Teacher Wendy and her new teaching tools. Practical English Usage (Michael Swan/Oxford) and The Oxford Library of English Usage (Grammar / Spelling / Usage)

One of the new services we’ve added to our business is Online ESL classes/tutoring aimed at adults who learned English as a second language and would like to put in some additional effort to learn elements that will help with cultural adaptation or career advancement.

The idea for these classes came about for two reasons. One – according to the Harvard Business Review, in its article “Global Business Speaks English”, some companies have adopted an English corporate language policy in order to remain competitive and to support expansion plans. Employees who are really great at their job shouldn’t have to worry about losing their job just because of a new company policy and a change in language to one other than that of their home country.

Secondly, I’ve been reading “The Culture Map” by Erin Meyer. In it, she demonstrates how the rapid globalization of today’s commerce has almost created a communications crisis – even among those who speak English but are from different countries. My company spent over a year working with a Chinese firm hoping to expand their brand of consumer electronics in the North American market. We all spoke English, yet I found over time what I thought was really clear communication was NOT, because as someone from the United States I didn’t know how to “read the air” and pick up on unspoken subcontext of a conversation.

My goal is to help adults who learned English as a second language to improve their English so they speak with little or no detectable accent. In addition, here are a few more things that can trip up a non-native English speaker:

  • Cultural references
  • The level of formality (or not) of written communications (depending on its purpose)
  • Idioms (those sayings that make no logical sense)
  • Other general cultural references that unless you grew up here or during a particular time period, you just or not going to understand.
  • Fill in the blank _______________________. What do you want to learn?

It’s been acknowledged – in education circles at least – that English is one of the most difficult languages to learn as a second language. Sometimes self-study is not enough. Sometimes Duolingo or another app is not enough! I am a native of Seattle, a part of the United States that is considered to have no accent. (The home of such global businesses as Amazon, Microsoft, Expedia, Starbucks, Costco, Weyerhauser, and Boeing.) I can help people learn to speak so they fit in almost anywhere by learning to pronounce English words as clearly as possible. This will help people adapt to almost any professional setting with ease.

Please visit our page Online ESL Classes to learn more about these services, and to request more information. Thank you.

NEW! Announcing Online ESL classes for Business English