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Are there any other English teachers on here? Any groups or forum topics I can check out? I'd love to connect with other English teachers, and here your thoughts on how teaching has affected your reading and writing, and how you implement your own practices into your classroom. Thanks!

Wow, randomly clicked on page 5 of this forum and came across this thread! Sorry no one has responded to your message until almost 5 months later.

I am an English teacher! Well, sort of... technically, I am an EFL teacher, from America, living abroad in Japan. For the past six months, I have been teachers exclusively at preschools/daycares, but for the past 4 years, I taught all grades and adults as well. Before I came to Japan, I was a speech-language pathologist. That's not exactly an English teacher, but I was in the education field, and I taught English to kids with communication disorders. But since I've never been an actually "classroom teacher," I don't know much (i.e., anything) about classroom teaching.

ALynnPowers wrote:Wow, randomly clicked on page 5 of this forum and came across this thread! Sorry no one has responded to your message until almost 5 months later.

I am an English teacher! Well, sort of... technically, I am an EFL teacher, from America, living abroad in Japan. For the past six months, I have been teachers exclusively at preschools/daycares, but for the past 4 years, I taught all grades and adults as well. Before I came to Japan, I was a speech-language pathologist. That's not exactly an English teacher, but I was in the education field, and I taught English to kids with communication disorders. But since I've never been an actually "classroom teacher," I don't know much (i.e., anything) about classroom teaching.

Sounds like a very cool career! Must be exciting doing it in Japan as well!

I love being in Japan so much! My Japanese is terrible, but there is something nice about being around people who think it's cool that you speak a language different from theirs (as opposed to finding it an inconvenience as I have witnessed too many times in my own homeland). I also think Japanese guys are really attractive, so that's a plus. I just spend most of my days checking out dudes.

I guess if it passes the time!

Calling All English Mavens!
Under the "Community & Off Topic" section I responded to the topic "Brainteaser" I answered one and then added one of my own which no one answered correctly yet...if there is an answer. Help me with this, here it goes - You have 2 pens and you give me 1. If I then ask you "How many PENS do you have?" most people will say "1". Is this response incorrect? Should you say "1 PEN" or "I have 1 PEN". I asked "How many PENS (plural) do you have?". It's grammatically incorrect (I think) for me to say "How many PEN (singular) do you have?", knowing you have only 1 PEN. Is the difficulty in how the question is asked or answered?
You can think of many other examples such as this.
How do the singular/plural English rules apply here?

fluidity wrote:Calling All English Mavens!
Under the "Community & Off Topic" section I responded to the topic "Brainteaser" I answered one and then added one of my own which no one answered correctly yet...if there is an answer. Help me with this, here it goes - You have 2 pens and you give me 1. If I then ask you "How many PENS do you have?" most people will say "1". Is this response incorrect? Should you say "1 PEN" or "I have 1 PEN". I asked "How many PENS (plural) do you have?". It's grammatically incorrect (I think) for me to say "How many PEN (singular) do you have?", knowing you have only 1 PEN. Is the difficulty in how the question is asked or answered?
You can think of many other examples such as this.
How do the singular/plural English rules apply here?

This is my opinion on this:
In English grammar, is it necessary to always use the plural form when asking a question with "how many," regardless of the answer. So, you must ask, "How many PENS do you have?" even if you know the answer is a singular 1. The question "how many" requires a countable answer, so as long as the answer is given as a number, it doesn't matter if it is singular or plural. So it is NOT incorrect to answer "1" to any question starting with "how many," as long as it is the correct number to answer the "how many" part of the question. It's grammar, not semantics, that dictates the plural in the question.

domo arigatou gozaimasu!

fluidity wrote:domo arigatou gozaimasu!

Hahaha! I almost said something to the effect of, "YOU SPEAK JAPANESE!" Which is the general response that I get whenever I say anything in Japanese... and then I'm like, "No, I just said one word!" hahaha

fluidity wrote:domo arigatou gozaimasu!

I thought that was domo arigatou Mr. Roboto!

rssllue wrote:

fluidity wrote:domo arigatou gozaimasu!

I thought that was domo arigatou Mr. Roboto!

"domo arigatou gozaimasu" is just a more polite/formal way of saying "thank you very much".

fluidity wrote:

rssllue wrote:

fluidity wrote:domo arigatou gozaimasu!

I thought that was domo arigatou Mr. Roboto!

"domo arigatou gozaimasu" is just a more polite/formal way of saying "thank you very much".

Yeah, super formal. I never even hear anyone saying the "domo" part.