Happy first week of class! At the beginning of the new semester, we would like to share Smita’s writing about English and her academic experiences with you. In this story, she writes about how learning English reminds her of the old days when she conducted researches without internet, and tells us how important English is to open doors for communicating with other scientists academically.
“English is a known language for me. I was introduced to English from my childhood. I was studying in a private school. I was learning English as a second language. Later I moved to government school. I was surprised they were introducing English from the very beginning in 6th grade. As a child, I was happy because I was thinking that I would get the best marks In English. But that was my downfall because later I realized that whatever I knew, I started to forget. I was learning English but my family atmosphere was very different. We used our mother language at home and nobody spoke English – not my friends or relatives. For learning any language the best thing you can do is create an environment for learning. For me, this was missing. At the time, I was not aware of the importance of language. I completed my Bachelor of Science degree. Everything was running smoothly. When I started the master’s program, it was very challenging for me. There was no internet or Google to search for things. It was not popular at that time. I needed more study materials to study and to make notes. In the field of science research, researchers perform and add information to books every year. This research is done by different scientists from different countries. Lots of books are written in English so I needed to be able to take good notes. I needed to read more books that were written in English. This time was very challenging for me. I tried my best but after getting married I didn’t get time to work on the English language so it was almost forgotten when I moved to the USA. I now realize it is time to learn and work on the language for the future. I joined an English speaking course [with LCNV] at James Lee Community Center in September and I realized it was very helpful for me to understand the small mistakes I always made. Now I am doing writing classes. This is also helpful for focusing on the writing skills and grammar mistakes. It is very important to understand grammar completely if you are writing something. Before joining the class, whenever I wrote a paragraph or Article in English, I was first thinking in Hindi (my mother tongue) and then converting into English. Now I am starting to think in English before I write. This is my biggest achievement. My teacher, Mrs. Annette, is very nice and cooperative. My assistant teacher, Mrs. Pat, is also very helpful. I love to learn the way they are teaching. Mrs. Annette always encourages us to write something. It doesn’t matter what you are writing. You should write every day to improve your writing skills. I want to give thanks to my teachers for supporting me and encouraging me. It is my dream to one day improve my English and to start writing blogs and short stories. Thanks for reading my essay.”