Name: Yoshiko Kaneta

Year: 1997

 

 

     It was as a new student of a JHS that I had an English class for the first time. At first, I did not like English very much. But I liked our English teacher. I wanted to be praised by him, so I was enthusiastic in the class.

     Also, I studied hard to get full marks in English. He taught me a lot of things. I played many games, watched the Western movies, and sang lots of English songs. Gradually, English became close to me. The more I was interested in English, the more I yearned for foreign countries and foreigners.                                            

     When I was a HS student, I liked to look up new words in my dictionary very much. It is not too much to say that it was my hobby. However many pieces of baggage I had, I always carried my dictionary. In those days, I had English knowledge to some degree, but I actually did not have the chance that I could touch real English. I usually read my textbook, learnt new words and grammar by heart, and listened to only Japanese teachers' English. But the chance had finally come! A native speaker teacher came to our school to teach us English. I was happy, and simply wanted to talk with him. But I could not, for the life of me, tell him my real feelings. I was irritated and impatient because I could not say what I wanted to say. When we communicate with others, the most important thing is our hearts. And if we can make ourselves understood, we can understand each other more. This is what I thought at that time. From then, I came to wanted to learn English as means of communication. I also want to know about other countries, cultures, histories, and peoples. I was especially interested in people all over the world because I loved human beings very much.

     In this April, I entered this university, but from the first class I was shocked by many things one after another. The English level of my classmates was much higher than my expectation. Moreover that it is natural to speak English here made me feel miserable. While I was unaware, I came to have an inferiority complex that I could not speak English very well. The more I had it, the more I did not want to speak English. I usually compared myself with my classmates; and I also worried about making mistakes. I could not enjoy studying English at all. But in one video that I watched in the oral class, I heard very wonderful words. One student who is in this university said that "Because I am a Japanese, it is natural to make mistakes. And others do not care about your mistakes at all". Since I heard this, I felt a little ease. Now I think I should advance toward my own goal at my own pace. Moreover, before anything else, I had better enjoy studying English. I want to treasure my feelings that I love English.                                                                     

     By the way, my ways of language learning have changed since coming to this university. At the foundation of this change, there is a great change of my opinion towards English. English is a -means to live and to understand each other. To do so, very difficult words and grammars are not needed. I tried to listen to teachers' conversations and my classmates' stories looking at their eyes. Also, I tried to do shadowing and summarize as much as possible. To do these things were helpful and very useful for me.                              

     Still now, I can not hear and understand all of native speakers'

conversations. But compared with what I was, I could improve a lot. I want to make the best use of this wonderful surroundings.