I wrote about English learning several times in different posts on the forum a long time ago. Now I'd like to write something about language learning from more aspects than I did before, according to my experience. My experience in learning English, rather simple, is well known by my friends. It is no of glory, because I am at the level that almost every one can reach. Though I focused on English for over two years, an English expert or an native speaker can easily find out my problems, which are the lack of professional learning, mistakes scattered throughout my writings, and sentences and expressions based on Chinese thoughts. Despite all of my weaknesses in English, I have harvested a number of things that many people at my age (and older) wish to have. This proves that English, considered a subject that can hardly be self-taught, may be acquired through everyday learning and practice. Some of my friends, including my parents, think it is a miracle. They believe it is my perseverance that helps me learn English. It helps, I admit, but it deserves not all the credit, and this is definitely not a miracle, for it came very naturally, like a sweet apple eaten, like birds learning to fly, in the first stage of learning. I don't know yet if it is difficult to tackle with my weaknesses, but I sure know I will be proud of myself when I grasp every thing that helps improve my English, just as I have been over the past two years. Every one is able to read, listen, think, and talk. These are what I have been doing in English every day. "What textbooks are you using now to study English?" Some acquaintances would ask me something like this. I did not know how to respond them because I have been using magazines instead of textbooks. They then would be suspicious of my English skills when they heard the answer, "I never use English textbooks." They would continue to ask, "Are you able to pass BAND-4 or even BAND-6?" I did not know that, either, because for some reasons I am unable to take the exams on paper. They then would think I bragged about my present English skills when I answered, "I've never tried it, but I can read, write, listen, and speak in English. Many who passed the exams cannot do all these things." "The English exam is just around the corner. What can I do to pass it? Help me!!!" I often see or hear some people ask worriedly, Usually, they use more than three exclamation marks. Is there anyone who can help them? Probably there is. They have English teachers to turn to and English classes to study in. Along with new English learning devices and books, they seem to have no reason to worry about. But questions like that are not widely solved. Why? To answer that question, I have to ask you, "Why do you learn English?" I may receive hundreds of different responses, but there is a direct answer: To use it on the daily basis. From this point we know there lies great similarity between English and other subjects like math. Not every one becomes mathematician, but every one must learn its basic in order to use it in daily life.
"Where there is a will there is a way." We need the will to learn anything. But where does it come from? Wills come out from motivation and clear goals in which put things into use. Earning high marks on the exam is a must, not a goal. The goal means motive and must the burden. So people who do not foresee English as a goal will not learn it well enough to use it. How many of the older people can remember all they had learnt in school? Few remember, because most of the subjects are not easily used after they graduated. To use, therefore, becomes a significantly important factor to learn something as a goal. However, sadly enough, you must study English if you want to graduate from college. You have to pass BAND-6 in order to continue with graduate education. English, a language used for communication, has become a measure to test if students are qualified to be a graduate! To most students, English is but a useful thing to earn marks. It will never be really wanted to learn by those who exclaim, "I really want to study English but I don't know how." There are two big groups of people who never ask such questions: People who work on foreign affairs, including translators, managers in multinationals, servers in international cities, etc, and people who are very interested in English, including English teachers, taking it as a hobby and a window to the outside world. People in different occupations need English at various levels. One who is learning English must know that because it determines how you learn it and how well you should learn. However, with the entry of WTO and more Westerners coming to China, English is playing a big role in our life like math. In the competitive work force, the more schools of skills you have, the better chance for you to find a good job, and the bigger selection of employers you will have. But the questions still hang over your head so you cannot make up your mind to go on with English learning, seen as a burden. Attitude can solve the questions. A long time ago I read a story about how a professor stimulated interest of students who majored in care-giving. He first presented them with a case involved with the hard tasks in caring of a person described as whom with "disabilities." Knowing the task would be tiring, no student would be willing to take care of the patient until the professor continued to say, "She is my six-month old daughter." This simple story tells us our attitudes may help us find out the fun shrouded by some seemingly tiring things. It is important to have a positive attitude when we begin to work on every thing, including on learning English. You may discover the fun only when you go right into it. With a positive attitude established, you should take your will into actions, but that is the most difficult thing to do. It requires self-discipline and effective time management. However, if we have a clear goal ahead, we will easily set ourselves on the right track. Many students in school are learning the grammar. Is it that important in English learning? It is in some sense. As we know, grammar helps us reduce mistakes. But students and even teachers speak Chinglish and sometimes cannot express what they think, even though they have acquired the grammar. Obviously, the first step is not studying the grammar. We all have learned our first language so naturally since we were toddlers. Can we teach a young child Chinese grammar? We can, if we do not care about failure. Without the grammar the child has no problem speaking, listening, reading, and writing in his first language. As for the second language, we should do exactly what we did to learn our mother tongue: Listening, mimicking, and speaking. Reading and writing come last. Aim at something not too high. You won't give a toddler a lecture on philosophy, will you? Practice is a good companion of learning. Without practice, vocabulary words, expressions, and sentence structures are easily forgotten, no matter what good English environment you are in. Find every opportunity to practice what you've learned. We have been through days we, learning to speak in our mother tongue, were not afraid of making mistakes. Of what are we afraid as we learn the second language? Getting rid of the fear and shyness is the best way to begin practicing. It generally takes toddlers four or five years to use their mother tongue freely. Though you may not need that amount of time to communicate in English, do not assume you will acquire it in weeks or months. The more impatient you are, the more disappointed you will become. Before very long, you will discover that you have learned a lot about the grammar from reading and listening. Only when you know how to use the language, its grammar will not be a book that makes you sleep. The rules and items become alive in articles and English TV and radio programs. Exams no longer trouble you. In all, a clear goal, positive attitude, initiative, and interest have been the best teachers not only to me but to all of you. Jenny
