It’s been two weeks since the class started, during when I spoke in English, read in English, and wrote in English. Whenever I deliver my opinions, or share my thoughts with the whole class, I am certain that words coming out of my mouth mostly matches what I think should be coming out of my mouth. Now, if I look back on my journey of learning English, I would say that It is a tough journey that I had been through. As all Chinese students, I began English study in kindergarten. English letters such as A, B, C, and D are pretty much similar with Chinese syllables in terms of handwriting and pronunciation. Although we were learning two languages (Chinese and English)together at young age, we were not mentally loaded because we were only asked to memorize how 26 letters are written and pronounced. At that time, I enjoyed nothing more than being praised in front of the whole class for matching all letters with their pronunciation correctly. Clearly I am not speaking bombast, but I am retentive. Therefore, the study of letters did not really seem to be a big deal to me. I started being interested in English simply because it seemed easy. Even now, I still appreciate that period, a period which equipped me with strong language basis.
Things really changed after I stepped into a middle school classroom. We began enlarging our Vocab and learning grammars. Due to the difference in the way Chinese and Americans talk, it took me a while to understand those grammars. For example, in Chinese, verbs do not transform based on pass tense or future tense. Unfortunately, “I have dinner last night” is unacceptable to English. I was totally mixed up. The way our teachers taught us is to get used to this specific arrangement of words and phrases by reading tons of English-based materials. So, reading English passages in the morning became a routine. We had done that for three years. Gradually, I started thinking in English. In my senior year of middle school, I was able to read and write proficiently. Those reading techniques and writing skills really helped me succeed on final exams.
English is a language, and languages need to be spoken. Once, we were granted with the opportunity to share experiences with students from American schools. We were all silent, not because we didn’t want to share, but we didn’t know how. We read and write English all day long, and when we open our mouths, we became idiots. Maybe in China, English is a subject, but English is a tool for communication. If we cannot even communicate in English, why should we learn it? For exams? Later, I came to an international high school where everyone speaks English. As a traditional Chinese boy who has strong accent when speaking English, I was really afraid of speaking English in front of a lot of people. There were always those strange ideas swirling on my mind. “What would they think of me if I do not speak well?” “Are they going to make fun of me?” “Will they take me down as someone who is too stupid to befriend with?” A feeling of diffidence took over my body. It is really important that you make the first move. I applied for a speech contest. Surely everyone except me performed well. I did not so well, but I was happy because I had made my first step. Another interesting thing I found out during the contest is that one is not judged on English. Participants were encouraging, helping and making friends with each other. Hence, speech contests became my major source of friends. With a bunch of English learners, my verbal ability is improved in an amazing speed, and I turned out to be a person who is much more confident than I used to be. The joy I took from that is incomparable, far exceeding the sense of achievement when I was commended by teachers in kindergarten. English learning made me an outgoing person who loves helping and making friends. When it comes to language learning, challenges and obstacles are inevitable. Your response is the key, and the way you respond it can be applied to any aspect in your daily life. Albeit English is what it is, a type of language, the way I see English learning is that English is a medium from which we are discovering ourselves.
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