Interview with Farhood Taghipour, Instructor and Coordinator

I was really glad that Farhood Taghipour gave me a few minutes of his time despite the fact that he had to deal with multitude of issues in his busy schedule. Farhood Taghipour woks as a head teacher (in charge of arranging classes for the teachers and registering students), instructor and coordinator at an institute of language learning ; he is 32 years old, graduated in mechanical engineering and of course married.

    Unlike many younger instructors, Mr.Taghipour has been teaching English since the year 2001.

    He started studying English for more than ten years before acquiring his CPE degree, and also has been teaching English for quite a substantial amount of time.

    I asked Farhood to describe how it feels to be both an instructor and a coordinator? In response he said "my responsibilities here are somehow difficult because I've got to deal with students and teachers and management…. it is a central part and, yes it is sometimes complicated".On a side note, being the equivalent of a hub for the institute has certainly influenced the way Farhood treats other people in an admirably warm manner.

    I then proceeded and asked him the reason behind choosing ESL as his main line of work and he replied that due to the fact that English is not only Iran's but also many other countries' second language, then as a result, it is of significant importance and is absolutely necessary.

    While Farhood did not comment on the way English is treated and handled in Iran, he instead showed his satisfaction regarding the students attending English classes who welcome the system's unquestionable focus on learning through engaging speaking and conversation in various courses with open arms. Farhood constantly talked about the grandness of communication in all English courses even those which might not initially sound exactly pertained such as grammar courses, but this emphasis has certainly worked simply because the results contain notable improvements amongst students.

    I asked him to describe the place of English language in the Iranian society , and in response he believes that since the majority of the population in Iran is made up of youth and youngsters English is considered crucial if not absolutely vital." They appreciate this speaking [in English], they love to speak in English because it is really common here in Iran" said Farhood.

    I then called for some thoughts regarding the ESL teachers, which unfortunately was  immediately faced with the word "shortcomings".

Mr. Taghipour believes that the major problem when it comes to Iranian teachers is the universities that fail to transfer the teaching techniques wholly and thoroughly by not emphasizing on communication and speaking methods. Although this problem could be solved by adding new conversation courses to college curriculums.

    When I asked him about the financial aspect of ESL in Iran, unlike our previous interviewee, he was quite satisfied by it, and considered it lucrative due to the fact that the emigration rate is so high in Iran; many people constantly reach out for such classes and as a result provide an uninterrupted demand for a solid market.

    As a tip for the students, Farhood believes that learners need to accept the significance of communication in English learning and fill this supposed gap by attending classes that are solely focused on the aforementioned skill. For the final comment Farhood Taghipour wants the learners "to start as soon as you can".

Interview with Ahmad Kashani, a credible English teacher

Aside from being one of my best friends in Iran , Ahmad Kashani has proved to be one of the greatest and most fluent English teachers I have ever encountered with. His determined and tenacious desire to instruct befittingly outmatches that of other teachers. His self-effacing trait coupled with his innate endowment regarding communication is his state-of-the-art apparatus in ESL classes.

He so altruistically gave me a few moments of his time to answer some of my questions.Bellow you can read the interview that has been emended for the sake of shortness.

After greetings I asked Ahmad to describe himself for the readers.Ahmad Kashani is 26 years old, he is graduated in two distinctive fields of Microbiology and Information Technology; he went on and delineated Microbiology a bit further by saying :"Microbiology is a brand new field of medicine which talks about minuscule things such as bacteria, viruses and so forth".

Then I immediately changed the direction of the interview towards ESL by asking about the reason behind him becoming a teacher. Well not to my surprise ,he began talking about his English background which is quite substantial in its own rights.
Ahmad has been dealing with English since he was four years old, now that is the perfect age is it not ?! And that has let him to pursue his education in many different countries including England.

As we all know online and distant learning has become a major competitor with the conventional means of learning and Ahmad certainly has benefited from this phenomenon by studying two separate major simultaneously, so go Web 2.0!

After that I asked him how he reached this level of competence and fluency in English and how long it took him to do so, in response he mentioned that due to the sizable amount of time that he has spent on the subject and his multiple encounters and interactions in many different countries, his interest in movies and music that feature English tracks and overall affection are but a few of the contributors to his skillfulness.

Ahmad considers English more than just a second language but an international language that proves even more vital than the mother tongues in overcoming some specific challenges.

What really impressed me about Ahmad was his attention to the factor of love that ought to be implied in both processes of learning and teaching. It's quite obvious that Ahmad is indeed satisfied with the way ESL is taken care of in Iran simply because he ranked it as B+.

As many of us would agree, Ahmad does consider teaching English a profession that is primarily focused on social aspects rather than financial ,and he believes that if your sole purpose behind teaching English is monetary then you would find far better opportunities in real estate business and whatnot. As in the case of Ahmad, his other and perhaps most significant motivation behind teaching English is teaching itself. Ahmad adores teaching in whatever form as long as true essence of learning is flowing in. However, this unprecedented desire for teaching is partially innate since Ahmad's father is a college professor as well.

In the end Ahmad wants the students to not only put effort in the learning process but also be patient.

You can listen to the full interview in Talk Show Podcast Episode Two.