated English speaker almost.

Soon college-educated, I hope!

Yes, I’m sure you will be. So have confidence in your own English, the English you use. Your students will hear you. They’ll pay attention to how you speak, to what you say.