I like English. I like the open-minded English culture. It's always much
relieved and straight forward to use English. English opens a new door to me.
I can know a lot of things at first hand, and learn new things from different
perspective.
I never live or study abroad, so I have been studying English on my own for
many years. My passion gradually becomes enthusiasm, when I get praise from
friends and colleagues. The tastes of accomplishment really feel good. But
there is always a huge gap between context learning and practical using
English. I cannot fluently express my thought without preparation beforehand.
I have difficulty following the lines in TV series. All these frustrate me.
To tackle this frustration, I started to change the way I study English.
English magazine such as studio classroom was replaced by more interesting
materials online such as blogs, tech news, and TED talk. To understand what
phrases people use at chatting, I take notes at the lines from my favorite TV
series.
Such changes have continued for a month, I post all the notes on my blog
and FB page, and try to log such experimental changes. This process becomes
very interesting, and many materials are inspiring. There is total different
feeling when using it rather than learning in context. English somehow comes
alive, because words have meaning, and sentences become ideas.
Those frustrations are not that severe anymore, but does my English really
improve during this period? I can feel a little enhancement, but still
limited. I found that the idea of using English is still passive in this way.
Listen is passive. Reading is passive, too. I start thinking my next trial is
to create an active talking and writing environment.
That's why I am here, sharing my experience. I can not flourish on my own,
because English is a language to use, a culture to build. That means we need
to use it in our daily life to communicate, transfer ideas, and learn new
things altogether with each other by English.
If you have been through the same frustration or have the same passion, I'd
like to invite you to join together to build an active English environment.
Simply, use English together! There is still no specific project to roll off
yet, but will be hopefully in near future. No rules and obligations, too! The
bottom line is use what you learn, and keep learning what you might need to
use.
If you are interested, come to my FB page,
https://www.facebook.com/notesoflives and start sharing your thoughts on
posts! Your input definitely shapes the discussion or even the content I
collect. You are also welcome to share your experience of English learning,
and how you think we could improve it in a more efficient way