My MOST DIFFICULT English Student QA with Teacher Tiff Episode 1
hey hey hey it’s me teacher Tiffany and
I am starting a brand new series that’s
right once a week we are gonna spend
time together and I’m gonna answer your
questions so you can learn more about me
and I can help you as well so this new
series is going to be called questions
and answers with teacher Tiffany or Q&A
with t2 tip now the questions are gonna
be coming from the students in my
Academy so if you’re not in the Academy
yet click the link right in the
description and you can join our family
but let’s jump right in
alright so for today the first question
comes from Roberto Roberto says teacher
I would like to know how to improve my
English pronunciation now I’m gonna be
very honest with you
pronunciation is not the easiest thing
however it’s one of my favourite things
to teach now I’m gonna tell you about my
personal experience first and Roberto
hopefully my experience will help you
improve your pronunciation and encourage
you so you all know that I speak Korean
for all of my Korean students and ya say
oh okay I just said hello but when I was
studying Korean remember I had never
learned another language from an Asian
country I studied Spanish a little bit
you know being in America when we’re
growing up we study either Spanish or
French those are the main languages
taught in school and I chose Spanish so
I never studied an Asian language like
for Chinese or Korean or Japanese so
when I started studying I was really
having some some difficulties with some
of the sound some of that right there
some of the sounds now I’ll pause real
quick sometimes you guys have trouble
with the th sound it’s tricky sticking
your tongue through your teeth alright
so I had some troubles with the sounds
that you had to
make for the Korean language um so
here’s what I did in Roberto I hope it
helps you and other students as well I
realized that pronunciation the key to
pronunciation was listening so literally
from level one I started watching as
much TV as I possibly could but usually
it was the news or dramas I watched
through the news because I knew that
people speaking on the news were
speaking properly their pronunciation
was amazing so I didn’t have any idea
what they were saying because they were
using advanced vocabulary words but I
knew that if I copied them my
pronunciation would improve now as I
progressed through my journey of
learning Korean I started to watch more
dramas instead of watching the news
because I got to the point where I
needed to learn the pronunciation of
some slang terms or how people speak to
each other when they’re with their
friends or in a comfortable environment
but what happened was my pronunciation
got so good that Koreans would literally
hear me and think I was Korean and then
turn around and be shocked when they saw
that I was an african-american woman I
got that all the time they still even to
this day when someone speaks to me on
the phone they said oh how loser Manya
they’re you’re not Korean
they think I’m Korean because of my
pronunciation so again Roberto great
question what you need to do to improve
your English pronunciation is to watch
more English dramas listen to more
English programs or podcasts and even
watch more news programs again
specifically for the purpose of
listening to their pronunciation so
great question Roberto all right now the
next question comes from Anthony Barajas
all right Anthony s Tiffany do you have
a staff that helps you with your Academy
now I’ve gotten this question before too
because people are very curious you know
because I have an academy again the link
is in the description I have an
Instagram channel I have a YouTube
channel and I have many other things
going on but I’ll be honest with you
I’ve been doing it on my own for a long
time I have one woman that works for me
she helps with my Academy and she helps
correcting students sentences in my
Academy but other than that it’s been me
I record I edit I produce the video
lessons I come up with the ideas for the
lessons and I do because I’m passionate
about what I do
I love teaching you guys I love helping
you and I understand where you’re coming
from because I also had to learn a
second language and it wasn’t easy now
as we continue to move forward you know
I’m adding people to my team
but yeah it’s mainly me and a few and
the other woman that’s helping me with
correcting but great question great
question all right all right the next
question is hey teacher I would like to
know this from Peterson close I would
like to know what method you are going
to use for exams or certificates in the
Academy all right so we’re getting a lot
of Academy questions um Peterson so
actually there are no tests in the
Academy now for those that aren’t in the
Academy the way the Academy works is
every day I send you an email so once
you finish one day’s lesson you’ll get
the next day’s lesson and you have to
watch a video and then you can put your
example sentences in the comment section
now Peterson what I do have in place is
when you write your example sentences
the woman that works for me she actually
will correct your sentences so that you
can know if your grammar is good or not
now you guys know I’ve always said I’m
not a grammar teacher and I say that
because there are so many other amazing
grammar teachers on YouTube I mean the
number of amazing English teachers on
YouTube it’s astounding and I really
want to tell you guys if you want to
learn grammar please go to the other
teachers they’re awesome my job as an
English teacher and my youtube channel
focuses on helping you put your thoughts
together I want to help you think in
English I want to help you be confident
and I want to encourage you and to help
you enjoy learning English grammar is
super important but if you only focus on
grammar you’ll never fall in love with
the language
so yes Peterson great question you will
get your sentences corrected and I
that’s kind of a it’s not really a quiz
but it’s feedback that you need as a
student so thanks for the question
Peterson all right so the next question
comes from Andres Ruiz and he asks
emotionally which was or what was the
best moment of your life when you were
living in Korea or what was your best
moment when you were living in Korea man
that’s a hard question to answer not
because I didn’t have many moments it’s
because there were so many amazing
moments that I had when I was in Korea
it’s hard to pick just one so maybe I’ll
tell you a few okay first the first one
that pops in my head is when I hiked to
the top of Sirach Mountain that’s one of
the highest mountains in Korea and in
South Korea and it took us about I think
five I think seven hours to get up the
mountain it was a very very tall
mountain and I think I’ve talked about
my experience during one of our
storytime sessions but I will never
forget when I got to the top of the
mountain and I just paused and looked
around me it was beautiful it literally
took my breath away so I will never
forget that scene it still remains my
favorite place in Korea now emotionally
you know what honestly I think
emotionally wow there’s so many one I
will say so I have a very very close
friend and if she’s watching this video
she knows who she is we are super close
like sisters and we went through this
period of understanding each other’s
culture so let me explain something to
you so again I am African American and
our culture is very strong and American
culture dealing with friendships and
relationships I realize that our culture
is different from other cultures so
living in South Korea learning the
language and then developing so many
different friendships I had to also
learn how friendships and relationships
are viewed in their culture so she and I
we kind of developed into women together
because we met in our
late 20s and we continue to grow as
friends for years all into our you know
late 30s but we experienced a few things
where we had to understand each other’s
ideas and thoughts I’m trying not to go
into too many details but that literally
I think was one of the most emotional
experiences and I think one of the the
best I the one that helped me grow the
most because it’s important to
understand someone else and to make sure
you can express your emotions and they
can express their emotions so I guess in
general so my friend and I there was an
experience we had and we were trying to
express the way we felt about what
happened that we realized that what we
were saying was not coming across
properly and we were misunderstanding
each other so you know as females you
know we may have disagreements but we
communicate a lot you know women as
women we talk a lot guys I know you talk
but as women we talked a lot and we were
experiencing difficulties explaining or
expressing our emotions to each other
because of the cultural differences so
we we work through it though and again
because of the situation’s we became
stronger friends like our friendship is
really tight and we’re very close but I
think emotionally having to understand a
different culture and how things are
viewed from a relationship standpoint
and also from emotions and ideas that
was the most challenging but also the
most rewarding I feel like it made me a
better person and you guys know I’m a
Christian I feel like it made me a
better Christian because people are not
gonna think the same way you think and
it’s a blessing and it’s wonderful when
you can understand something from
someone else’s point of view and even if
you have different viewpoints you still
value each other and you still respect
each other so that was a long answer I
was trying to not say all the details
but yeah we’re closer friends because of
that experience so angel I know you do
not talking about you so yeah I really
appreciate our friendship and we both
grew so much all right
great question um I think that’s a good
enough answer I have many
experiences but I think that’s a good
enough answer um and I think we have
another one here we go this is from
Paola she says can you please talk more
about your time in South Korea as a
missionary how did you teach the Bible
and do I have any testimonies about
someone who came to know Jesus Paola I
could talk about this for days but so
yes you guys know that I went to South
Korea in 2009 and I went as a missionary
and went as a missionary which meant I
taught English and I also taught the
Bible so we did both of those and that’s
where I fell in love with teaching
English but when it comes to my
missionary experience so you know
teaching English as you guys can tell
it’s my passion I love it I love
teaching in general but I also love God
I love God so much like he literally
that God is literally number one in my
life and he’s the reason why I want to
help so many people so when I was in
Korea I had a class and I was teaching
the Bible and again taught the Bible
using English so I would have to teach
words and concepts to make sure my
students understood and I had this guy
in my class and I will never forget him
he was basically a genius super
intelligent he was a lawyer in Korea and
for those that don’t know in Korea if
you become a lawyer the exams to become
a lawyer are extremely difficult in
Korea you basically have to memorize
books and books and books so he was very
intelligent and I put my phone down
because I you know I’m very animated and
I love what I do and I’m passionate so
I’d be in a bible class teaching the
Bible and explaining to everyone and all
the students were engaged and paying
attention and he’d be in the back like
this the entire class so I’m not
intimidated easily but I still was aware
of the fact that this man every time I
taught my class was just sitting there
with his arms folded so you know I
prayed and I said okay God what do I
need to do to help him relax and to
understand what I’m trying to teach so
we got to the point where we got to
Daniel
Daniel and revelation now Daniel
revelation are the prophetic books of
the Bible and they can be a little bit
difficult to understand so anyways my
class continued to progress and I
started to explain those books of the
Bible and slowly I saw him go from this
to this to this to this and he seemed to
really be interested in what I was
saying and again the reason why I was a
missionary is because God is so
important in my life Jesus has done so
much for me I wanted to tell other
people about how amazing God is and how
much Jesus loved them because he made me
who I am today
so I just wanted to let them know how
amazing God was and how much Jesus loved
them and I could see him changing I
could see him understanding how much God
loved him and how much Jesus wanted to
save him and I I’ll never forget that I
mean I have so many other students but I
think he’s the one that I’ll never
forget Paola he he was a good guy
and we had a good have some good
conversation so it really was a touching
experience for me to meet him and to
study with him so that’s those are all
the questions we have for today guys but
hopefully you enjoyed I kind of want to
expand on the story time because you
guys love story time so much I want to
give you an opportunity to get to know
me better so again I take questions from
my students in the Academy so if you
want to submit a question again click
the link in the description and you can
join my Academy there’s a special offer
so you’ll see it in the description as
well but guys thank you so much I truly
appreciate you you are the reason why I
wake up every day I love what I do and I
love putting lessons together for you so
again if you enjoyed this please let me
know in the comments section like the
video share the video please subscribe
and again I will see you next week so
that you can learn more about me and I
also can talk to you a little bit and
encourage you as you are along going
along your English journey I’ll talk to
you next week