Every month I have an article in ALC’s “Kodomo Eigo” magazine and they’ve just given me permission to put the English version online for free. The basic idea is that I take some of the strange or annoying English that is often taught in Japanese schools and try and make it sound a little cooler and more authentic.

From April they’ve actually doubled it so I have two articles in each issue and as luck would have it my “classic annoying English” for this month is the dreaded “Fine thank you, and you?” robot answer to “How are you?”. If you want to get the message across to your teachers, showing the magazine might just help, people seem to believe things more when it is written down in black and white!

If you’re teaching overseas you might be wondering what all the fuss is about the phrases below, but if you’re in Japan you very quickly tire of hearing the same things over and over again!

Here are a few links to the English versions of previous articles (just ignore the Japanese menus on the page)

April 2008: Bad: Fine thank you and you? > Good: I’m good, I’m great!
April 2008 (Part 2)：Bad: : Do you like dog? > Good: Do you like dogs?
March 2008：　Bad: Etto > Good: Hmm
February 2008：　Bad: What do you like fruit? > Good: What’s your favourite video game?
January 2008：　Bad: Do you know kendama? > Good: Do you know what this is?
December 2007：Bad: What time is it now? > Good: What time is it?
November 2007：Bad: How many members in your family? > Good: Do you have any brothers or sisters?
October 2007：Bad: Hello Mr Richard > Good: Hello Richard Sensei