It was
the first time that I came into contact with English when I was born because my
mother gave me a name like an American name. This is the reason why she went
abroad to study English when she was 19 years old and she wanted a mixed child.
When I was an elementary school student, I was going to an English conversation
school on my mother's advice. I really enjoyed talking and singing in English.
I liked English so much then. However, I was being bad at English little by
little because it is getting harder to understand grammar and vocabularies and
master them. The awareness came to me about English.
When I
prepared the university entrance exam, I hated English very much after all. I
spent a lot of time on things that I study. However, I couldn't pass that exam.
When I failed the entrance exam twice, I decided to go abroad to study. My
mother told me that I have to go abroad to study and have many experiences. I
wanted to change myself and find a dream for my future.
When I
arrived in America, I couldn't say anything even I'm hungry. I just could say
Yes or No. Then I realized that how important to assert my opinion and also I
need to speak English for that. I had been spending the break time in my
classroom. However, I tried to go out for talking people. After that I could have
a lot of opportunities to talk English with people from foreign countries and
have great friends. They got rid of the awareness about English. I really
started to enjoy talking in English. These experiences encourage me.
Now, I
am studying English so much because I love it. I always come in to connect with
English to study as I was preparing the university entrance exam. However,
studying English comes natural to me because of my mother. I have been studying
conversational skills, study skills and content area knowledge. These are very
interesting to study for me. There are a lot of assignments; for example, book
reviews, essays, English Central, reports, presentations, and so on. However, I
can feel that these assignments improve on my English skills.
What's
more, I have been studying Spanish. It is very fascinating because grammar is
similar to English. So, I could understand Spanish easier. However, Spanish
pronunciation was difficult to say for me. There are many rules on these. The
teacher of Spanish has taught us strictly and simply. I thought that I want to
go to Spain someday in the future and talk them.
I have
no idea in my future now, but I want to go abroad and work using English.
English changed my life and myself. I want to take part in English. Because of
that, I have to study more and engage in everything seriously. In addition, I
want to travel all over the world and see people. I have a lot of places where
I want to visit. For Example, I want to go to the salt lake in Bolivia. It is a
salt lake as far as the eye can see. One of my friends went there and it was
awesome she said. What's more, Spanish is spoken in there, so I want to try my
Spanish.
In
addition, I want to get some capacity; for example, TOEIC, TOEFL and English
proficiency test. I just have 500 points of TOEIC. I need more points for my
dream so I should study and take measures. I am going to begin to learn grammar
and vocabularies. For that, I have to manage my time for studying.
[613 words]
Hi Kurea,
ReplyDeleteThough you composed quite a long language learning history, it is a bit of a challenge to follow the time line, especially through the first parts. Your essay seemed to make a big jump between topics in ¶1 (elementary school and before) and ¶2 (college entrance exam. prep.). I'd like to read about what you learned (or didn't) and how (or why not) through junior high and high school.
When you got into the present, you mentioned having been studying Spanish, but not for how long or where. Then your topics get jumpy again in ¶¶5-7, where you have Spanish, English, Spanish, and then English again. Perhaps your hopes and plans would be easy to follow if you focused on one language first, then the other, in the most likely order for you to achieve your goals.
At the end, where you wrote about tests, I'm guessing you meant the STEP Test, for which there are various levels. What level of certification would you like to get, and how soon?
You also mentioned scoring 500 points on the TOEIC, but not when that was, or what a similar STEP test level might be. Was there something in your TOEIC part scores that indicated weakness in either grammar or vocabulary? How many more points do you need, and what methods and resources do you plan to use to increase your score that much?
Cheers, PB