Brown Chapters 6, 7, & 8 & Kumar Chapter 6

Upon reading chapter eight of Brown one thing that popped out to me was when authors stated how well over one-half of the one billion English speakers of the world learned English as a second language, and how most English language teachers across the globe are nonnative English speakers. This fact really shocked me-- not because I don't believe it, but just because I have never thought about this, nor have I heard about it. I remember in one of the first days of class we posed questions about if we should we able to teach students when we have no background in their native language. Also, the book asks the question of how important is it that a teacher of a language be a native speaker of the language instead of a nonnative speaker. I find it so interesting that the book demonstrated how nonnative speakers offer as many or even more advantages to students, and that no-- native speaking teachers are not always best for students to learn from. Being that I am an English teacher, and I originally would have said that yes, it is important that a teacher be a native speaker of the language to teacher students, now I am not so sure. I have never thought about the different legitimate and acceptable English dialects that nonnative speakers take on, nor any of the other difference between NEST and NNEST that can be seen as advantages when it comes to teaching language. This is very interesting and has given me much to think about.