Name: Yukari Nomura 

 Year: 1996              

 

                                                                                                               

     I started to learn English when I was twelve, in my sixth grade at elementary school. I think this is a little bit earlier than other people, since we usually begin studying English in Junior High School. When I was eleven, I was told that I had to move to the United States because of my father's job. At first I did not want to go. I was afraid to go abroad at that time. The biggest reason was English. Since I was moving to a rural part of the States, Kentucky, I was told that I had to go to the ordinary school there, which meant that I would have to stay at a place where everybody speaks English, the language I did not know at all.

     I entered the elementary school from fifth grade (in the US ) when I was twelve. It was a great challenge for me, but it did not take more than a year for me to get used to English and to be able to speak with easy conversations. In school there was a class called ESL (English as a Second Language), and people like me studied English there. People go there when they have difficult classes like social studies, science, foreign language. At first, I stayed at ESL class a lot but soon I started to try to stay in regular classes with Americans. I think this challenge made me successful. Of course it was not that easy and I think I could manage it because I had the ESL teacher's help. After I finished sixth grade at Elementary school, I entered Middle school, and there I also learned a lot of English  through daily life with friends and from studying at school. Not only English but other things as well. Probably my friends were my best teachers of English. To conclude, the experience in the States gave me the biggest influence on my English history.

     After I came back to Japan, I went to junior high school for a very short time and then I entered high school. My high school was an ordinary school where a lot of students were studying in order to  enter college, and I was one of them. At the school, nobody wanted to study for college examinations but that was the reality. In English classes we studied grammar the most. English was a subject that a lot of people disliked. As for me, since I liked studying English and I was pretty good at it, I think it was a good time to learn English grammar.

     I began to think about going to this university when I was in eleventh grade. I was sure that I wanted to study English and thought that this was the best place for me. I expected to perfect my English.

     At this university, I think that I have learned to learn English not on the desk with papers  but by hearing and speaking English. I have learned that memorizing words is not the only way to study English. When I was in high school, I thought that increasing vocabulary is the most important thing for me. I thought that was what was lacking in myself the most. But now I found out that  there are more important things in order to learn English, and I am learning it through my ears. Also I am enjoying it!

     In OC class, I liked talking with a lot of partners. There were many things that I  learned from partners. From my experience of learning English, I think using English is the best way to keep up with it. If you do not use what you have learned it will be gone soon. So my goal for the next year is to keep in touch with English as much as I can. Even when I am by myself. Now my goal, so far, is to learn English itself, but I want to learn about cultures (American cultures, English cultures. . . . . even my own culture) as well.  If I improve English enough in the near future, then maybe I want to learn difficult vocabulary so that I can read  English fluently. I do not have concrete plans for the future, after graduating from the University, but I do hope to use English in my career if possible. I also hope that I will be able to use English as a means to communicate with many people.

     In learning English, people like me are lucky to have a chance to go abroad and that is where I learned most of my English. It is true that living in America helps a lot to learn English, but I think it is not only that. I know  many people who can speak English very well who have never been abroad, and I also know people who lived in the States but did not improve their English that much. Some people think going abroad means acquiring English. That is not true. It is how hard you work and what kind of strategy you use.

     As a suggestion to freshmen next year, I would like to say that when you are learning a language, you should enjoy it. You do not have to study on the desk (sometimes it is necessary but. . . ). I think the more you use what you have learned, the more you improve. I think most of the people entering Eibei-ka are very good at English and they are confident as well. Because of this, I am sure some of them will be shocked to meet people who are better than  they are, and I was one of them at first. Think of it in this way, if there are people who you think are better than you are, that means you have more than one teacher to learn from. Also when you are talking with  people who you think have a lower level than you, teach them what you know, then you will learn as well. By changing how you think, the levels do not exist.