Jeremy Comfort:
I hope that you continue to be as enthusiastic
as the teachers I’ve come across...
 

Jeremy Comfort is well known to many of our readers. He is one of the authors of Effective Communication Series published by Oxford University Press. Together with his friend and partner from York Associates,  Nick Brieger, he has been involved in  several programmes of the British Council, teaching tertiary level teachers, ESP teachers, teachers of Business English. This autumn he was teaching at the RPMTI teachers at a residential course in Zerkalny, where he kindly agreed to give this interview. The second seminar starts on 22 November and we are very lucky to have Jeremy at our Conference.

Tatiana Ivanova
T.I. Thank you for the opportunity to take this interview. Let’s start with why we are here. We are here on a training course for Russian teachers with a bit complicated title a Teacher Training Programme funded by the British Government Know How Fund and managed by the British Council and taught by York Associates. Please say a few words about York Associates. What is it? Why are they in the Programme?
J.C. York Associates is a private firm, a partnership, based in York, in the North East of England and we specialise in language and communication training for industry.for the corporate sectors. So, we do a lot of work with participants from companies throughout Europe and  further afield. We are also involved in teacher training and in particular in business English Teacher training and we have done that for the last five years and a lot of work for the British  Council in Eastern Europe and in Russia in training teachers especially in tertiary sector to new concepts of teaching business English.
T.I. How did you decide that you would like to be an English teacher and was it Business English from the very beginning?
J.C.  It was really a coincidence. I left University and like a lot of people in Britain nowadays I left University owing money. It is quite expensive. So I took a job which I thought would just be a summer job -  teaching English in a language school in London, as you may know, there are lots and lots of language schools in England.
It was teaching English to business people, but teaching general English to business people and I liked it.  And I decided I’d like to follow this as a career. It wasn’t something I chose, I sort of fell into it.
T.I. So from what I know from this course you think that business content or professional content is not a must, so Business English teacher doesn’t have to be an expert on this, but we all feel that you are an expert to some extent. So, what resources did you use to increase your knowledge.
J.C.  I mean, I think that’s important point to make that it is unrealistic to expect language teachers to be experts in areas  such as financial management, production or operations. On the other hand the longer that you work in a certain field the more knowledge you pick up and I think working in business English now for  well over twenty years, naturally if you spend twenty or more years working with accountants, working with marketing  people, you do learn a lot from your students and that’s where I learnt most of what I know.
T.I. Not many people nowadays, I mean not many people abroad, would be happy to go to Russia. What was your reaction to this job when you were chosen to go here?
J.C. I honestly was delighted. Before this programme, I’ve been to Russia before. Russia has always held an appeal for me, so when I was first invited I went to Moscow and I went to St. Petersburg and I was delighted to come back. So I wasn’t worried about it. I mean, I think there are probably some  dangerous aspects to inner-city life in some of the cities of Russia, but to be honest they are also in many cities throughout Europe, also dangerous aspects to life.
T.I. What was the reaction of your family? I mean have you ever been here with your family? Were they curious about Russia? Were they worried about you going  to Russia?
J.C. They were not worried. I travel a lot, and I think they just get used to it. They were very curious, because my wife, her maiden name was actually Borroff. She comes originally from a Russian family and she is just waiting for the opportunity to come with me some time to Russia.
T.I. You mentioned you have two daughters. Are they interested in your profession? Are they going to be teachers  of English?
J.C. I have two daughters – one of 16, one of  19. The 16 year old certainly is not planning to do that. She is determined to be a fashion designer. The other one who is 19 has started to travel a lot and she recently said that she would also like to be a teacher of English, because, I think, she ‘s seen that it is a good job.
T.I. We discussed stereotypes a lot and cultural element in teaching language. It is interesting that you said you had held an appeal for Russia. What is your impression of Russian people and Russian teachers?
J.C. I think that obviously a lot of them have had  a tough time. I know it’s quite difficult times in Russia. They have to work extremely hard, but what I‘ve been incredibly impressed by is enormous enthusiasm to learn and to improve and to become more professional. Much more so than in the West, where you can get quite a lot of cynicism during teacher training sessions, so that’s been a pleasure to work with Russian teachers.
T.I.The next question is a bit philosophical, I think. Are teachers born or made? Is it possible to teach a teacher? Is it more difficult to teach a teacher?
J.C.  We recruit a lot of teachers and there is no doubt that there are some natural teachers. I think you can’t dismiss that. On the other hand there are teachers who aren’t natural teachers, and who have become very very good teachers, very competent teachers, so, I think they are both born and made. When I think about teaching teachers they are difficult to teach. I think teachers are naturally quite a critical bunch of people, so you know, you need to be aware of that.
T.I.  What do you think is or are most difficult things for you as a teacher as a native teacher of English in teaching foreign students?
J.C.  I think the important point to make is that a native teacher of English is at a disadvantage in a fact that they often don’t know the mother tongue of the people they are teaching, therefore they are not aware or it is more difficult for them to understand the interference problems that come from the mother tongue. So, I think that’s an important point to bear in mind. In terms of the most difficult thing to teach there’s a sort of overall point which is difficult and that is to persuade  the students that it is not just a question about being accurate in a language,  being correct in a language, it is also how confidently they use the language. I think this is something that is difficult to get across to some students.
T.I. What is the most difficult  concept in methodology, that is hard to explain to the teachers or difficult for them  to master?
J.C.  I think that’s again related to the last point. I think that in the business world what is appreciated above all is someone who communicates well. People are not very concerned about how accurate you are in use of your grammar, but they are concerned that you get to the point quickly, that you don’t waste time and that you’re helpful, you’re courteous, you know, these things matter, and I think that for a lot of teachers who have been brought up teaching the grammar method or even the old grammar-translation method this is quite a big jump for them to turn, not away entirely from that method, but to move also towards teaching more effectiveness in the use of language.
T.I. Speaking about effectiveness, this concept of accuracy versus fluency and versus effectiveness... Sometimes it is difficult when you have students with different expectations and you mentioned a difficult example from your own experience. Would you tell our readers about it?
J.C.  Yes, of course. That was actually a person that I recently taught, called Sergei, who was actually a man who had been in the Russian Navy, he was a senior when he left Navy, and then he was working for a Swedish Telecoms Company in Moscow. And  he came to us for some intensive training. And as far as the company was concerned they wanted him to manage their project in Moscow. They wanted him to be able to have meetings with the Swedes in English. His perception was he needed to learn a lot of language, he needed to learn a lot of grammar. My perception was that he needed  to become more confident when he spoke, to better get across his messages etc. And it was difficult to persuade him of this and I wasn’t entirely successful.
T.I. How did you manage ?
J.C.  It is always a compromise. To some extent I allowed him to follow his way of learning, not way of learning, but his expectations of what learning a language is about, because he was in his fifties. It is very difficult to change someone’s mind or approach at that stage, but on the other hand I tried to show him how everything that we did, however grammatical it was, had an application and could be put to practice in real situations such as on  the telephone or  writing an e-mail.
T.I. This  morning you gave us a very interesting exercise on teacher’s roles: a manager, a decision-maker, evaluator, etc. And you asked us to say which are most comfortable and most uncomfortable for us. And what about you?
J.C. Most uncomfortable is that many of us once had, which is  friend. I think it is very interesting because when I started teaching, I think that I did make friends with  a lot of the students that I taught and the relationship I had and the success of teaching was partly related to that friendship, that increasingly, you know, as you teach more and more people it is not realistic for you to continue to make friends with all your students. You do get  a certain amount of distance and I now find it easier to relate to students without becoming their friend. But of course  on rare occasions that is not true and I do make  some very good friends, but as a rule, I don’t. And  as for the most comfortable role I would say as a facilitator, someone who facilitates learning, that ‘s what I would like to think I did.
T.I. What do you think about our residential course in terms of cultural differences, food etc.?
J.C.  I was delighted actually, because I’ve been to St. Petersburg a couple of times before and done courses, but in the city centre and this course was run out in the country,  on a lovely lake in the forest, about two hours from St. Petersburg. So I was very pleasantly surprised by this residential centre, very good facilities, the weather’s been great, it’s been a nice place to be. And the meals are certainly different, generally good, the thing that’s struck me was the quantity of food, you know, quite a big breakfast, very big lunch, very big dinner. Seems that we are expected to eat much more than I really eat in Britain.
T.I. Speaking about St. Petersburg, what is your most pleasant and most unpleasant impression?
J.C. Pleasant impression is that it is such a beautiful city. The last time I was in St. Petersburg I stayed in the hotel St. Petersburg, just opposite is the battleship Aurora and every morning at eight o’clock there was a bugler who played on the ship and that was really nice and really romantic thing to look out to,  to see that and to listen to that. Unpleasant thing, I guess I have to say that, is the fact that there are a lot of prostitutes in hotels, if you stay in a hotel that’s quite off-putting. Besides, it was difficult to find somewhere a medium priced and local to eat. If you are in St. Petersburg, it seems to me, maybe  I’m wrong,  that there are a lot of international type hotels to eat in, but if you wanted to eat something ethnic, sort of something Russian in a nice restaurant, small or medium size restaurant, not too expensive, it is very difficult to find.
T.I. What would you like to wish to our association, to the teachers of Russia?
J.C. I hope that you continue to be as enthusiastic as the teachers I’ve come across, that you don’t become as cynical as some of us, teachers in the West. And obviously I hope very much for you that your working conditions get better, because I know that at the moment they are still quite tough.
T.I.  Thank you very much.

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