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Tag: Language

Why do we easily get affected by our mother-tongue language as ESL learners?

Why do we easily get affected by our mother-tongue language as ESL (English as a Second Language) learners? The short answer to this question is that if we are learning a language spoken by a different ethnic group, it is almost as if we are trying to speak a language of a different species if we were in the animal kingdom. ie. If I were a cat species, how can I get myself to talk like a pig species? However, whenever we come across people like ABC’s (American Born Chinese) who are able to speak English like a native speaker, we can feel like we are not competent enough, as if our own species can even be better than us. So the question is, is it actually a normal phenomenon when our English expressions are being affected by our mother-tongue language?

Throughout history, we have seen how countries have tried to preserve their own local culture by preventing the invasion of foreign values and culture. So if culture and language cannot be separated, what happens when English words try to enter the brain? Well, the brain reacts the same way a country does when it senses a security problem, then drives away all that is associated with foreign culture in it. In other words, if an English word were a foreign person entering the brain to find a place to settle down, the brain would yell out something like “Here comes an intruder!” or “Let’s put him in custody for 3 days!” Then maybe the person (English word) will be executed afterwards.

So from the perspective of culture, the brain may already have a defense mechanism that guards against foreign cultures by making sure that its local culture stays well-intact and remains predominant. So how can we speak English like a foreign person if we do not even have the culture and lifestyles of a foreign person? This is why experts say that the best way to learn a language is through immersing yourself in a real life language environment. Yet, most of us still hit a brick wall in our language learning process because we are so used to the lifestyles and culture from our mother tongue language. We may still continue to improve ourselves in vocabulary knowledge of a foreign language, but never be able to reach the fluency of a foreign language’s native speaker.

So how should we feel about ourselves whenever we leave a hint of our mother tongue language when we speak English? For one thing, our brain has a natural response to different cultures other than our own, and even if we try hard to memorise words, our utterances are nonetheless indicative of where we come from. Even though we still tend to admire native English speakers very much, we should never forget that we also have our own heritage to be proud of and to be admired by foreigners. We may try to sound like native English speakers through various methods such as learning IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet), but have we completely forgotten what colour we are on the inside? 🙂

Why is it important to practice spelling English words correctly for ESL learners?

Why is it important to practice spelling English words correctly for ESL (English as a Second Language) learners? With so much technology that can do word corrections automatically for us when we type, will we ever need to learn how to spell words with a pen or pencil anymore? Also, as schools nowadays use the Ipad for student’s homework and even allow students to use laptops during lessons to do classwork, it seems as though it is rendering the learning of English spelling and handwriting useless. So the question is, is there a need to learn how to spell English words with a pen or pencil anymore?

If I started off by saying that “Studies have shown that people with strong spelling skills have better cognition.” or “It has been shown that people with stronger spelling skills are smarter.”, you would probably think that I’m explaining nothing of my own and just copied and pasted the information here from somewhere on the internet. So if I use the analogy of spelling words with a keyboard instead of a pen or pencil is like using a fork compared to using chopsticks for a meal, wouldn’t you think it is so much more vivid? In other words, a person who only knows how to use a fork could be missing out on many things that the person with the chopsticks has. For example, you can have much more control and be able to grab food gently without pinching through them, you can widen your chopsticks for grabbing or delivering much more food into your mouth, you can use the chopsticks like a pair of scissors to cut food into half or proportions, and so much more!

However, since we have transitioned into the Information era, most people now prefer a keyboard instead of a real pen or pencil because the former is just so much more convenient than the latter. With the back button on our keyboard, we can undo things that we’ve written and don’t need an eraser. Or with just the click of a button, we can erase everything on our screen without throwing away paper and being unenvironmentally friendly. So what is the use of stationery anymore? Should we throw them into trash after we graduate from school? While ‘yes’ is most likely the answer in everyone’s minds, I would actually say ‘no’.

So how is the pen or pencil better than a keyboard? The keyboard may be convenient, but it is actually very limited compared to the pen or pencil. With a stroke of the pen or pencil, you can write each and every letter of an English word in any shape and style that you like, but also the way you write each and every word can tell something about your soul, spirit, and character – the living, breathing being inside of you. As you keep on practicing writing with the pen or pencil, you may even find that the spelling of words is more like an art to be appreciated than it is chore, as opposed to using the keyboard that can only jot down words for you in a mechanical way, without transferring a slight imprint of your soul and spirit. Practice writing passages even – you may even begin to realize that there is much more real knowledge to search for in your brain with the pen or pencil than with the keyboard and the computer, or even the internet.