Search results for 'tag:Nouns tag:Learn English' matching tags 'Nouns' and 'Learn English'

Re: Lack of emphasis on NPs in ESL

Kooyeen — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:38:55 GMT

I obviously agree with Forbes: it depends on your first language. I have never had any problems with passive sentences, subjects and objects, the difference between countable and uncountable, etc. because those are all features I have in Italian too. It is not difficult at all for me to use conditional structures (= modal verbs) in polite requests, like in "Could you lend me 1,000 dollars?", because very similar structures are used the same way in Italian too. On the other hand, I know some Asian languages don't even have past or future tenses, so it's easy to imagine how much more difficult it must be for them to learn English.

So instead of focusing on noun phrases, shouldn't we rather focus on the real difficulties, which happen to vary from learner to learner according to their native language and past experience with languages in general?

Anonymous

How about this student?

<<I assume many of you have watched the cartoon "Totally spies", right?
I just wonder why it is "Totally" here. "totally" is always an adverb, so what do they imply when using "totally" here? How can it go with the noun "spies"?>>>

Heh, good question! I don't know! Could somebody tell me more about that, as a side note here without going completely off topic? Otherwise I will open another thread. I would say "Total spies", but if I suspect that "totally" in "Totally spies" is used informally in some dialects to mean "definitely", like in, like " Are you, like, coming to my awesome party tonight? - Oh, yeah, totally!"
If that is the case, then I don't think that "totally" has anything to do with proving learners have trouble with noun phrases. It would suggest learners have trouble with informal English, and if you ask me, that's true.

Re: Need an advise!

Cool Breeze — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 15:55:21 GMT

I think you mean the sentence Never listen to fear, right? Listen is an imperative and no inflection is ever used in English imperatives. Imperatives like this look like infinitives, which should make it easy for you to learn English. Except for certain fixed phrases and idiomatic expressions, the is not used with nouns when nouns are used in a general sense and the reference is not to anything specific.That's why fear has no article.

Re: Help me please

Fandorin — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 20:06:37 GMT

Anonymous

We ~~are~~ feel so sorry for this short notice. Because we ~~are keep to checking with the factory~~ are to watch over implementation of agreement and to make sure that 800pcs ABC *** ~~have~~ had been received it according subcontract until to 18:00 yesterday. Therefore, the ~~booking~~ order is so rush (rush is a noun but according your sentence the Adjective should be), but we ~~are~~ appreciate ~~for~~ your help and will try to make the ~~booking~~ order to you at the earlier time in further arrangement

It's another way to express your thoughts.

We feel very sorry for this short notice. Because we are to watch over implementation of agreement and to make sure that 800pcs ABC *** to have been received according subcontract until 18:00 yesterday. Therefore, the order is so sudden, so that we appreciate your help and make every effort to conform all conditions with our future arrangement.

So, I would wish you to learn English Grammar, starting from the first.

Yours Faithfully, Fandorin

Re: Sentence/sightseeing

Anonymous — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 21:38:34 GMT

Method OF Learning is totally right, because here it's a noun.
You could also use FOR, but I don't see any reasons to change that.
But if your intention is using "learning" as a verb, like "I use this method to learn english",
You SHOULD change that for TO. You can use FOR if you change the phrase to:
"I use this method for english learning" because here it's a noun.

Re: What makes English so difficult to learn?

Anonymous — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 18:34:01 GMT

Hello, another English teacher here. I have been teaching English in China for about 2 and a half years now and also speak fluent French, decent Spanish and am learning Chinese (not as hard as you may think once you get the hang of those tones, easy grammar). Now I'll start off by saying that English seems to be an incredibly easy language to communicate with (and by this I mean to give the general idea of what you're trying to say). However, if you want to learn English like a native speaker then it's a completely different story. The pronunciation CAN be difficult to learn depending on your native language and also the age you attempt to learn it at. Training your tongue and mouth to move the same way a native speaker does can be difficult to do, especially if you're like many of my students who got their start at an older age or didn't have good teachers. I've also noticed that my younger students are able to mimic my speech much easier than the older ones speaking, both of whom are studying at the same level. I started learning French when I was 4 years old (Quebec French, I'm Canadian) and because of the quality of my teachers and my young age I was able to become quite good with my pronunciation. With my Chinese because I'm learning from scratch from native speakers my pronunciation is also decent (notice I said decent, not great, although when speaking Chinese I'm always understood). Native language has a lot to do with it too as the sounds you use in one language may be very different for another. I've taught in both the north and south of China and find that the people all have the same problems. Chinese people have problems with s (they often pronounce it as a sh sound) and with closing their mouth for the letter m ("sometimes" is a nightmare for them and they often say it like "suntine"). L and R can also be troublesome. One can't forget sentence stress as well as well as linking words together to make it go smoothly.

The vocabulary can also be a pain. Someone here mentioned 150,000 words in the English language but the number is actually much higher. The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd edition) contains over 600,000 definitions. Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged contains 475,000 main headwords and it is believed the language grows by 25,000 words a year. Don't believe me, check Wikipedia. There's also the difference in spelling and vocabulary between the different forms of English. British English and American English use different words and the words that are the same can be spelled differently. American English and Canadian English essentially share the same vocabulary to a large degree but the spelling of Canadian English in many ways is closer to British English. British English is pretty much the English form most Asian and European countries will learn but American pop culture will also have an influence, not to mention the American economy and it's impact. This can all be very confusing. To the person saying they are tired of using "well" as in "well, then..." there are many substitutes you could use.

The grammar is also a nuisance. It's not the hardest of things but certainly isn't the easiest. Sure French has a gender attached to all of it's nouns (which I hated when learning it), but English still has more exceptions to it's rules that need to me memorized. So many even native speakers have trouble with it. A language like Chinese that may seem hard to speak actually has very simple grammar. For example if you wanted to ask someone where they are you would say "ni zai na li" or simply "ni zai nar" (you where?). To ask a question in Chinese you merely ad "ma" to the end of a statement. "Ta hui shuo zhongwen" is "he/she speaks Chinese whereas "ta hui shuo zhongwen ma" is "does he/she speak Chinese?". Also in Chinese as there are no forms of he or she.

It's impossible to say which language is easy and which is hard when compared to each other because there are so many things that need to be taken into consideration. Let's just say that English has it's easy parts and it's ridiculously difficult parts as well. Speaking at a native speaker level can be done and I know people who have done this, but it takes a lot of hard work, good instruction, and a good learning atmosphere. I hope all that made sense, I stumbled onto this site a 2 in the morning and am quite tired.

Re: "s" and "z"

Pter — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 15:41:41 GMT

Thank you very much CJ, Zerox, and Carson. You all have given me very valuable advices. After reading through all you said carefully, and then watching a couple of English TV programmes, I believe I can now tell the difference! The ending /z/ in most cases are much shorter, voiced but less audible than the hissing sound of the ending /s/. Now, I found out what's the problem. Those sound files I was listening to are from a pronouncing dictionary. And perhaps in trying to make them as clearly audible as possible, both the ending /s/ and ending /z/ are spoken very "clearly" and become unnatural.

For people like me that learn English as a second language, we are often influenced heavily by our mother tongue. This is like looking at something through a piece of tainted glass. In those aspects where our mother tongue has big differences with English, unless we are told the rules explicitly, we often never realize how people really say them in English just by listening. My mother tongue does not have any voiced consonants and consonant clusters, therefore, it is quite a challenge for me to learn how to pronounce a cluster of voiced consonants, such as /-ndz/, /-gz/, /zd/.

Again, thank you very much to you all. You really helped me a lot!

=======================
EDIT:

Let me summarize what I have learnt here plus a little that I have discovered myself.

1. Final voiced consonant (b, d, g, l, m, n, ng, r, v, voiced th) + s ---> /z/
2. Final voiceless consonant (f, k, p, t, voiceless th) + s ---> /s/
3. Final vowel + s ---> no rules, except when any of the following rules apply
4. Some words that can be used both as verb and noun/adjective ---> verb: /z/, noun or adjective: /s/
5. Words ending in -as, -is, -os, -us:
when the s is part of the word in its basic form (not plural or third party singular verb) ---> /s/
when the s is added to make it a plural or third party singluar verb ---> /z/
6. Words ending in -ces, -des, -oes, -shes, -ses, -zes ---> /z/
7. Words ending in -sis, -nce, -nse, -ss (including -less, ness), -sce ---> /s/
8. /z/ is more common than /s/ overall

Re: Why this way?

Believer — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:56:59 GMT

Thank you, Avangi.

So I think what you seem to alluding to me is that native speakers like you (I am sure you are one of them) seem to divide a noun into categories based on practical usage -- the usage that serves a practical purpose in an environment where English is spoken naturally -- although some people would make up a different number of categories than yours and not necessarily into categories that are set up or created to help a learner learn English in a systematic way.

My guess is that the distinguishing terms like a countable noun, an uncountable noun, a mass noun, and others are set up/created for the purpose of serving the needs of English learners in a non-English speaking environment.

Thank you for your explanation and your elaboration on those categories. I would say your effort is one of the finest responses I have gotten for a long time and matches in quality to that of those few, more firmly established teachers of these forums.

Re: Is 'As such' used wrongly?

Goodman — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 00:19:37 GMT

_{Hi Hoa,}

_{You are pretty brave to dare this thread!}

_{The discussion about the âas suchâ usage, to me, was actually more of a reflection of how we interpret what a noun or noun phrase is, rather than grammatical correctness. As I found on one of the site, it said:}

_{"As such" -as being what is indicated or suggested. All I was doing was to confirm my interpreation and if there were others seeing it the same way. I am not saying right or wrong.}

_{There is always this hidden bias that natives can communicate and write better than non-natives and therefore, in a debate situation, the non-nativeâs answer is likely deemed incorrect. Generally, it may be true. However, the reality is, even natives canât seem to have a uniform answer or opinions to the same question in our everyday life sometimes. Not because they are wrong, itâs just because their answer is subject to personal interpretations and how they acquired their language skills. Mike Tyson is a famous, or infamous American native, would anyone care to comment on his English correctness or perhaps like to learn English from him? For the longest time, I had always thought âamongstâ is a wrong word for âamongâ until I listen to Dr. Michael Savage's radio talk show who has two Ph.Dâs. The manâs fluidity and command of the language is absolutely magical, aside from his personal view on issues. But one has to admire his wit and quickness on the language. I donât want to offend any natives here by what I said. Please do take this in the negative light. If I do, I sincerely apologize.}

Re: Who is / are online

Kooyeen — Tue, 15 May 2007 14:43:53 GMT

Hi Yoong,
I know what you are trying to do: you want to find a case where you can say "Who are...?", in a question where "who" is the subject. I learned that such a case doesn't exist. When "who" is the subject, the verb is always singular. Like "everyone", you say "Everyone is happy to learn English here", even though "everyone" refers to a lot of learners, and you can't think of a case where you would say "Everyone are..."
So the same is true for "who" as a subject in questions:

Who lives in the US, Americans, Italians or Germans? - Americans.

Who is screaming out there? There are a lot of people, it seems some of them are screaming, but I don't know who is screaming. Who are the people who are screaming? (in the last sentence, the first "who" is not the subject, and the second is a relative pronoun)

That doesn't seem strange to me, because I have similar structures in Italian too. If you don't have such structures, then I can undestand why it is confusing to you: a singualr verb doesn't seem the most logical choice, unfortunately.

Re: Free english learning sites

Aussiewombat — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 00:13:10 GMT

Hi Forevershi,

Thank you for your comment.

Forevershi wrote:
hi,thanks very much.i have payed a visit this site at once after your message.it's a good site to learn english.

I would have written:

Hi, thanks very much. I paid a visit to your site immediately after I read your message. I think it is a good site to learn English.

Note the 'capital' letter 'H' at the beginning of the first sentence. The personal pronoun 'I' is always written as a capital. Also, note that 'English' is a proper noun and is spelt with a capital 'E".

If you liked my corrections, I am happy to do it for others. Let me know.