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Geschrieben von horse patronus am 18.01.2009 um 13:57:

 

I'm reading a lot of stories at (or on?) fanfiction.net in English. And I read Harry Potter and the deathly Hallows because I couldn't wait. I was really surprised of myself so read the first book, too.
I think reading is the first part of becoming a friend of this language speaking and writing is more difficult.
want to do it always in the right way but of course I'll make mistakes and it's normal but not motivating.
@ Hankstar
You're right I had to search fot this Thread! We need new topics to dicuss about.
I think you wanted to write 'too' and not the number...

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Geschrieben von Jausti am 18.01.2009 um 14:07:

 

yeah, i also think reading is really important to improve someone's english. but i can also recommend listening to english audio books e.g. harry potter. my great cousin let me have his 7 audio books and i uploaded them onto my iPod. it was quite funny listening to them and at this time, my english improved a lot

maybe we could talk about english lessons at school. i have to admit i'm really disappointed with my current english teacher. she tries hard, but it doesn't really work out. her english is terrible and i noticed my english corrupted during the past 2 years. well, what about you? anything to say about stupid english books (english G 2000 : haha, good one) ore teachers?

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Geschrieben von horse patronus am 18.01.2009 um 16:33:

 

I never listened to english audio books, maybe I should do this once...
We can about English lessons
My teacher cans speak english but not very well, I think some students can do it better. And her lessons are sooo boring, don't know what she prepares at home. We learn about grammar (ok, maybe I'll need it) and write comments and summaries and more comments and summaries. "What's our Class Test about? Oh, writing a !!!" What the hell shall I do with my comments in the holidays, maybe in an English-speaking country?
Of course I care about my marks but I also want to use things I learned once in real life!
Bad books is a good topic
We read a lot of stupid books, I can remember two of the last few years: The Australian Connection (I never finished this boring book about Australia; I think the author doesn't know even where to find this continent) and The War between the Classes (should criticize the society of, what was it US or Britain).
In 9th grade we had a (huh, what's 'Referendar' in English?) she could speak but not teach english - very sad...

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Geschrieben von AllegroAssai am 24.01.2009 um 07:00:

 

We did grammar and vocabulary for six years. Fiill in gap texts, vocabulary tests, etc. From year 5 to year 10. Then, in year 11 it started to be interesting. Horrible though it was, boring though it was, I then mastered English, it felt like it had clicked if you know what I mean.

Year 11-13 was actually really interesting, lots of dialogues, reading good stories (my teacher adored short stories and science fiction and so do I).

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Geschrieben von _Severus Black_ am 01.02.2009 um 17:10:

 

I'm in grade 9 and we also have a (I don't know "Referendar") and I have to say that his lessons are really interesting and not as stupid as our normal English lessons.
Maybe its because of his way of teaching^^
Instead of reading stupid books like English 2000 or novels like "Prince WIlliam,Maximillian Minsky and me" we've learned how to speak english in a different way and he also told us that we dont really need all this grammar stuff or how to write a summary

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Geschrieben von Rumtreiberin am 02.02.2009 um 17:17:

 

In my school we have an assistent teacher from the US. His name is Allen,he has darkblond hair and blue eyes, and all the girls a cracy for him. I feel pitty for him, propably he is a good teacher, but they don't really talk to him, and when he looks at somebody, she blushs and starts to giggle.( it s a school with one male student) I am one of the few, who are able to answer and look at him at the same time. As a matter of fact that's all very annoying and it bothers me a bit.

My english is pretty okay, just like talking, but my writing and my grmmar should get better.( my teacher told me *drop*) She is a very good teacher, also funny and so on, but the teacher before was horrible, he was just to nice, nobody listened the hole class got very loud, though I had to teach me myself.

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Geschrieben von Lupinia am 02.02.2009 um 17:36:

 

Hi everyone

I'm in grade 13 now and I absolutely love to speak English, especially because of my accent which for some friends must be really annoying when I start to talk to them in English no matter where we are .
Since last year we read short stories and some of them are quite interesting, and luckily we have an excellent teacher, whereas others are not that lucky (Just today I sat in a friend's class and her English teacher is just horrible! I'm so sorry for her.) But as I'm thinking about it: we never read bad books like we often do in German class unfortunately.

Which books did you read in class/school?


By the way,"Referendar" is student teacher

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Geschrieben von Tatjana am 02.02.2009 um 18:02:

 

Hi!
Well, some months ago I started to write in English (I know some people from GB) and to watch English movies. And my English improved A LOT!
Now I'm an A-student
And I had to realise, that it isn't as difficult to watch English movies as I expected.
Did you know that Ballet Shoes is on youtube again? I watched it a few days ago. It's wonderful!! And I also learned a new word: alas

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Geschrieben von Misto am 13.02.2009 um 16:01:

 



I'll send you a couple of my favorite movies and you won't say that again. Try Texan english or a movie in good, oldfashioned northern english working-class slang.

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Geschrieben von Jausti am 13.02.2009 um 16:10:

 

you should try "snatch". brad pitt's gipsy accent is kinda horrible!

i nearly hate my current english teacher. she doesn't hear properly, she's not able to speak english herself (so why does she try to teach it?) and her lessons are always the same. i don't know how often we've already had the topic "child labour". it's annoying

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Geschrieben von Bella13 am 21.02.2009 um 13:51:

 


My english-teacher is also soooo horrible! She speaks english in our lessons, and hers is so bad, you wouldn't believe it. She says wrong things all the time and she doesn't want to be corrected by us. And she has her favourite pupils! They can do all they want and don't get punished for it. That's so mean!!!!

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Geschrieben von Sirius15 am 12.03.2009 um 23:59:

 

Hey you lot!
So, after months and months of way too much to do I'm hereby announcing my return to this board (*winks at Teekon* yep, I'm going to start catching up on your fanfic )
Speaking about English lessons at school, I myself had quite a mix of teachers and teaching styles in my 8 years at Gymnasium.
In our first year, we had this on the one hand quite nice teacher who did lots of activities with us - for example one day we had to bring stuff for a typical English breakfast to class and then we tried to act out little dialogues about food while we ate and she filmed us - but on the other hand she was way too strict to some of us and clearly had favourites.

Then after she left, in came a very young teacher with a quite different style of teaching. For one, he insisted on speaking nothing but English - and we were in year 2 at the Gymnasium - with a broad American accent, and he set on a high standard very soon... Whilst in year 2 I hated him, but thinking back his classes have done wonders for my English vocabulary.

Year 3 and 4 with yet another teacher, also American English. I still recall writing at least 2 A4 Pages each lesson, as he covered all the topics in the book in much more detail than required For example, when speaking about Florida he not only did the exercises and stories from the book, he also told us lots of stuff about crocodiles, the Everglades, the Space Center at Cape Canaveral and the history of space travel in general ...
I loved his little lectures and I think I've also gained a lot from these years, even if he was a bit difficult to get on with at times.

The best classes of English I clearly had in my last 4 years at Gymnasium. Not only did I personally get on brilliantly with my English teacher, I also loved her classes as we did lots of different things, it was never boring and I simply enjoyed myself almost every time.

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Geschrieben von Kings Crossie am 29.03.2009 um 12:23:

 

@Lilly-Potter

Oh I didn't wrote in the last time, too. I'm sorry!
mmh...I know that in HP6 the trafalger square is in and there I was too. other places I don't know, but perhaps you will find the telephone house from HP5 where the entrance to the ministry is. I'm not sure but I think that I walked on the Street which you see in the background in this scene in the movie. It must be in the near of trafalger square.

oh! yes I know Twilight!!! I read all the books in german but nowly I read the first 264 pages from midnight sun from the internet in english. I love the books!! They are great!! But i find the movie is not so good, because they take so much away. The realisation from book to film made warner bros. with harry potter much better. Althogh Twilight film is unfotunatly good too.

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Geschrieben von ~Miss-.-mini:*me~ am 12.04.2009 um 21:10:

 

I had three different teachers in the past six years and fortunately each one got better instead of the other way around. The first one was pretty creepy. She could speak English very well but she absolutely couldn’t teach. It was all vocabularies, irregular verbs and PETER (her rabbit-puppet) – I think she confused us with her little kids…

I was a maroon in English and I only managed to pass grades by copying things from my friends (what a shame! *blush*) Luckily, the teacher didn’t stay for long and traded school so that we got a new one for one year. He was pretty cool, very funny and easy-going. TOO easy-going. Again, we didn’t learn much. In fact; it’s just because of harry potter (and my impatience) that I managed to improve my creepy English.

It started with the release of DH. I was so obsessed with the series that I just COULDN’T wait any longer. So I made myself a promise: to improve my English so that I could understand the book. And if I want something very badly, I normally find a way to reach my goal.

So I started to read Fanfictions on harrypotterfanfiction.com and I got better and better and then the big day arrived: DH got released! First I had some difficulties with understanding but when I got used to Rowlings style (and realized that there are a lot of similarities between French, Spanish (two languages I already mastered) and English) it got easier and somewhere in the middle of the book I didn’t even realize it was English any longer. I just kept reading and reading… and so I became a big fan of the language.

Two months later my mom got me the Deathly Hallows in german but I didn’t like it as much as I liked the original. I put it away after the second chapter and started to re-read the English version and it got even better! Because now I was able to understand those things I didn’t understand at the first try.

I searched for another series that I could read in English (I had to get past my potter-obsession which got worse after I discovered that the books were even better when you read them in English) and what I found was Twilight.

Well, I’m sure you can imagine that my potter-obsession-problem is solved now, after I made the connection with Edward Cullen. But there is also a new obsession I have to worry Twilight *sigh*

The hot vampire series wrapped me even further into the language because I love the interviews with the cast and I love fanfictions and the amazing websites the Americans created for the series.

I think I haven’t touched a single book written in german for two years nor seen a movie which is translated from English to german. I’m feeling like a freak, an addict. English-addict. But I love it.

My current teacher even uses to tell me I’m better than she is in English (and she is REALLY GOOD. The best we had so far (ALL subjects considered))
Unfortunately the rest of my classmates aren’t as passionate with the language as I am and I have to slow down a lot in the lessons, making them quiet boring and uninteresting for me.

But this summer I’m going to another school. And I hope I’m the worst student in English so I have finally some competitions and can improve my skills again (difficulties are always good motivations for me because I CAN’T STAND to be the worst in anything)

At the moment I’m trying to slow down a little because I’m already known as ‘the English dictionary’ and I certainly do not wish to go in history as “the English freak�

But I’m still glad that Harry Potter managed to transform me from a complete English-maroon to a stable English-Lover in just the course of a few weeks

greets

miss mini me

P.S: Does anybody know a book which is good enough to distract me from twilight and cure my obsession? (English of course ;D) My mom would thank you a lot since I'm driving her mad with Edward Cullen

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Geschrieben von Lupinia am 12.04.2009 um 23:01:

 

@~Miss-.-mini:*me~

I don't know what kind of genre you like or prefer to read but I have read "Confessions of a Shopaholic" recently and I really enjoyed it.
Or maybe a Sherlock Holmes story or Shakespeare (it really not that hard to understand).

Those are a few suggestions I can tell of, so if you're interested you can try

Lupi