Before I talk about my English learning journey, I would like to do a short introduction of myself. I am a Taiwanese. My family migrated to Singapore in 2006, when I was thirteen. My parents realized the importance of having good English skills, and Singapore is definite an ideal place for my sister and I to study English. Therefore, I am here.
Unlike most Singaporeans, my English learning journey only started when I was studying in the Primary school. My English learning journey can be divided into three stages. First stage, when I was learning basic English in Primary school in Taiwan. Second stage, when I moved to Singapore and started to learn basic sentence structure in Secondary school. Lastly, when I learned to write critically in Junior College.
When Brad talked about how Japanese university students struggled with English, I could totally feel the same pain of those Japanese students. Although there was increasing emphasis placed on English education in Taiwan, reality just do not match the expectation. I only learned simple vocabulary and grammar when I was in Primary school. Singapore students could write short essays when they graduated from Primary school. However, Taiwanese students could not even construct a proper sentence without the guidance of a teacher. That is how poor my English skill was when I graduated from Primary school.
I am lucky to move to Singapore for a better learning environment. When I entered local Secondary school, I could barely speak a sentence of proper English. However, I worked extremely hard to catch the standard of local students. I had never pass English exams in Secondary school. Fortunately, I obtained C6 for English during GCE "O" level, this enabled me to promote to local Junior College.
I learned English in a totally different perspective in JC. When I was still struggling with writing essays in proper English, critical writing skill was introduced in English class. Now, I had to master both writing and critical thinking at the same time. My English skills were always inferior to that of local students. However, I feel that I am luck to pass my General Paper. I am looking forward that I can further improve my English skills in ES1102.
