An Excellent ESL Teacher

I took tutoring this morning. My tutor is not a native speaker, but her pronunciation, speech, grammar, and writing are incredibly perfect. When I first met her, I thought that she is an American or was born in the U.S. at least because of her excellent English skill. When I knew that she was born in Iran and moved to the U.S. 10 years ago, I was really surprised. I was amazed at her English skill, so I asked her how she improved her English skill. She told me that when she was 10 years old in Iran, her mother made her go English school. She went to the English school which had American teachers everyday and also went to normal elementary school at the same time. She had to learn English everyday, and she decided about her major which is English. After she graduated from the university with English major. She started teaching English in Iran and other Middle Eastern countries too. When she moved to the U.S., she was shocked because she couldn't understand what American people were saying. Even though she had 16 years experience as an ESL teacher at the time, she was struggling with her English skills, especially listening skill. However, she didn't want to go back to Iran and determined to live here. Then, she started going to college. At the beginning, she had to take ESL classes. Because she was already good enough with English except for listening skill, soon she was able to take an academic English reading class which American students take. After that she earned her PhD. in English and has been getting many offers from college as an ESL instructor. Because she is not a native speaker, she knows how difficult it is to learn English as a second language. She said that many immigrants give up learning English soon after moving to the U.S. and never go to ESL school. As a result, they are always staying with their native communities. She told me, "You are going along on the right track!" She taught me that the most important thing is that trying to learn something everyday and not giving it up. She told me that in order to improve speaking skill, watching TV is the most effective way, and she also recommended to memorize English sentences. She told me that if you memorize the sentence perfectly, the wards comes out from your mouth without thinking, and you will be surprised about that. I had never thought about memorizing English sentences, but I will try to focus on memorizing them from now on. She also told me that if you believe that you are doing well and will definitely become successful, it will become true for sure. She gave me a lot of hope and courage today. :)