My Uncle of age 47 from Ghana has told me that he wants to improve his English so that he can sound 'posh' :-D. His meaning is he wants to be able to speak more like a typical native speaker, improving his vocabulary and written English and not in terms of pronunciation or accent. He's a builder by profession but is a leader of some sort in his Church which sees him travelling to different countries to spread the word.....along the way he meets people of a 'higher standard of education' then himself so his instrumental motivation is to be able to talk to these guys with a bit more confidence and fluency.
Now i can guess the underlying problem in this situation is a lack of knowledge on the subject areas that these guys discuss around him but i think it is true that if he improves his knowledge of commonly used idiomatic language and words he can present his ideas with a little more flavour then usual.
His background is a bit different from most students who go to the EFL schools; in that English is 'kind of' his First language. However, he spent a lot of time in Ghana and they have a different kind of style of English then the Standard English spoken here in England. But it's just that he wants to learn how to use the English language more proficiently..
My question is should my uncle just get some books and use the internet to learn new words, idioms and how to improve one's writing or will it be more beneficial for him to join one of these English language learning schools in England...maybe would force him to be more active the study more. :shock:
Now i can guess the underlying problem in this situation is a lack of knowledge on the subject areas that these guys discuss around him but i think it is true that if he improves his knowledge of commonly used idiomatic language and words he can present his ideas with a little more flavour then usual.
His background is a bit different from most students who go to the EFL schools; in that English is 'kind of' his First language. However, he spent a lot of time in Ghana and they have a different kind of style of English then the Standard English spoken here in England. But it's just that he wants to learn how to use the English language more proficiently..
My question is should my uncle just get some books and use the internet to learn new words, idioms and how to improve one's writing or will it be more beneficial for him to join one of these English language learning schools in England...maybe would force him to be more active the study more. :shock: