Lester

Lester Tutor Interview

Q. I heard you work as an actor in Los Angeles! Could I ask about your recent work?

A. I’m working on a few things here in LA, but they aren’t finished yet, so I can’t talk about them. However, my most recent job was the Hong Kong debut of the off-broadway play, “The Last Days of Judas iscariot.” The play is about Judas, the man who betrayed Jesus. He is on trial, in a place between heaven and hell. There are two lawyers questioning him. I play El Fayoumy – the lawyer from hell and the villain on the show. It was a lot of fun, probably my favorite role so far!

Q. Acoording to your profile, you had taught English in Japan and Hong Kong for more than 4 years. What motivated you to teach English?

A. I’ve always been a teacher. My mother had a preschool in our house. At first, I was one of the kids, but then after I grew up I began to help out. I eventually became a preschool teacher for my university. After moving to Japan, I decided what I wanted to teach was English.

Q. How do you spend your holidays? Do you have any hobbies?

A. I love to read and watch movies…but I enjoy writing and MAKING movies even more! Any opportunity where I get to be creative is always fun. I also enjoy working out. I guess I’m what you would call a “gym rat” because I hang out in the gym so much!

Q. You have a lot of lessons! Which lesson do you recommend to take for beginners?

A. Lessons like The Alphabet, Verbs, Animals and Describing People are great places to build your vocabulary. However, for both beginners and advanced students, my best class is English Conversation. I truly believe that casual conversation is the best way to learn a new language. Depending on the student, I can raise or lower the difficulty level as we go along and focus on your strengths and weaknesses, giving you a very personalized or “tailor made” lesson!

Q. I know you’re familiar with the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) because you have great experiences with an actor and a teacher! Coul you tell me about the feature of your lesson, “Pronunciation – みんなも出来るネイティブ発音！”?

A. The IPA is absolutely necessary for students who wish to learn English. This is especially the case with japanese students, who’s language lacks many common English sounds for example, TH, V, F, L, R, C (as in “see”), etc. This creates a problem when we want to communicate simple ideas. If a student says to me, “I take a basu every morning,” I don’t know if they mean, “I take a bus every morning” or “I take a bath every morning.” The purpose of language is communication, and if I can’t understand you, we can’t communicate! For that reason, I decided to teach pronunciation with the IPA, because even though the English Alphabet has every letter, it does not show us every sound. The IPA solves this problem. And don’t worry! You don’t have to know the IPA to take my Pronunciation class! I’ll give you an IPA chart and we will work on it together!

Q. Finally, would you like to leave a message for our students.

A. Don’t be afraid! Fear is the ONLY thing holding you back. Anyone can learn a language; it just takes a willingness to learn. Don’t be afraid of mistakes. Embrace them! LOVE them! mistakes are how we learn! If you never make a mistake, you haven’t learned anything! My favorite Japanese proverb sounds like this in English: “If you understand everything, you must be misinformed.”

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Lester

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