My English Learning Journey

English has been my Achilles heel since young. Dealing with numbers, equations and symbols was definitely a much easier chore for me to handle. English, Literature and papers that requires a good command in English language was never my forte and have never scored well in them during exams.

Coming from an English speaking family, one would definitely think that my English would be of a certain standard. However, conversations at home only revolves round things we do in our daily life and also, no one would bother correcting even if one speaks in broken English. On top of that, I never liked reading books. Whenever my mum asks me to read books, just reading a page or so was the perfect lullaby for me and the “Z monster” would start coming to haunt me.

Having bad grades was just inevitable. In secondary school, my English was so bad that I had to attend a workshop, organized for students like me, that focuses on teaching us how to write English essays to score a better grade for O levels. It however was not useful for me. Just barely passing my English with a grade of C6 for my O levels really hit me hard, and it further proves my lack in competence in English language.

In college, my general paper tutor was really funny and interesting and that really gave me more motivation to write English Essays. However, he only focuses on teaching us the contents to put in to the essays. What I am weak in is actually penning my thoughts down into words. It takes me a long time to actually structure my sentences and putting my ideas down into words.

The fact that I have to end up taking the Qualifying English Test and eventually ES1102 shows the inadequacy in my aptitude towards English. My English Language Learning journey has never reached its peak before and I really wasn’t looking forward to attending any of the ES1102 classes initially. After the first lesson, hearing my tutor’s words of encouragement and how ES1102 will eventually be of much help towards taking ES1541, I begin looking forward to more of such tutorial lessons. What I can do now is to make full use of this time to brush up on my English proficiency instead of complaining about this compulsory additional module that I have to take. Having the right attitude in mind, I believe with hard work and determination, I would be able to conquer my phobia of writing and bring my standard of English to the next level.