Get Up! Confidence!
Hey everyone! I set up this blog to share some of my experience of learning English as both a language and more importantly, a way of thinking.
Most trainees spend almost one third of their school years in learning English and they complain all the time that they are not good at it. Is it our English pronunciation that holds us back? The fact that Chinese people carry lighter accent when speaking English becomes pleasantly obvious when we talk to people from other Asian countries. So it is not about our prounciation or accent.
Or is it true that we do not know as many words as what should be enough? Nah. Never! A lot of trainees use SO MANY complicated words in their quizzes that I always turn to online dictionary for help.
Grammar is never a problem for Chinese English learners. Most of you can write in correct tense and make perfect use of subjectives such as “would” and “were”. As one of our colleague trainer John said, our English education focus too much on grammar. The truth is, grammar is one of the last things that you need to spend one of your third school time on.
It seems there is actually nothing in our way of learning English. What is holding back our fantastic pronunciation and our great bank of vocabulary? Nothing but confidence!
So why cannot we be as confident when we speak English as when speaking Chinese? English is just a language. It is totally NOT linked with intelligence, integrity or any other qualities that people may rely on when looking at a person. It is absolutely unfair to judge a person in terms of whether he/she is not good at a language that is not his/her mother tongue. No one is qualifed to do that because everyone has a language that is totally foreign to him/her.
We are all smart and fast learners. All we need is a little bit more confience. What you can do is find more opportunities to speak during discussion sessions. Seize the time and speak up!
September 11th, 2007 at 2:50 p
I agree with you that pronunciation and grammar are most unlikely the main obstacles of learning English. Confidence is important indeed while we are learning English. However, I consider it oversimplification if the reason is simply because we short of confidence.
To me, vocabulary is a big obstacle. I have problems to understand others’ meaning if I don’t know some words in their remarks. Another is my thinking way. I get so used to express my ideas and thoughts in Chinese way, such as “I think you are not right”, which is typical Chinglish. The third is because I lack constant practice. I fail to study English constantly.
The above is only based on my limited experience and knowledge.
By the way, confidence is never a problem to me while I am learning English.
September 11th, 2007 at 10:19 p
If you are a big fan of second language acquisition theories, you will find out different learners are totally independent of each other. It is quite risky to generalize that the biggest problem that all English learners has is lack of confidence.
As a trainer, sometimes I find myself keeping encouraging trainees who are a little introvertive or shy. Lack of confidence might be the main impediment for those trainees. It is those trainees that need more encouragements than others. So if we trainers do not want to leave anybody behind, we have to wake those group of trainees up because they are the very group that need confidence to speak up.
September 13th, 2007 at 3:49 p
Just I have typed lots of words! But they are lost after page refreashed! !I ‘m crazy~
September 19th, 2007 at 5:52 p
Hello Adah, this is John from the Dalian office. It’s nice to see your blog. You are very enthusiastic so your blog has lots of positive energy !!! I’ll look for more posts in the future. You are welcome to visit my blog as well at http://blogs.tefl.net/johnslinn/
Keep thinking in English !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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