I have spent almost five years teaching English to Czech students of all ages. I am Czech myself so I know the major differences between the two languages and this helps me to predict the possible problems in the learning process. I know this can be very difficult for native speakers as they are not aware of them. I would like to note a few major differences and their effect on the learning process.

The biggest problem for Czech / Polish / Slovak / Latvian / Bulgarian (perhaps many other) learners must certainly be articles. We do not have any articles in our own language therefore we have to memorize the situations when to use them and how. We don’t see their importance and tend to leave them out or use them far too much. It’s very important for tutors to point out the correct usage and also their importance. Proper and frequent practise is absolutely essential. Explaining students that articles are there to make the dialogs, sentences or articles clearer, can be hard work but it will eventually pay off. Reading and possibly analyzing easy reading books (eg Penguin) can be great help, as students will see the importance on the meaning. The teacher should let learners discover the meaning of the text with the article and the same text without it. Students find this entertaining and by discovering it themselves they will remember it better.

Another difficulty is called “perfect tenses”. This term is not in our language so to use eg: present perfect correctly will involve a lot of drill and practise. Generally students have problems with any kind of grammar that they cannot compare with their own language. Students should be encouraged to read, listen to English radio programmes or watch films in English. This will help them see the tenses used in practise and give them better ideas on when to use them.

Czech language is based on different verb endings for each person so there is no need to say the pronoun itself, as it is in Spanish or Italian. Students should understand that this doesn’t apply to English and that they always have to mention the person (apart from imperative). Again a lot of practise will help.

Compared to German I consider English quite easy when it comes to grammar. But a big disadvantage is the pronunciation. For all students it is very hard to write something else than what they hear, especially when there are not any proper rules to help. Students should be encouraged to learn the alphabet that can help them a bit. After this course I can see the importance and possible usage of the Phonetic alphabet. I can see now that it can help many students. I have never done it with my students, apart from some sounds. I am trying to change this now.

Generally Czech students don’t have problems with the sounds apart from the sound Ө. That is very hard for us to pronounce. Students either produce a sound [f], [t], or [s]. It is up to the tutor to explain them that this can cause some confusion eg: three x tree, think x sing… This involves plenty of pronunciation practise, games and activities.

Over all, Czech people are quite well motivated because the knowledge of English is very important now and they can work hard if they are well motivated.

Renata Hejnysova