日本の学生に英語を教えようと思います。
I think that I'll teach English to Japanese students.

the particle i need reassurance in is the と before the 思います. i think it means "that" but im not sure... help would be greatly appreciated.

と is a quoting particle. So it gets used before speaking, thinking, imagining, etc. In other words, this is the exact same construction as と言います. Only, you're thinking instead of saying.

http://www.guidetojapanese.org/quotation.html

Also: http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa061701a.htm - I only learned a month or so ago that you must use と思っている when speaking of another person's thoughts.

o thanks guys haha glad i asked before i put a wrong translation haha ahhh... such a great community we got here....

Actually, while we're at it: 彼は行政を改革したいと思っている。

I originally interpreted this as 'He thinks that he wants...', but could it also be 'I'm thinking that he wants...'?

It would be the latter. You cannot flat out state what someone else wants.

Smackle Wrote:It would be the latter. You cannot flat out state what someone else wants.

But it'd be okay if you added something that suggested you were making a supposition somehow?

Or you use a form that makes it a statement about the appearance of their desires. This isn't grammatical, it's just considered rude to presume insight into another person's thoughts.

Though I don't remember source locations well enough to check, I'm pretty sure that doesn't mean it isn't done.

~J

I've learned the 欲しがる construction, too, I guess I should have stuck with that and assumed first person for the above sentence. It always kind of bugged me, which is why I remembered to ask (good thing ;p). I guess I was thinking someone was kind of saying, "He *thinks* he wants to do such and such, but..."

nest0r Wrote:Actually, while we're at it: 彼は行政を改革したいと思っている。

I originally interpreted this as 'He thinks that he wants...', but could it also be 'I'm thinking that he wants...'?

just to add a few things:

彼は行政を改革したいと思っているらしい would change it to your first one.

or したがってるらしい would just be that "he wants to~"

But as a previous poster said, you don't just out and out say what someone else is thinking or wants or whatever. You can say what they said, however.