English is a language I have always been familiar with, probably due to the fact that my parents went to English medium schools and speak English better than their native Chinese tongues and have always spoken English to me. This is however is not standard English and the English of some people of my parents' generation have a lot of mistakes, as they found English grammar difficult. I also make grammatical mistakes personally.
Personally, English can be said to be my native language, and although I do speak some poor Mandarin to some members of my extended family, I am unable to understand chinese dialects which are truly different languages, which I definitely feel is a loss.
Learning English became a chore to me in secondary school, and I still find this to be true when I attend this module, even though my English is probably not as good as that of others in the class, primarily because I am not fond of writing essays, doing critiques, using rubrics etc, am poor at these and also find them to be meaningless and boring to me. However, I know that it will be beneficial to learn new things and do my best and will therefore try to do so in this course, and in the compulsory English module for science students in the future.
Hi Esther,
ReplyDeleteIt is a pleasure to read your blog post.
However, I think most of your sentences are a little lengthy.
Take for example the first line of the first paragraph. Maybe you could just shorten it to, "English have always been a communication language in my family as my parents, who were educated in English, preferred English to their native chinese".
This is just a small suggestion from me. :)
Pardon me for any mistakes made.
Also, if you need help in understanding Chinese dialect, I would not mind helping you. :)
Let's work hard together through this module!
Thanks!
ReplyDeleteHi Esther :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the interesting reflection!
It is good that you did some reflection and analysis on the grammatical mistakes in the first paragraph. It is also good that you paragraphed the essay, making the essay organized. :)
I agree with Jocelyn that some of the sentences are a bit too lengthy. Perhaps, you can split the sentences up, instead of using ‘and’ to connect them together.
For example, the first sentence can be split up to ‘English is a language I have always been familiar with, probably due to the fact that firstly my parents went to English medium schools and speak English better than their native Chinese tongues. More importantly, they have always spoken English to me.’
For the second paragraph, what I can think of to reduce the sentence length is ‘Personally, English can be said to be my native language. Although I do speak some poor Mandarin to some members of my extended family, …’
Pardon me if I made any mistakes! Let us work hard and help each other to improve our English! :)
Thanks, Esther, for the honest and detailed reflection. It's interesting to learn about your language background. I'm also happy to know that you are going to make an effort to overcome your general dislike for writing and embrace the goals of the course.
ReplyDeleteYou've gotten some good feedback for this post. This sort of interaction warms my heart.
All the best this term!
Hello Esther, my group and I are going to comment comment on your blog post. :)
ReplyDeleteGenerally it was a well-written and the paragraphs are coherent.
We realized that your sentences are rather long. Perhaps you could put some commas to separate some independent clauses. :)
1) at my parents went to English medium schools and speak English better >>> schools, speak
2) This is however is not standard English and the English of some people of my parents' generation have a lot of mistakes, as they found English grammar difficult.
The sentence is full of different ideas that may be inter-related, but they may be better being separated into different sentences.
2) can be said to be my native language >>> can be my native
3) native language, and although >>> language. Although
4) es, which I definitely feel is a loss >>> language. I feel that this phenomenon is a loss.
5) class, primarily because >>> class. I am
6) rubrics etc, am poor >>> rubrics, and am poor
7) these and also find t >>> these as I also find
8) best and will therefore >>> best. I will therefore
9) course, and >>> course and
Thank you!