Hi! This is Shafu. Today I am going to write about my English study. Now I live and work in the U.S. but I born in Japan and had lived there for 26 years. Of course, my mother language is Japanese.
I decided to write about it because I am often asked “how did you learn English?” by American colleagues.
Study at Japanese school
Currently, English classes starts at 3rd grade of elementary school. But when I was a student, it was from 1st year of junior high school. So I started studying English at 12 years old.
At that time, Japanese school focus on grammer. Grammer is important, but it is bit boring for students. English was not my favorite class.
When I was a high school student, I was interested in global problems such as poverty, education gap, religious conflict and so on. I started to learn English hard to enter an colledge where I can learn “International relations”.
After I getting in the colleage, I took some courses taken place in English. It means I had to read, speak, make presentations, write reports, all in English. It helped me a lot to improve my English.
Reading Harry Potter
When I was a colleage student, I had a lot of time. Maybe you are surprised but Japanese colleage student do not have so much reports (STEM students are different. They are super busy). So I could use plenty of time to read my favorite novel, “Harry Potter”. I bought the British Edition of Harry Potter and read these repeatedly. In my opinion, it is much enjoyable to read in original language rather than in translated Japanese edition. This is very useful as English study.
Online “EIKAIWA”
Last yaer at my colleage, I got an job offer from a Japanese company which sent me the U.S now. This company has many branches around the world. I accepted this job offer because I wanted to work outside of my home country. It means I need to speak English (or local language).
But at this time, I was not good at speaking. So I started taking “online EIKAIWA” classes. “EIKAIWA” is Japanese word which means “speaking English”. Some companies provide English 1 on 1 lessons on online. I took 3 30-mins lessons per a day. Many of teachers are the Philipinoes or Eastern European. We can talk and practice my English by using online meeting tools.
Preparation for coming to the U.S.
I had worked the Japanese company for a few years. During this period, I often told them that I wanted to challenge working oversea. At last, the company ordered me to move to American branch.
There is no Japanese or Japanese speakers at American branch. I have to speak English. So I started stydying English again. I used my old school textbooks and online EIKAIWA. Still I do not like studing grammer (because it is boring for me) but I did because my English was often broken.
※I understand my English is broken still now! But it was much better than before…
In the U.S.
After coming to the U.S. I use English to just LIVE. For me, every occasion such as ordering at McDonald’s, making contract for lifeline and every communication at workplace train my English. Here there are many gatherings. I found difficulty to do small talks, but I believe it is getting better. But sometime, I think “how many times do I repeat “how are you” in a day?” though…
At workplace, I find a lot of unkown words. I often serch the meaning on Google. Yesterday I learnt a new word ー mercy’s sake”.
By the way, this blog is written by myself. Sometime I use Google to serch words, but I do not use translator. So probably there are some mistakes, but please forgive me! If you are good at English and let me know how to correct errors, I would appreciate! Thanks!
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