StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...
Free

Individual English Language Learner - Essay Example

Cite this document
Summary
According to the report, my interviewee’s name is Oyla Macgill. She’s a 20-year-old student studying Public Relations at Jordanstown University. She currently lives in Ballymena but is a native of Belarus, which is situated between Poland and Ukraine…
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER97.5% of users find it useful
Individual English Language Learner
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "Individual English Language Learner"

Individual English Language Learner My interviewee’s name is Oyla Macgill. She’s a 20 year old student studying Public Relations at Jordanstown University. She currently lives in Ballymena but is a native of Belarus, which is situated between Poland and Ukraine. She began to learn English at primary school at the age of 6. When she was 7 years old, she had come over for a month through a charity that helped children who suffred from the Cherlnoble incident of 1986. During that time she stayed with a family in Larne. As such, she was exposed to the English language fairly early. At the age of 10, she came to live in Northern Ireland. She can still speak Russian fluently but forgets how to write some iof it as she rarely reads any Russian books. Oyla picked up her early vocabulary from common things such as food, films, household appliances, magazines and music. Celebrities also helped her learn English by reading magazines that published stories about them. She also acquired English words from listening to her favorite American music. Oyla displayed a strong desire to learn the language. Reading books and completing English exercises helped her lean a bit of English before she started school. She found books helped her with grammar but listening to people talk helped her to understand how to say words. Oyla enjoyed school and believed going there was the best way to learn the English language. She found it the best method of learning the language because she wanted to understand what everyone else in her class was saying. She didn’t want to be left out. Now, as a university student, Oyla is aware that she needs to stay more diligent in acquiring English. Not only is everything around her in English – the people, the places, the classes she wsa taking – but she is also taking up Public Relations. Her major entails conversing and interacting with different kinds of people. She has to be articulate and confident. While she was learning English she came across a few difficulties. She found using different verbs confusing such as begin – began. It took her a while to understand when to use which verb and with what word. The use of “a” and “the” was hard as well because in Russia, she didn’t h ave to put auxiliary words in front of main words. It was just the main words put together. The varied accents were difficult for her, too. Also, people spoke fast and used made-up slang English. She found it odd that when one goes to a town 10 minutes down the road from another town the people talked with completely different accents. For her that was strange as in Russia, even though it’s a massive country, everyone talks with the same accent. Another problem was when she had to learn double-barred words such as pollo mints. She would say mint pollos. She would say chips and fish instead of fish and chips. The Russian alphabet is also completely different from the English alphabet so learning new letters was very hard. Even the writing in Russia would be italics whereas in English it isbubblier. The Russian language is harder than the English language as there are 36 letters in the alphabet. Also, they would be more difficult tosay. As for writing, they employed some symbols, too, unlike in English. The Belarusian language is part of the Slavic languages like Polish, Ukranian, Czech, Serbian and Croatian, etc. Strong “akanie”, “dzekanie” and “cekanie” are typical of the dialects in central Belarus. In 1906 there came about a uniform system of spelling for Belarusian. New letters appeared for Latin script and use of some letters in the Cyrillic version ceased. Intsead, they used ‘ / I / wy. In the Decree of 28th August 1993, there was a debate as a reaction to the adoption of the Belarusian Cyrillic writing. As a consequence, Belarusian was brought closer to Russian, grammatically and phonetically. In 1991, when Belarus became independent, Belarusian started to be known as the state language of the Republic of Belarus. There seems to be limited written information in English on the details of the Belarusian language system probably because they use Russian in education and public life. There are two variations of the Belarusian language. These are narkomaŭka, initiated by Stalin and is officially used today; and, taraškievica which came from the person who wrote the 1st Belarusian grammar. The two have differences in syntax, morphology and writing. The grammar rule for modern Belarusian works on the principle of “you write down what you hear. (Belarusian grammar) It has a grammatical system which contains affixes, suppletivism, intonation, function words, roots combining, reduplication and order of words. Suppletivism means using two roots to make up the forms of one verb, like ‘go” and ‘went’ in English. (Gazariah 2003) I think this is why Oyla had a hard time with the English sentence structure. There are 6 cases of nouns in Belarusian grammar and 8 types of pronouns. When I interviewed Oyla on tape she said “emm” a lot and to be helped with words. For example, she was talking about people living in apartments and couldn’t remember the word “storey”. She has also picked up on English slang as she said “cause” instead of “because”. There are a lot of before and after words in her speach when they aren’t relevant. I think a big reason Oyla continues to have difficulty adapting to the English language is because she grew up using the Belarusian language. At the age of 10, the age when Oyla came to the country, her cognitive skills had already been developed. Children start to “learn” their native language at the early age of 2. This is usually done through parroting their family members or people they watch on TV. This is why even without formal education children can already converse when from the time they’re three. By the time they are 6, most have acquired enough communication skills to enter formal schooling. When Oyla moved to Northern Ireland, she was already well-versed in her native language, Belarusian. After this interview, I realize that Oyla displays two of the VAK learning style, namely: visual and auditory. I wonder if she knows this. It would be beneficial to Oyla, in my opinion, if she knew this fact. As researched by Donald Clark (2008) “most students are unaware of their learning styles and if left to their own means, they are UNLIKELY to start learning in new ways. Thus, knowledge of one’s learning styles can be used to increase self-awareness about their strengths and weaknesses as learners. In other words, all the advantages claimed for metacognition (being aware of one’s own thought and learning processes) can be gained by encouraging learners to become knowledgeable about their own learning and that of others.” Oyla is an avid reader. She reads magazines and books, knowing these will help her make her a better speaker. Personally, I believe this is an excellent way to learn grammar & vocabulary. Avid readers have wider vocabularies than those who read as a necessity. They are also become more observant in the use of grammar. Oyla was right in saying that reading books helped her with grammar. Printed materials have been edited and revised to be grammatically proper and coherent. Language learners can find helpful words, phrases, idioms, expressions that they can use in conversation. The more a learner reads, the more his mind becomes familiar with these vocabularies. Unconsciously, the learner may use these in speech. He may also find himself correcting his own mistakes because his mind, continuously exposed to English in written materials, tells him something’s wrong. The interviewee is also an auditory learner because she has admitted to intentionally using her past time of listening to music an avenue for studying the language. The only disadvantage to this though is that most songs are more concerned with matching words to fit the melody. At times, this practice has led to grammatically incorrect lyrics. If the listener is a language learner with problems in grammar, this may have a big effect on her communication skills. In Oyla’s case, this can further be aggravated by the exposure, and her use, of slang. Because of the big difference in the grammar concepts of her native language and English and the points mentioneded above, Oyla is now still having a hard time reconciling when and what to use in proper speech. A good aspect of though of her listening activities is that, like she says, it’s a way to improve her pronunciation skills. This is true. It is my opinion, too, that being able to just hear a word or phrase over and over again will make our subconscious absorb and store it for use. This is how Oyla acquired her native language. I agree it will indeed be helpful in her acquisition of this second one. References Belarusian grammar, Absoluteastronomy.com, Accessed on April 1, 2009 from http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Belarusian_grammar Clark, D 2009, Performance, Learning, Leadership & Knowledge, Accessed on April 2, 2009 from http://nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/styles.html Gazariah. , 2003, Re: Digest Number 828, e-mail, yahoo.com, viewed April 1, 2009, http://listserv.linguistlist.org/ cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0309&L=gothic-l&P=6319. Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(Individual English Language Learner Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words, n.d.)
Individual English Language Learner Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words. Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/education/1722412-profile-of-individual-english-language-learner
(Individual English Language Learner Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 Words)
Individual English Language Learner Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 Words. https://studentshare.org/education/1722412-profile-of-individual-english-language-learner.
“Individual English Language Learner Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 Words”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/education/1722412-profile-of-individual-english-language-learner.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF Individual English Language Learner

Praise and Regular Monitoring of Knowledge to Test Individual Progress in Learning English

This essay highlights the divergence between the earliest and subsequent language learning and offers suggestions on how an educator would motivate and nurture self-esteem in elementary schools could apply to achieve success in english language Learners (ELL).... First language learning is a natural process that allows children to acquire and extend the linguistic comprehension of their environment.... However, second language learning is a deliberate pursuit, in which mature individuals partake for many reasons....
4 Pages (1000 words) Essay

Model for the Acquisition of a Second Language

language is a complex system of symbols, that acquiring and learning it is a domain exclusive to humans, simply because only man has the innate ability to do it.... Although animals similarly demonstrate communication systems, which are also filled with symbols enabling them to… s on messages to other members of their class, the communication systems of animals do not possess the richness and complexity of the human language that theirs cannot be considered language (Deacon, cited in Harley, 2001: 50)....
24 Pages (6000 words) Essay

Answer 2 questions about language teaching and learning

In explicit learning, various mnemonics, heuristics and strategies are… This is as opposed to the implicit learning of a language in which the learner acquires a language without awareness of what is being learned (Dekeyser, 2003, 314).... This is as opposed to the implicit learning of a language in which the learner acquires a language without awareness of what is being learned (Dekeyser, 2003, 314).... Explicit learning may be deductive, where the learner is taught rules directly by an instructor, or inductive where the learner draws own rules based on examples available in the language....
2 Pages (500 words) Essay

Worksheet Taking Sides # Issue 12 Does Dating Impede Adolescent Development

The assessment of a learner seeks to identify the various challenges a learner might be facing in order to be able to administer teaching methods which enhance the learner's capacity to comprehend things.... She is a Assessment of a learner Assessment of a learner Introduction The assessment of a learner seeks to identify the various challenges a learner might be facing in order to be able to administer teaching methods which enhance the learner's capacity to comprehend things....
2 Pages (500 words) Essay

Second Language Acquisition

The author examines the concept of the Second language Acquisition which has been defined as the process by which individuals acquires the skills of using another language, which may entail the speaking, writing or application skills of another language, other than that first language.... hellip; The teacher should be prepared to teach language skills and pedagogies that are of the caliber of the learners, rather than just following the curriculum instructional provisions....
9 Pages (2250 words) Term Paper

Second Language Acquisition

Second language acquisition is not about how many times learners speak that language, it is about the learner's attitude, exposure to the second language… Comprehensive checks should be employed so that learners' self-confidence is not affected.... After correcting a learner from an utterance mistake, comprehensive checks posed in quick succession may create a different notion in the learner's mind.... The learner is likely to look down upon his progress and thus quitting second language acquisition He claims that language acquisition is a concern with effective communication, in the sense that the recipient is able to decode the intended message rather than his utterances or pronunciation (Krashen 5)....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

Saudi English Second Language Learner

he ESL Saudi learnerThe focus of this case study is a Saudi english language learner.... Some background information on the learner especially about how he experienced learning English in his home country and how he has gone through ESL in the UK where he's now will be provided in the paper "Saudi English Second language learner".... But, before he gets accepted to the university, he further needs to improve his command of the english language....
12 Pages (3000 words) Case Study

Second Language Acquisition

Social constructionists have discovered that instructor's and learner's beliefs are far more significant than information in influencing how persons systematize and define responsibilities and problems, and are superior forecasters of how instructors and students perform in the classroom (Horwitz, 1985).... For instance, a learner's opposition to a particular method could be caused by the learner's perception of his tasks as well as those of the teacher....
13 Pages (3250 words) Literature review
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us