Chilean Teachers’ English Language Use

The Globalization and the necessity of Teachers of English.

When we talk about the globalization of the economy has had a direct impact on the Chilean people to learn and be conversant in English. Without a doubt English is the international language.

Up until 1973 Chile’s economy was closed in the sense that the major industries such as mining were national and foreigners could not invest. This changed under the Pinochet government and since then the country has been “invaded” by investors from all over the world. Take the mining industry for example. There are currently many joint ventures based in the mineral rich north of the country consisting of Chilean and foreign partners. Many investors come from Canada as well as Australia and whose native language is English. Another industry which has been opened up and heavily invested in is the maritime industry. The Japanese have been the principal investors in this industry.

Due to this investment in the Chilean economy, the engineering profession is one of the most popular academic areas of study. This latter one translates into English as “business administration.” With a major in business administration, Chileans can run and supervise North American companies and affiliates in Chile. So the need for engineers to be fluent in English. Professionals also need English if they plan to do a graduate degree in any European or North American university. There is also a segment of Chilean professionals who need English to do research or publish in English. In this case, reading and writing in English come into play more than actually speaking the language.

Teaching English in Chile can be viewed economically as a direct response for integration into the global economy through trade agreements with the United States, the Asia-Pacific region and the European Union. Consequently, private language institutes have grown ten-fold as a result and a national academic program has been implemented so that children will be fluent in English by high school.

The initial phase of the 18-month-old program, officially known as “English Opens Doors,” calls for all Chilean elementary and high school students to be able to pass a standardized listening and reading test a decade from now. But the more ambitious long-term goal is to make all 16 million of Chile’s people fluent in English within a generation.

So as a future Teacher of English I think we must to trust in our capacities because we are well prepared in what we do, we understand English, we write in English, we think, we dream and we speak English. We can make our students improve the standard of their language by hearing us, in this way I am talking about the importance of the language use.
But Teaching English is by no means the best paying job and you should be able to work for more than one employer if you choose to do so. Teaching is for those people with vocation.