8 reasons you need a human English teacher in 2025
Welcome to the future! Suddenly we are surrounded by AI chatbots, helpers and widgets that are trying to make our lives easier and more polished. And there are the AI English teachers. How fabulous, teachers who never get tired, are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for free, and always have an answer for you. What could be wrong with that? Read on for 8 reasons you need a human English teacher in 2025.
1. AI uses a huge amount of energy
It's estimated that an enquiry on ChatGPT uses ten times more energy than a Google search. And everyday ChaGPT is using as much energy as a city of 180,000 households. It may not seem like much at the moment, but in the future demand will increase, where will the energy, and water, come from?
2. AI lies
Sometimes we forget that not everything on the internet is correct, but what makes it worse is that AI can tell barefaced lies. The strawberry problem shows how this works. Ask a chatbot how many letter 'r's are in the word 'strawberry.' The bot replies: two. Even when questioned it insists 2 and then is proved wrong. This is a very basic problem that any human can see is wrong.
The strawberry glitch might have been sorted out, but it persists with other words and concepts - this is because of reason number 3...
3. AI doesn't actually speak English
AI has learnt language from millions and millions of inputs. But it doesn't actually understand what it says. Sometimes you'll find Chatbots spitting out a lot of random lists of words. As Google AI told me: "While AI can process and respond to English language input through Natural Language Processing (NLP), it doesn't truly "understand" English in the same way humans do; it identifies patterns and generates responses based on the vast amount of data it's trained on, often lacking the deeper contextual understanding, nuance, and common sense that humans possess when interpreting language."
4. Humans understand your feelings
Obviously, humans win at understanding feelings, and knowing when to provide correction and when not to. But good teachers can also judge when you need to learn a new grammar point, and when you need to just chat. When you really need to fix your pronunciation and when it doesn't really matter. And when your questions are a sign of stress, and when they really need answers.
Humans understand feelings, well most of the time.
5. Humans can make connections and remember
As mentioned above AI doesn't really understand English, so it's not always good at connecting the dots. It can provide information but it can't know why you're asking about a certain topic. Humans can make the connection between your life situations and the phrases you might need. A teacher will also tell you the different kind of phrases you might use when talking to adults or children, to a professional audience or for entertainment.
6. Cultural insights
Humans understand culture and can give you pointers about what is appropriate in one setting and not in another. Teachers can also give you insight into why your words or actions might have produced a negative response or positive one, in business or life, because they can understand the meaning behind words. You need a human English teacher to give you this kind of help, just as much as helping your grammar or pronunciation.
7. Motivation
Having a regular scheduled lesson with a teacher is a great way to keep yourself motivated, and keep your learning rhythm going. It's harder to cancel a lesson with a human being, than an unscheduled time with a robot! Humans need other humans to connect with!
8. Lifelong connection
And a huge bonus of having human teachers, you can stay in touch with them for years, if you choose. Teachers love hearing from students and finding out how they've progressed and grown since working together. That's definitely something chatbots haven't figured out yet!
Connect with an amazing English teacher today in the Elevate directory and see where the path takes you!
