I grew up in a Mandarin-speaking family, and since young,
my parents emphasized on the importance of Mandarin, which actually caused me
to neglect my English skills. All along I thought that it was alright to speak
broken English, as long as my friends understood what I was saying. However, I
felt rather embarrassed when I realised that most of my classmates in secondary
school were able to hold proper conversations in English. Furthermore, they
often used vocabularies that I have never heard of, which made it difficult for
me to understand them.
Since then, I decided to put in more effort during
English lessons, particularly in my grammar. Without a basic foundation, I
faced many challenges. For example, I often mixed up the past and present
tenses as well as singular and plural. I even pronounced “soup” as “soap” once.
Due to the lack of confidence, I seldom spoke English in public. However, I came
to realize that the only way to improve myself was to use English more
frequently.
Hence, I plucked up my courage to converse in English
more often. My friends around me seemed to noticed my improvements subsequently,
and I also started to have more confidence in myself. Every time I made a phrasing
or grammar mistake, my friends would make an effort to correct me. That allowed
me to learn much more than what I can in class. Even up till now, I do not get
offended when people correct my English. I am glad that they do so because
there will always be room for improvement.
In my opinion, being able to converse fluently in English
is an essential skill in life. I may still make a few grammar mistakes here and
there, but now I have the confidence to strike a conversation with a
stranger in English.
(Amended on 8 October 2016, 10.03pm)
Hi Derrick, I really admire your courage; I wish I have the same courage as you and not to feel offended when others are trying to correct your language. Instead, I should accept it and correct myself to improve my English too. However, do remember that your mother tongue language are equally important. Especially when we are communicating with other older generation. While, I am also interested to learn Mandarin if you do not mind teaching me. Cheers!
ReplyDeleteHi Ahmad, thank you for reading my post. I agree that mother tongue is equally important and i will definitely teach you mandarin if you are interested!
DeleteThanks, Derrick, for this comprehensive and self critical reflection. I appreciate your effort at not just penning this post but also in self analysis.
ReplyDeleteIn line with you wanting to improve your language skills, allow me to point out the following problems:
1) I grew up in a Mandarin-speaking family and since young, my parents emphasized on the importance of Mandarin which actually caused me to neglect my English skills. >>> (punctuation)
I grew up in a Mandarin-speaking family, and since young, my parents emphasized the importance of Mandarin, which actually caused me to neglect my English skills.
2) However, when I realised that most of my classmates in secondary school were able to hold proper conversations in English except for a few of us, I honestly felt pretty ashamed of myself especially when they tried to converse with me as they used many vocabularies that I have never heard of in my entire 13 years of life then. >>> (verbose: Reduce this long sentence into smaller, more digestible chunks.)
3) ...mixing up the past and present tenses and even **confused** with singular and plural occasionally. >>> (lack of parallelism)
4) Due to the lack of confidence, I seldom speak English in public but I started to realise that the only way to improve myself will be to use English more frequently. >>> (inconsistent verb tense)
5) Hence, I plucked up my courage to converse in English more often and subsequently I seemed to have more confidence in myself and my friends around me also noticed my improvements. >>> (verbose)
6) I told my friends around me to correct me every time I **phrase** certain sentences wrong or when I made mistakes in my grammar and through that, I managed to learn much more than what I can in the classroom. (verb tense inconsistency & verbose)
7) Even up till now, instead of getting offended when people correct my English, I am actually glad that they did so as there is always room for improvement. >>> (verb tense inconsistency)
8) Language is not just a subject to be studied in class, it is an essential skill in life. (run on sentence)
Hi Brad, thanks for pointing out my mistakes and listing them out in details for me. I appreciate your time and efforts and will make the necessary corrections.
DeleteHi Derrick!
ReplyDeleteBy now I hope you have learnt a few things or two in our lessons like I did. It has been a great learning journey indeed! If I do have mistakes in my English next time, do give me a heads up too!
Cheers
Dayn
Hi Dayn,
DeleteThank you for taking your time to read my blog post. Yes, I sure have learned many things during the lessons. Let's continue improving together!