Nome: André Luiz Elias de Souza
Idade: 22 anos
Escolaridade: superior incompleto - Letras
Tempo de aprendizagem: +/- 2,5 anos (quase 3 anos)


When I saw that this task would be on talking about the experience in learning English, I thought: Well, It’ll be great. First, because I love writing about this sort of things, and also because we ALWAYS learn more and get to know better about ourselves as beings. It is hard to find out a metaphor to guide an autobiography that is different from the LIFE AS JOURNEY. Vera DID it brilliantly in her “memorial”, but I could not find one different. Then I’m going to imitate Ana Lúcia Gazzola and paraphrase Robert Frost. I am going to relate “THE LONG ROAD TAKEN”
I remember well my very first contact with a foreign language (see that I am “literally” talking about contact, it means, I had no idea about what I was dealing with): I was about eigth years old, was walking with my father in the center of Belo Horizonte city when just in front of the “OTON PALACE HOTEL” I heard a tall man talking to some people in a strange manner. Well, at that time I had no idea that it could be English (neither my poor father) but I knew that I wished (from that moment and as a curious child) learn to talk just the way that man was talking.
After that I remember that one of my mother’s friend was getting rid of some books and magazines, and as I have always been interested in reading, I went to her house and took the old books. Among them there was an English book. I didn’t understand anything about what was in that book, but since that time I decided my overt passion to the English language. Then this same friend of my mother taught me how to count one to ten in English and of course (due to my passion) I’ve learnt at the very first time.
I have NEVER had formal instructions in English before enter the college. I studied in a school where English was taught from “7ª série” on. But it was a public school and there was NO available English teachers at the time. The school staff kept telling us: “We are going to find you an English teacher, but while this does not happen, you are going to have “religion” classes to replace the English ones”. I heard that discourse the “7ª, 8ª séries”. When I started high school I thought this problem would be solved. But it was not. Hence I had no formal instructions before the college. When I decided to try “vestibular” I borrow one set of books and tapes (from CURSOS DE IDIOMAS GLOBO - CIG) and I studied by myself. The English test in “vestibular” for me was EXTREMELY hard. The things I got from CIG was not enough to cover the kind of test required in “vestibular”. Well, but I passed vestibular and enter the college. It was in 1999.
This year was hard for me, because I had a bunch of problems altogether attacking me. I had to stop the CICLO BÁSICO of the course. I just went back to college one year after that.
2000. During the first semester I re-did the CICLO BASICO, hence no contact with English. During the second semester I registered myself in disciplines from Letras and among them “ENGLISH I”. I was exciting about having my VERY FIRST English class. I remember it as it was today. I was the first guy to arrive in the classroom. After some time, people were still there, the professor came in: she started talking EVERYTHING in English. I didn’t understand a word. I was quite anxious and that disturbed me a lot. Then she started asking some questions to people there. They were answering. This facts got me more nervous than I already was. I remember that she spoke something and most of the class started laughing. It was the click. I simply ran away from there (before she asks me anything), went to “colegiado” and “gave up” the English I course. Indeed, I thought of given up Letras or at least given up the English major. Then I was down and I decided to talk to a friend (who was studying here more than two years) and she told me that I could try CENEX course before the graduation one. It was what I did. I entered BASIC I course ate CENEX. It was marvellous. First of all because it was really basic, and the environment the teacher created in classroom was fantastic. I did at CENEX BASIC I, II, III and IV. Just at the end of BASIC IV, I decided to register myself at the graduation ENGLISH I. I took ENGLISH I, HABILIDADES INTEGRADAS II and III.
The fact is that I have never been abroad and all that I’ve learnt concerning English was here at the college (interacting with you guys, and professors, etc.) and by myself (reading, self-evaluating me, etc.). And now here I am telling you about this wonderfull experience with the English Language.


Well, as my formal experience with the English was totally in the college, I think it was (at least it was supposed to be) communicative. The better experiences I had in classroom with English was at CENEX. The classes I had there was completely communicative in terms of the principles of the Communicative Approach. I remember that at BASIC I, the teacher brought us texts taken from a web site that “manipulated” the language of newspapers in order to give the same news in English (but with different levels of difficulty – the web site is www.englishtown.com). So, we worked with “real” contexts and so on. We talked a lot. Altough the teacher talked only in English, we could understand her. I think this happened because she was extremely kineasthetic and it helped me a lot.
The activities we did in class almost always required us to talk among ourselves and look for understanding with the mates, not only with the teacher. The teacher I had in BASIC III was wonderful. A very intelligent person, with a very good sense of group-work. He taught us all the cultural things that plays an important role in understanding a language. This propensity is linked with the “communicative competence” we are supposed to have to appropriately communicate.
I do believe that the Communicative Approach is a good approach (with its flaws, of course) to deal with language learning. Language has to be understood as something non-trivial as many people think it is. In my opinion, language is one of the most complex cognitive ability human beings have, and we as professionals from this area have to have an idea of what “acquiring/learning language” is all about.
But I do believe that the AUTONOMY is one cogent factors that learners should have. I am telling that, because most part of my experience in English was by myself and this fact helped me a lot in dealing with the English language. One should go for it, and as Danilo Cristófaro said in his autobiography “There is no ending to this one. We will never be able to know everything and become absolute masters of the language. It is a futile attempt. Not even natives do that. By doing this, humbly, we should enjoy every new word we learn. Every new expression. Every step of the way”