totm july 2020 People who have English as their secondary language, how did you learn English?

[Starhelperdude]

I learned it at school, I think my english is good in relation to my classmates, which talk like this:

''I don't have a Drucker zuhause, could du please geben mir a Drucker?'' Really someone in my class talked like this. My ''spoken'' English is not that good but my understanding of sentences/reading/hearing is really good IMO

[YNM]

I had like a set of story books in english from when I was a small child. We had english at school too, all the way from elementary to high school, then there was even a course of it in first year uni.

But what really pushed my english off (on ?) was once I had a PC at home, and once I was able to pore off the internet. By the late years of elementary school it had "clicked" on inside my head, and I started to mostly think internally in english somehow (or at least I was able to - kind of harder when you're conversing in another language than what you're thinking !).

Obviously none of this truly helped the pronounciation - until I came across Technical Difficulties (still want a northern accent, but anyone who actually knows it properly can't classify me in there as most of the pronounciations I've heard in my life are american english and so I'm still grouped as "london"). Honestly I wonder how did I actually went and did this one - I barely practice speaking to anyone ! But like, speaking to foreigners in english ? Fine ! (I was even able to tell to some poor foreigner in the commuter train that they're blocking off other passengers, sadly they didn't accept my suggestion). Using VC in Discord ? First time in english, and has been most of the time since, entirely fine, even for lightly technical stuff.

 

Honestly the trend only reverses a bit now when I try to learn yet another language (about a decade after I went off with english). With 3 languages trying to pop in my head it's just much easier to stick with my mother tongue...

And to be fair to anyone here whose mother language's written form don't use latin, I think I have it easier from that angle too. (And to be fair to most of the english-speaking person trying to learn the language I'm currently learning, our pronounciation already comes much closer and much more consistent already.)

Edited November 19, 2020 by YNM

[kerbiloid]

10 hours ago, Starhelperdude said:

''I don't have a Drucker zuhause, could du please geben mir a Drucker?''

Being a native speaker of neighter English, nor Deutch, I can clearly understand that they ask to give them a printer because they don't have it at home, even before realising that this is a mix of two languages...

Das is strange... Ich been shocked.

Edited November 19, 2020 by kerbiloid

[TitiKSP]

Basically google translate,FNAF and english school.

[HyperDraco]

I grew up in a country that wasn't the one of my birth nationality. My parents also didn't have English as their first language (although they could easily match natives far before my birth), and so I learnt English with my parents. At school was where I learnt it primarily, from Nursery onwards. By 14 or 15, I was particularly gifted at most subjects and English, barring Biology. I still used to mess up sometimes whilst speaking but oration practice over the years and reading aloud to my English girlfriend at the time. So theoretically I can speak it to a level that it easily matches my native language's skill, but I still consider it my Secondary Language. Also reading, reading many books help a lot. I used to devour books as a young child and as such my vocabulary is quite vast.

(If I come across as snobby I'm really sorry I've been told this is a problem I face but I swear it's unintentional) 

[Mukita12]

I just.... use the knowledge of english that i have back in 4th grade and immediately talk to foreigner... and movie, tv shows, youtube video also helped

[JB182]

i learn english because i learned it from school and i also see website, video, and people chatting using english. most games uses english, and i helped by Google Translate.

[herberttaylor941]

I remember Philippines their second language is English so it's easy to communicate.