【講師コラム】グレッチェン講師No.2 ～Learning the English Language～

Learning is vital in life. Learning is a progressive change and we know that change is the only constant in life. Learning anything is always fulfilling. There are some that just comes unnoticed and natural. Some needs time, effort and patience. Learning during childhood is always the fastest and the easiest. The brain is still an empty canvass at that time and with no or less experience, a child has fewer inhibitions that can hinder learning. Also, learning a language at a younger age makes you sound closer as a native compared to starting learning it when you are already an adult. Brain elasticity and rapid neural formation contribute in the reason babies or children learn faster, easier and sounds closer as a native speaker of the language. Adult minds has already full grown which makes it more difficult to have them learn new things especially if they are not interested and do not exert great effort. My journey in learning the English language has been unexpected. In our house, my family does not habitually speak in English. We converse by our native language/dialect, Cebuano-Bisaya. Lucky for both my siblings and I that early on in school we already had English subjects and the medium of instruction was English. For entertainment we watched English movies. As a college student that majors in English, I needed to learn the more complicated part of learning a language which is dissecting parts of a sentence. This helps me understand more sentence constructions and develop my writing skills. Like everything else in life, learning anything needs practice. We need to do it constantly so that we will not forget. Anything that are not used would eventually be lost. Immersion is always the best technique. Be in a place where people are speaking in the language you want to learn. Needing to be understood because you are in a foreign land makes you learn the language without knowing. During this pandemic, travelling is not advisable so just speak to someone whom you have no other option but to speak in English. Unlike in a classroom, at least here you can talk about anything. Therefore, never be shy in asking help. Sometimes, that is where great friendship starts. Not only you have learned a language, you always acquired a friend.