improving my English

[Tueuse de Vampires]

hi everyone :heart:
Today I wrote an English exam. It went okay, but as I was writing I got the feeling I don't really know how to create really complex but concise sentences in English. And it's not only this exam, I feel like this has become a general problem: I don't really know how to put my more elaborate thought into sentences which don't sound like a 5-year-old has said them, plus I can never tell if sentences (not only my own, as well in other texts) are gramatically correct or not.
So my question is, does anybody know what I could do to improve my English? We don't work with a textbook at school which I could use at home alone, so that's not an option. So far I've always learned most by watching English Tv and reading English books. This was okay for years and has put me on a certainly high level of English (at least compared to what it was before I started all of this), but I feel it's not sufficient anymore, I feel like I've reached everything I can with TV and now that's it. So I really don't know how to proceed any further.

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

I know this might sound silly, but I have a suggestion that could work.

Songs.

Take a whole heap of English songs, print off the song lyrics and sing along.

What you are doing in this process is hearing a word, reading a word and pronouncing a word all at the same time.

In the context of the song you are also understanding what the word means and generally, the better songs, are pretty good grammatically.

 

[Kean]

That's a really good idea Botd...try some Jeff Buckley...fantastic lyricist and beautiful singer

 

[Edmund Blackadder]

That's a really good idea Botd...try some Jeff Buckley...fantastic lyricist and beautiful singer

You are dead inside if you don't love Hallelujah

 

[Vicariously]

my best advice would to be engaged in conversations with other English speaking people. Pick topics that you can be passionate about and regardless how silly your translation sounds ask them to help you put it into words. You may find that you are right on with expressing feeling in english. Based on what I see though, you have a better understanding of English than half of the hoodlums and hicks that are native to the language.

 

[Blondie Bear]

I think you're doing great, personally. You're much better in English than I feel I'll EVER be in German. Being on this board will help a lot; you get to read and write in English, and most of the time what you're reading is grammatically correct and well-articulated (unfortunately, not always).

 

[ILLYRIAN]

To improve your use of the English way of speaking read the Agatha Christie novels. Most films with Margaret Rutherford. They have a way of speaking that is descriptive, eloquent and precise.

 

[Frenchy Faith]

Well the board actually helped me a lot with my English... to make it even more efficient, you could ask people to correct you in post when they notice something you wrote doesn't sound right... I think it could help ya! :silly:

 

[Tueuse de Vampires]

Okay, so wouldn't people mind correcting my mistakes? If not, I think it's a great idea!

 

[Vicariously]

nah SS I dont think we would mind much in the least. I will if I notice something if you want me to. 🙂

 

[Angels baby101]

I just have to say for the record... Honestly I agree with Vicariously, I also think you speak or in this case type alot better then most who are native to the language... Actually you typed way better than i normally do...

 

[Blondie Bear]

Okay, so wouldn't people mind correcting my mistakes? If not, I think it's a great idea!

I normally try not to because I think it annoys people, but since you ask. . . . ::evil::

Here's one: I think you meant "So people wouldn't mind?"

 

[goldenboy]

Yeah. To me, the way it's written now, it's (literally) implying that you assume that people would mind. English must be such a pain in the butt to learn (if you're not immersed in it).

 

[Frenchy Faith]

English must be such a pain in the butt to learn (if you're not immersed in it).

True! And to illustrate this, check these poems (which I didn't write, just for the record, but I don't know who wrote them) :silly:

One about meaning:

Let's face it
English is a stupid language.
There is no egg in the eggplant
No ham in the hamburger
And neither pine nor apple in the pineapple.
English muffins were not invented in England
French fries were not invented in France.

We sometimes take English for granted
But if we examine its paradoxes we find that
Quicksand takes you down slowly
Boxing rings are square
And a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

If writers write, how come fingers don't fing.
If the plural of tooth is teeth
Shouldn't the plural of phone booth be phone beeth
If the teacher taught,
Why didn't the preacher praught.

If a vegetarian eats vegetables
What the heck does a humanitarian eat!?
Why do people recite at a play
Yet play at a recital?
Park on driveways and
Drive on parkways
How can the weather be as hot as hell on one day
And as cold as hell on another

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy
Of a language where a house can burn up as
It burns down
And in which you fill in a form
By filling it out
And a bell is only heard once it goes!

English was invented by people, not computers
And it reflects the creativity of the human race
(Which of course isn't a race at all)

That is why
When the stars are out they are visible
But when the lights are out they are invisible
And why it is that when I wind up my watch
It starts
But when I wind up this poem
It ends.

And this one, much harder to a non-native, about pronunciation:

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble but not you
On hiccough, thorough, slough and through.
Well done! And now you wish perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps?

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird.
And dead, it's said like bed, not bead-
for goodness' sake don't call it 'deed'!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(they rhyme with suite and straight and debt).

A moth is not a moth in mother,
Nor both in bother, broth, or brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there's doze and rose and lose-
Just look them up- and goose and choose,
And cork and work and card and ward
And font and front and word and sword,
And do and go and thwart and cart-
Come, I've hardly made a start!
A dreadful language? Man alive!
I'd learned to speak it when I was five!
And yet to write it, the more I sigh,
I'll not learn how 'til the day I die.

 

[Mr. Pointy]

And dead, it's said like bed, not bead-
for goodness' sake don't call it 'deed'!

...not to mention lead and lead, pronounced led (the metal) and leed (to show the way or to guide - among other meanings) - which can also be pronounced led in the past tense...my brain hurts! 🙂

I'm always impressed by the way you guys who are not native English speakers manage to make some of us native speakers look inadequate...keep up the good work :thumbs:

 

[Tueuse de Vampires]

Same spelling and different pronounciation (or the other way around) is really a pain in the butt, believe me. Whenever you come across such a word, you have to check your dictionary for how to pronounce it correctly (which is also a drag if you, like me, are still not able to understand the phonetic symbols). It has already happened to me that I said something and nobody understood what I meant just because I completely mispronounced the word.

But not everything about English is that hard. I'm learning Russian as well and the worst grammar you have there are the 6 cases. It's been 2 years since our teacher introduced the first forms of these cases to us and still they are the source of most of the mistakes we make. See, and that's good about English, no one cares about cases (most of the time).

 

[Blondie Bear]

Cases are difficult if you speak a language that hardly uses them. German cases are kicking my butt. So are the compound words--you all really aren't afraid to just take two words and smoosh them together to make a whole different word that only vaguely resembles the original two words, are ya?

 

[Tueuse de Vampires]

Cases are difficult if you speak a language that hardly uses them. German cases are kicking my butt. So are the compound words--you all really aren't afraid to just take two words and smoosh them together to make a whole different word that only vaguely resembles the original two words, are ya?

I heard from my Mom about how difficult cases were. Apparently she has trouble to get the endings right whenever a word is masculine or neutrum. For me it's just instict more or less 😛
If you're having trouble with the cases, I heard learning Latin helps, as it really depends on cases.
And compound words are fun 😀
You know another thing that drives me mad with English? Tenses. Not all the tenses but definitely simple past and present perfect. Sometimes it seems to me as if they are being used randomly.
Oh, and while we're on it, whenever I build relative clauses, I never know how to connect them. Like I tend to overuse 'that' a bit (as you may have noticed) and I just never know when it's better to put 'who' or 'which' instead of 'that'.

 

[Blondie Bear]

Rule of thumb on "who" or "that": if it's a person, it gets "who" (or a form thereof). If it's a thing, it gets "that" (or a form thereof). "Which" is a little trickier.

 

[Frenchy Faith]

Cases are difficult if you speak a language that hardly uses them. German cases are kicking my butt.

Ditto! I HATE cases! lol I did Latin, German and Russian & I've never managed to overcome the problem! It took me 2 years of German and 3 of Latin just to start understanding how they work (I'm dumb and really bad at grammar... although compared to kids I teach, I guess I'm pretty good since I know what an adjective is LOL)... let alone learning the endings and sticking them to the words correctly!

About English though, excluding pronunciation (which is "the" pain in the bum) I think English is pretty easy. I mean, it's not like you can learn it in a day or anything, but the only difficult things in this language are the irregular verbs, (and once you've learnt them you're fine), and the little words after verbs (like call by, call off, call on, each little word bringing a completely different meaning, try to learn that and not to get it wrong! lol).

But seriously, the verb stay the same with all pronoun, the tenses are pretty simple (just the word 'will' to put your sentence in the future, could you seriously make it simpler?), no cases, no verb endings to worry about...

I'm with you on pronunciation though SS. The first time I went to an English speaking country, people could NOT understand me no kidding. Which made it really bad when I was trying to explain to kids how to build and light a fire... haha

Once I said "I wanna have a party at my house" and the people thought I said "I wanna have a body at my house"... go figure how that happened : king :