Native Speaker Search: How to Find a Native Speaker Near You
Definition: native speaker
A person whose primary (or acquired) language is at a level of communication and understanding such that it is indistinguishable from the communication and understanding standards of the community of speakers of that language.
In other words, if no one calls to say that a speaker of a language has acquired it as a foreign language later in life, they might as well be considered native speakers.
Find a native speaker
Congratulations on your decision to increase your communication level of a foreign language. Your options will vary by location, whether you’re an expat living abroad, a student in a college town, or working from home in a big city.
Let’s start:
1. Classified Ads
Native speakers often advertise their online teaching and tutoring services through the most popular classifieds services, depending on their region. Craigslist might have a virtual monopoly (pun intended) in the United States, however, outside of North America, other classifieds sites are prevalent. These include Kijiji, especially in Canada; Gumtree in the UK, Poland, Central Europe; Farpost.ru in Russia, especially in Eastern Russia, the former Soviet Union states, and Beijing, China.
For those living abroad, sites such as expatriates.com and expat-blog.com may be of particular interest.
These sites will often have a subcategory, usually under ‘jobs’ or ‘services’ targeting the language learning and education category. Why not take a look at them?
Pro: easy access to multiple ads.
The fraud: these sites typically target the largest cities in a country. Students from other towns and cities may not find too many native speakers near them. Also, the fact that the person posting the ad can be anyone, are you getting quality?
2. Educational Institutions: The Local College, Public and Language Schools
Every reputable liberal arts college will have multiple departments of foreign languages (also known as Modern Languages). It is a rich community of language learners and potential native speaker language instructors: not only limited to foreign exchange students, but also PhD candidates who lecture to university students. From my personal experience as an undergraduate student at the University of Toronto, every foreign language class I took had at least one (more often multiple) native students.
If you are learning a more popular language in your area, for example Spanish or French in North America, you can try contacting educators in public schools. They will often have one or more language specialists on staff who are often interested in earning some extra money teaching languages outside the classroom.
Similarly, schools that offer to teach English are full of language learners and native speakers of other languages. As they try to improve their language skills, they may be interested in helping others learn their mother tongue.
Other websites:
You can also consider searching social networking websites for a particular group on sites like meetup.com or facebook.com
Pro: You can usually count on quality like most educators with years of teaching experience, pedagogical training, and a college education.
The fraud: The investigation needed to get in touch with these people, by calling or emailing the schools and then the people. Try searching the schools site with your favorite search engine. Limited linguistic diversity in public schools.
4. Community Centers, National, Cultural and Heritage Organizations
Many immigrants, as well as second, third and higher generation nationals, try to keep their mother tongue alive and share the stories and culture of their heritage through involvement in various organizations. The capitals and larger cities will also have their national consulates, embassies, and commercial trade organizations.
The strategies mentioned above are among the most popular, but nowhere is this an exhaustive list of ways to meet a native speaker.
Feel free to let me know how you found your native speaker by emailing me at: