TESOL Certificate, Part 1: Teach English Now!

Specialization
Arizona State University

Week 01
Lesson 1: Technique and Content – Practice peer-graded assignment

Language is Cake

Hello everyone! It’s a pleasure to meet you all. My name is Binoy, and usually go by the nick name Bee.
Today, I’ll be sharing with you what my opinion is, on the metaphor “Language is Cake”, what has it got to
do with teaching English and finally the reason why I take this course. First off, I thank all of you in advance
for taking your time to review my assignment, and here we go!

Language is Cake! I believe this metaphor has a deep meaning and to examine it, I would first define a few
characteristics of cake, which is a food that all love to eat. Cake is sweet, delicious, garnished and visually
appealing and is made by a recipe with a variety of ingredients. Same goes with language as well, it could be
just enough to know the basics in order to communicate with other but the more it is decorated the more
delight it gives in using it. Just like cake is made of different ingredients like sugar, flour, eggs and cream, in
language we use vocabulary, good grammar, punctuation and accent to deliver understandable and pleasant
communication.

Therefore, I believe this metaphor has a perspective in the world of teaching. It represents that language is
a complete system of communication, but should be served in easily digestible slices to students. Like for
example; cake is mouthwatering and obviously delicious. However, trying using unwashed hands to grab a
fistful of cake and showing it to someone for consumption, no one will not be interested in consuming it
even though it’s the world’s best cake. Why? Because it is not presented well. On the contrary, a neatly sliced
piece of cake with a napkin and a spoon would surely get one’s taste buds tempting. The same is applied to
teaching, no matter how good the content is, if it is not presented in an attractive and creative manner to
the students.

To conclude with this, I would finally like to say why I chose to do this course. I’m currently a primary school
teacher at Lyceum International School, Wattala. As I’m a teacher, I thoroughly believe this would be
advantageous for me to further develop my teaching skills and give a productive outcome to my students
and also reach milestones in my career of teaching.