Author Topic: Do your students always say "nice to meet you"? (Read 6880 times)

andrucer · « **on:** March 15, 2013, 06:20:01 PM »

If your students say "nice to meet you" instead of "nice to see you", show them the attached ppt file. It's a good explanation in Korean on when to use it.

NaturallyStacie · « **Reply #1 on:** March 15, 2013, 08:13:41 PM »

Crap! I could've used this earlier this week. My conversation class lesson this week with grades 4-6 was differentiating meet v see during greetings.

timephone · « **Reply #2 on:** March 20, 2013, 12:52:08 PM »

This used to annoy me a lot until I realized that the translated expression in Korean is used in both instances: (manaseo) bangapseubnida (sorry can't enter hangeul on my computer).

I had a 50+ year old math teacher at my school who's learning English approach me the other day with "nice to meet you". I didn't want to correct him, but with my first graders I'm making the difference very clear.

kyndo · « **Reply #3 on:** March 20, 2013, 01:29:23 PM »

This is actually a good thing to bring up during your introductory lesson. Have all the students roleplay introductions first with 'meet' and then with 'see' after explaining the difference.

Of course, now all my students yell 'nice to see you' all the time, and it's starting to annoy me just as much...

WestMeetsEast · « **Reply #4 on:** March 20, 2013, 01:54:12 PM »

7 months of drilling it into them has resulted in it not being said once to me in the last week or so. It's always Hi, hello, or a bow...except for one or two that say 안녕 and I shout them back and have them say hello properly without the 반말

stucoe · « **Reply #5 on:** March 20, 2013, 03:36:31 PM »

I know this is an age-old debate, but I really don't see what the problem is. Yes I understand that "Nice to meet you" is a Western idiomatic sentence fragment, but they're not making any literal errors. They are meeting you. Plus, it's a nice quirk and it always makes me (and them) smile.
Perhaps it's just my (UK) English, but I meet my friends after school, I meet my significant other at weekends. To say "I'm going to see my friends tonight" just sounds wrong to me. Today I met my students for the third time. It was nice to see them again. So I told them it was nice to meet them.
Maybe I'm part of the problem

cheezsteakwit · « **Reply #6 on:** March 20, 2013, 03:42:08 PM »

Thanks for the PPT.

My kids say 'nice to meet you' ALL the time.

But, just now in the teachers room, a young , 'fresh outta college' co-worker said it to me & without thinking, I corrected him.

It's automatic for me, at this point. My kids get that wrong so often.

kyndo · « **Reply #7 on:** March 20, 2013, 03:47:35 PM »

Quote from: stucoe on March 20, 2013, 03:36:31 PM

... Today I met my students for the third time. It was nice to see them again. So I told them it was nice to meet them.
Maybe I'm part of the problem

So YOU'RE the one!

I would argue that it's an incorrect usage of an idiom, and therefor not something one should encourage. You COULD tell them that it's nice to meet with them again. Less incorrect that way.

gepikteachers · « **Reply #8 on:** April 01, 2013, 01:21:15 PM »

I actually did a lesson on this so I thought I'll post my ppt.
I spent all last year telling my students instead of saying 'nice to meet you' say 'nice to see you again' but they just didn't understand. It probably didn't help when I kept saying 'oh are we meeting for the first time again?!' (my jokes are a bit dry

)
My new first grades had a brand new book and this was actually their first lesson in the book so I was quite pleased I could finally teach them the difference.

Powerpoint is quite simple. Just had the ox quiz where I got them to show with their hands o or x. Gets them a bit more awake and involved(would have liked to have made the ox signs for them to just hold up but didn't have time for it). And of course you could add few more ox questions if you wanted. I said it's 50:50 chance so pick one and if you don't I'll get you to stand up) (also you could play it like golden bell where only the winners go on to solve the next question)
Famous faces went quite well and they were all saying nice to meet you or nice to see you. I told them of course you don't know these people in person personally and this is just a practice.

The last part was introducing themselves as this was their first lesson and the new first graders didn't know each other very well. Worked alright for me so hope someone else can use it.

sweetjane2011 · « **Reply #9 on:** April 01, 2013, 02:56:14 PM »

Quote from: stucoe on March 20, 2013, 03:36:31 PM

I know this is an age-old debate, but I really don't see what the problem is. Yes I understand that "Nice to meet you" is a Western idiomatic sentence fragment, but they're not making any literal errors. They are meeting you. Plus, it's a nice quirk and it always makes me (and them) smile.
Perhaps it's just my (UK) English, but I meet my friends after school, I meet my significant other at weekends. To say "I'm going to see my friends tonight" just sounds wrong to me. Today I met my students for the third time. It was nice to see them again. So I told them it was nice to meet them.
Maybe I'm part of the problem

The problem is they're saying ''Nice to meet you'' every time they see you. You wouldn't say that back home to friends or someone you've already met, would you? ''Nice to meet you'' is what we say the FIRST time you meet someone. I know this is confusing to Koreans but I think it's useful to try and explain where they're getting it wrong. I explained to my co-teacher the other day that ''Take a rest'' is a really awkward sentence too, and something that native speakers don't say.

I suppose it's better than ''Glad to meet you''. I've never heard ANYONE say that EVER yet it's all over the textbooks I use. It sounds grammatically wrong as well. Grrrr

WestMeetsEast · « **Reply #10 on:** April 01, 2013, 04:34:44 PM »

Quote from: sweetjane2011 on April 01, 2013, 02:56:14 PM

Quote from: stucoe on March 20, 2013, 03:36:31 PM
I know this is an age-old debate, but I really don't see what the problem is. Yes I understand that "Nice to meet you" is a Western idiomatic sentence fragment, but they're not making any literal errors. They are meeting you. Plus, it's a nice quirk and it always makes me (and them) smile.
Perhaps it's just my (UK) English, but I meet my friends after school, I meet my significant other at weekends. To say "I'm going to see my friends tonight" just sounds wrong to me. Today I met my students for the third time. It was nice to see them again. So I told them it was nice to meet them.
Maybe I'm part of the problem

The problem is they're saying ''Nice to meet you'' every time they see you. You wouldn't say that back home to friends or someone you've already met, would you? ''Nice to meet you'' is what we say the FIRST time you meet someone. I know this is confusing to Koreans but I think it's useful to try and explain where they're getting it wrong. I explained to my co-teacher the other day that ''Take a rest'' is a really awkward sentence too, and something that native speakers don't say.

I suppose it's better than ''Glad to meet you''. I've never heard ANYONE say that EVER yet it's all over the textbooks I use. It sounds grammatically wrong as well. Grrrr

Yeah I have this discussion with my co-teacher a lot. The response I get is 'the kids have to be taught it because they'll be tested on it'. So they'll be tested on incorrect usage and/or useless expressions?

Also, my kids have stopped saying 'nice to meet you' and now just say 'hello teacher'. Something has changed somewhere. I've heard 'nice to meet you' maybe twice in a month [seriously] and a bunch of times when they go 'nice to meet you, I'm fine thanks and you?' as a joke. I find it funny that my kids mock the English system with that set sentence.

aklimkewicz · « **Reply #11 on:** April 01, 2013, 05:56:57 PM »

Personally, I'm okay with: Glad to meet you. Nice to meet you. Happy to meet you. And pleasure/pleased to meet you. The first week of classes I introduced the phrase "What's going down?" as a substitute for "How's it going?" It has stuck with one student, who always says, "What's going down?" when she sees me. I'll chalk that up as a win.

MrBannystar · « **Reply #12 on:** April 02, 2013, 06:42:13 PM »

My school's head of English has been teaching for 30 years and has said it to me everyday for over a year. I sometimes have to use Korean when we have discussions so he understands me. You can't teach an old dog new dog tricks.

But you can have them put down...

pumpkinstuffing · « **Reply #13 on:** April 03, 2013, 10:47:56 AM »

The majority of kids at my elementary school seem to know the difference - I really only hear it occasionally as a joke from some sixth graders.

Chadwickhhs · « **Reply #14 on:** April 03, 2013, 11:14:41 AM »

I've explained the difference like 12 times with the same students and they still do it. Either they tune me out, lack hard-drive space or they go to their default practiced English. I can't get them to stop saying "Nice to meet you." My coteachers also reinforce bad English.

AfroBurrito · « **Reply #15 on:** April 03, 2013, 12:08:09 PM »

Quote from: aklimkewicz on April 01, 2013, 05:56:57 PM

Personally, I'm okay with: Glad to meet you. Nice to meet you. Happy to meet you. And pleasure/pleased to meet you. The first week of classes I introduced the phrase "What's going down?" as a substitute for "How's it going?" It has stuck with one student, who always says, "What's going down?" when she sees me. I'll chalk that up as a win.

You are lucky. Every time I say "How's it going?" to a student they respond by telling me WHERE they are going. "I go to the home."

Hyperkinesiac · « **Reply #16 on:** April 03, 2013, 12:33:16 PM »

Quote

I know this is an age-old debate, but I really don't see what the problem is. Yes I understand that "Nice to meet you" is a Western idiomatic sentence fragment, but they're not making any literal errors. They are meeting you. Plus, it's a nice quirk and it always makes me (and them) smile.

I'm with you. As a teacher you have to pick your battles, and this one doesn't seem worth it. It's not a literal error and there's no real confusion as to what they mean when they say "Nice to meet you." I think if I pretended to be confused as to what they meant, I'd be no better than all of the English teachers in America who pretend to get confused when American students use "can" instead of "may."

I'll admit that it's quirky and not a common greeting in Western countries after you initially meet someone, but I don't think it's worth "correcting," even at the high school level.

jay0003 · « **Reply #17 on:** April 17, 2013, 11:17:55 AM »

Quote from: stucoe on March 20, 2013, 03:36:31 PM

I know this is an age-old debate, but I really don't see what the problem is. Yes I understand that "Nice to meet you" is a Western idiomatic sentence fragment, but they're not making any literal errors. They are meeting you. Plus, it's a nice quirk and it always makes me (and them) smile.
Perhaps it's just my (UK) English, but I meet my friends after school, I meet my significant other at weekends. To say "I'm going to see my friends tonight" just sounds wrong to me. Today I met my students for the third time. It was nice to see them again. So I told them it was nice to meet them.
Maybe I'm part of the problem

Yes we know spoken British English has some colorful quirks in the informal strain of speaking. I guess you could teach a class on cockney rhyming slang if you wanted. But let's pretend these kids are on a business trip to Vancouver, and they joke about needing bees and honey mate. If they were native British, the canadians they encounter might assume they were making an obscure joke. However since they are non native speakers, people will assume they have no idea how to speak English properly.
The point I'm making is the rule may seem silly to you, but when your students go out into the world and they keep telling professors and colleagues they've already met, "nice to meet you." They will be judged negatively off of that, whereas when you do that people just think "Oh another British English quirk I don't understand."

TeachaTeacha · « **Reply #18 on:** April 17, 2013, 11:49:03 AM »

It's a bit of a stretch (okay, a LOT of a stretch) to compare, "Nice to meet you!" and Cockney slang. It's also insulting to suggest that North American English will lead to success, while other dialects will lead to judgement. Korea has decided to hire people of many different dialects to teach, here. These kids don't need teachers suggesting that their other teacher(s) was/were teaching them wrong - this could lead to kids getting frustrated by the mixed-messages, giving up, and losing trust in their English teachers.

I avoid teaching my students that one dialect is more correct than another. I tend to teach North American English - as that is what I grew up with - but if, for example, a student asks me a question about the difference between, "Nice to meet you!" and "Nice to see you!" their English is probably at a level where I can get the message across that both are correct. I do not, however, introduce them to differences because that will do nothing but confuse them... if they ask, I will teach.

If you really can't stand your kids saying, "Nice to meet you!" but that seems to be what they are most comfortable with, simply get them to add the word again to the end of their statement... "Nice to meet you, again!"

jay0003 · « **Reply #19 on:** April 17, 2013, 03:14:34 PM »

Quote from: TeachaTeacha on April 17, 2013, 11:49:03 AM

words

British English has the "meet vs. see" rule too. The point I was making was just because his friends understand his meaning, that doesn't mean it fly well ANYWHERE else in the world: South Africa Australia, New Zealand, Singapore. I don't teach my students every incorrect thing I say with my friends. I don't think British English takes more license with language rules than any other dialect, I just think they are more cavalier about it because it's "their" language. Meet you again can work in some cases, in others it will not. Again, they will appear to be less skilled if they use this as a universal greeting.

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Author Topic: Do your students always say "nice to meet you"? (Read 6880 times)

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