A Little ESL

Now, I want to introduce a new feature that we will be experimenting with. Recall that I am an English professor, with a Ph.D. and everything. I have taught literally thousands of students, most of whom have been English-language learners. They have spoken every imaginable language, from Basque to Haitian Creole to Cambodian to !Kung. Along the way, I have picked up a few tricks on how to teach English as a Second Language (the "ESL" in my title).

Since so many people who work in national parks and similar places are new English speakers, we thought it would be useful for me to offer some of these tricks, to help you as you become more comfortable as a speaker of English.

Here is the first one: look up some political speeches on YouTube. Start with speeches by Barack Obama. Pick a famous one, and then find a transcript of the speech on the web (this will be easy: just use Google, and insert a few words from the speech into the search box. This works best if you put in consecutive words inside quote marks). Play the speech, then read the speech yourself, then play it again. Do this over and over. Obama is an especially clear speaker, so you will find yourself improving your pronunciation as you do this.

That option is for liberals. For conservatives, do the same thing with Ronald Reagan.