Arsenio’s ESL Podcast: Questions & Answers – Why Students Fail at Learning a Language

Speaker 1: (00:00)
Guys, welcome back to another episode of, of course, Arsenio’s ESL podcast. You know what, today is a special, it’s a Q and a. And you know what? Because I’ve been through so on so many different occasions through this process, I really just want to emphasize why do people give up on themselves so easily self-sabotage, right? I’ve talked about this on so many different occasions and I think the end result and why everyone always does this is because there’s not a strong enough why power. So for those of you who are learning through me and listening to me and trying to develop yourselves, I implement a lot of different things like personal development. Ah, I bring international guest speakers on here. I do a variety of things to keep you guys guessing. And you know what? Out here in Thailand, it’s very, very difficult to keep people motivated because they don’t have a strong enough sense and they give up on themselves very easily.

Speaker 1: (01:00)
Now remember a while back, back in March, I actually posted a podcast in regards to one of my students. Now, this particular student, uh, he was an engineer at a very reputable hotel, um, eastern. As a matter of fact, it’s a very high class hotel and I met him through some students that I was teaching at, at a company just before that. Nonetheless. Uh, I began teaching him and I felt like I didn’t know what he really wanted. I’m like, you know, what, what is it that you truly want? And so again, when I asked people that they don’t have a white power behind it, it’s the beause why to why you are learning English. Some people say, oh, I want to communicate better. That’s not a strong enough white power. Everyone wants to communicate better. Tell me the reason why you want to learn.

Speaker 1: (01:51)
Let me give you another example. A fine example of this would be an art director at a, a at the number one tech company in Thailand. I actually teach him along with other students within that room. And I’m like, why do you want to learn English? Well, I’m going to La and I’m going to learn a bunch of things about graphic designing and I want to be able to communicate that back to my staff back here. And so I’m like seeing now that is a very, very strong why to why you want to learn a language. If you just say for grammar, listen, you’re going to learn grammar your entire life. Oh, I’m to learn conversation, listen to, you’re going to learn conversation your entire life. The goal is to implement habits in your routine throughout the day to better yourself. This is what I do.

Speaker 1: (02:37)
And so when we actually, when I talk about students always failing, the number one cause of failure is that they always self sabotage themselves and they give up on themselves too easily. Now there’s another student that I teach privately and he’s been learning with me for quite some time. Now. There was a guy that I met through another trainer. I know there’s a lot of people, right? But there’s a trainer most specifically on Wednesdays. Um, and he’s like, hey, I have a friend who wants to study, who wants to study English. And I said, okay. So I started speaking to him and I spoke to him. I’m like, what is it? Why do you want to communicate? He’s like, I want to go to Hong Kong, I want to do this, I want to do that. And for 10 hours, man, we learned a lot of hands on English and whatnot and it was fantastic.

Speaker 1: (03:21)
But after 10 hours, he was gone. That was April, just before the [inaudible] holidays. And he never came back. And so yes, there were some chatter, you know, here and there. And he was like, Oh, uh, this and that. And I’m like, yeah, hey, completely up to you, but you don’t have a strong enough why. And a lot of people say, oh, I want to do this, I want to do that. But there is no action that backs up what they are saying. They are incongruent with everything that is going through their body. And so he fell out. But another guy, he posted my picture on his Facebook page. Another guy reached out to me, his name is som yacht, and now I teach him personal development. And a variety of different things as well as helping him at work. He has renewed 30 hours consistently and he always does this.

Speaker 1: (04:06)
Why? Because he knows the stronger, the bigger picture, and this is what a lot of you need to understand. You need to figure out what your bigger picture is. Cause while I was teaching these two twins and these two twins who have just quitted on me just recently, it was like four to five cancellations, right? They reduced a number of hours from two to one per day and then they said, oh well we have this, we have that. And then last week the mother contacted me and say, oh they have to go visit the grandfather. And then this week they’re like, oh we want to suspend the classes cause we want to learn French and German, blah blah blah blah blah. And I said, yeah, well I saw this coming from a mile away. You guys don’t have that urge within you. And a lot of students don’t. You can’t force upon, you can’t force something upon someone that to, to make them do what they don’t want to do.

Speaker 1: (04:54)
Does that make any sense? That was in the grit, the movie, the great debaters. Like if we force and continue forcing people to do something that they simply just do not want to do, guess what’s going to happen. This is why so many students are reluctant, they are hesitant and they just do not want to learn a language whatsoever because they are forced down their throats. Things that that has no, you know, value to them and that they cannot apply in the real world. Practicality. They don’t have that. So as an instructor, do I take this seriously? No, because I mean even with my patrion and you know, people are going to be coming onto my patron and then they’ll probably cancel. I asked them why they cancel. It could be because of this. It can be because of that. I don’t take it personal.

Speaker 1: (05:44)
And it’s really funny because when I even go into the entire language center and you know, in terms of what I’m doing and the place I used to work at before we would be at fault as a teacher. Like, even if I taught them and I told them, you know, what bleeds, you know, a comeback where I pled to them and I tried so hard to bring them back and I was an outstanding teacher. If that specific student didn’t renew, even though that student never wanted to learn English, I’m at fault. I lose work and I’m the bad teacher. That’s a very, very horrible way of approaching a completely debacle. Amin, completely shambolic broken ass system. And so what I do is I assess myself. I saw these girls who were sitting across from me, these two twins, there were times that they weren’t very engaged.

Speaker 1: (06:34)
They weren’t enthusiastic about learning compared to companies that I teach at. And I knew that they were going to go away just as the other people were going to go away. It’s like another lady I was teaching, she’s a vice president of a big bank and she’s not on top of things. She doesn’t send me things. She doesn’t say, Oh, can you do this or can you do that? Can you please, um, set this up for me? I’m, I want to learn this day. I want to learn that they, she’s not on top of it. She doesn’t send me your schedule. She’s gone. She’s going to be gone and I’ve already accepted that y is not a strong enough. Why? Why do you want to learn English? All I want to communicate that’s not good enough. That is never good enough because guess what? You communicate every day in your language on a daily basis.

Speaker 1: (07:15)
So why aren’t you communicating in English? Because there aren’t any English speakers. Listen, no excuses. I’ve brought Kim Kim onto my podcast if you guys haven’t heard and she learned all by herself. There’s another lady that has a daughter. I’ve been like somewhat teaching the daughter and then the lady’s like, Oh, I have to cancel or I have to cancel. Guess what? She’s going to be gone too. There’s not a strong enough why, but you know what? There’s another lady that I teach, she’s an influencer, has like 200,000 followers on Instagram. And she’s like, listen, I want to be on this top show by the name of Luke Golf out here in Thailand and I need you to help me with improving my conversational capabilities. And I said, okay, well you know what? Here I am. See there’s a why behind it. So guys, you need to establish your why before learning anything in life. Please establish your why. If you do not establish your why, you’re going to be like the masses out there that have always quitting on themselves. So I hope you guys could take this with you, this Q and a and if you have any questions or if you have any additional questions in regards to more Q and A’s, please let me know. I’m your host as always over and out.


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