The teaching English Team interviewed me about my views on ELT and teaching in Nepal.

1. What are the major challenges facing EL teachers in your country?
Most teachers lack the proper know-how of the classroom practices and their own command of the English language is far from being satisfactory. This means that they not only have to learn appropriate ways of lesson delivery, but also improve their own grasp of the language. Even for the teachers who have relatively good command of English, the school environment and the resources are not conducive to support them to implement the new concepts in ELT. The English curricula in Nepal have tried to reflect the latest trends in ELT e.g. learner-centredness and learner autonomy but the environment is a major deterrent for realising these changes. Head teachers, parents and students take classes as an examination preparation. Similarly, though trainers stress on communicative practice in their words, they do not actually simulate training sessions for experiential learning.

In this regard, the major challenge lies with the teachers as they are not ready for delivering the changes in the classroom: skill-wise and motivation-wise. Some independently produced textbooks have now started to follow the concept of content-based language teaching. Teachers do not have the knowledge and skills to handle content rich materials in the class.
Another challenge for them is to be able to act professionally when there is too much of politicising of the school environment.

2. Are teachers in your country generally members of teachers' associations?
Yes, almost every teacher is a member of a teacher association but these associations are trade unions. These associations use their energy in putting pressure on the government for non-academic issues. They hardly do any professional activity.
At least for the English teachers, NELTA is providing a forum. It has 800 life members and around 3000 general members. Even then, out of 35,000 English teachers (from primary to higher secondary level), the number is not satisfactory.

3. How well resourced are teachers in your country?
About the teachers' resourcefulness with knowledge and skills, I have already clarified the situation above. But regarding the resources at schools, most teachers work in under resourced situations. There are no teaching aids, libraries, reference materials. They just have a textbook. However, the schools in the urban areas, and those that have received support from NELTA, Room to Read and other organizations, are better off.

4. What technology do you use with your students?
I should say I am lucky. I use overhead projector, computer, LCD projector, audio sets, and television. I also use whiteboard and flipchart. All these facilities make it possible for me to use all kinds of resources including Internet.

5. What have you found most useful on the teaching English website?
I find this website useful in a number of ways but sharing experiences and interactions on issues raised by colleagues from around the world is what I like most. The beauty of this is that each member can initiate the discussions.

6. What classes do you teach? (age, level class size)
I teach Masters and M Phil students. My students are adults; they are 22 and above. In the M Phil classes, some students are over 50. The number is between 20 and 40.

7. What aspects of your teaching are you most interested in developing?
I am interested in developing skills to improve students' academic and professional reading and writing. I also want to be resourceful for student-led English language projects.

8. Why did you decide to become an English language teacher?
When I was a school student, I was fascinated by the people who spoke English. So, I decided to major in English. Later when I was at college, one of my classmates was a school principal and he offered me a job of English teacher. I went to college in the morning and taught in the day. Then, I became a branded English teacher.

9. What is the status of teachers in your country? Are they generally valued and well paid?
Traditionally teachers are respected in Nepal: they are called ‘guru' with respect. People in the communities turn to teachers for general advice. However, as teachers are not paid as well as other professionals, teaching is not the priority career choice for college goers. One of the reasons why teachers do not come to training on their own is because they cannot afford.

10. What is the status of English in your country? Is it widely spoken to a good level?
English is a foreign language and slowing gaining second language status. A small minority of population speaks it as mother tongue. 32% of the schools in Nepal use English as medium of instruction. All government offices and courts use Nepali as the official language but banks and other corporate houses use English for the operation and record keeping. If you know English, you are respected. If your English is good, you have a better prospect for jobs.

11. What have you learned from being a teacher?
I have realized that being a teacher, I have been able to keep pace with the new and emerging knowledge. People in other professions know about their professions only, but in teaching, especially English teaching, you are always up-to-date. I think for a human, possession of knowledge is the best possession.

12. What advice would you give to someone thinking of becoming an English teacher?
"Welcome to this noble profession! You will always enjoy what you do. I would like to advise that you need to know how language learning takes place so that you can teach effectively. You must develop one hobby: reading books."

13. Which writer /researcher has had the most influence over the way you understand learning and teaching?
There are so many but I would like to name three: Carl Rogers (Freedom to Learn), R.K. Nayayan (The English Teacher) and Hermann Hesse (Siddhartha). The latter two are novels but genuine eye openers for realizing how learning takes place.

14. What most interests you about ELT at the moment?
I am just curious to know how the communicative approach "generation" receives content-based teaching concept that is gradually making its way into the mainstream.

15. How do you see the role of the EL teacher evolving over the next 5 - 10 years?
I think English teachers will not survive just as English teachers rather they will become language-cum-technology teachers in the next 10 years.