[Night Hammer]

Ive noticed we have a lot of people from nonenglish speaking countries. How are yall so good at typing it and all that? Is it pretty widely taught or what?

[Nico]

I'm just good at english, I guess

[Zarax]

English is compulsory/mandatory as second language at least at high school level in EU.
Middle schools also have it in many countries and some basics are taught even in primary school.
Nonetheless the individual proficency is related on how much one uses english and the overall interest in the thing.
My first teacher was my old 286 in 1988 then game manuals and dictionary gave me most basis.
High school helped be hone the language and finally daily usage brought me here.

[Andreas]

I've been reading english in school since, was it 2nd or 3rd grade? A long, long time ago though, but that doesn't matter unless you are interested in the subject. I guess I'm just a quick learner, I've always considered myself to be pretty damn good at english, so there you go

[Rictor]

I can probably speak/write English better than most people who grew up with English as their first language. From Grade 1, I have never gone to anything but an enlish language school, and before that I had a tutor, so speaking English is about as natural as walking.

Actually, I'm starting to fear for my Serbian. Though I speak it at home, I'm starting to forget words and have trouble making coherent sentences at times. Bleh.

[Genryu]

I've been travelling often enough to get a good grasp on the language, plus reading fanfiction

[Ghostavo]

*wishes he could express himself at least in one language*

[mitac]

I had like nine years of english courses in school, which was the most you could get back then. This has been increased during the last years, with very basic english courses in primary school, totaling at 13 years of courses, in theory.

[Swamp_Thing]

I speak 4 languages myself. 5 If you include my native tongue. Learned english, french and german in school (but i completelly forgot my german), and the spanish and italian i learned actually living in those countries. I´ve been all over southern Europe.

[Taristin]

...Heh. Some of you speak English so fluently, I would never have thought it was your second language. Amazing.

[redsniper]

despite living here my whole life, I've never managed to learn Texan so I just speak English.

[IceFire]

Interesting...see I guess its the immersion in the language that does it.  I for the life of me, despite starting French in grade 4 in public school, have not been able to pick up any French.

But here's the problem: they teach frickin grammar for 7 years and I learned nothing but verb conjugation to which we had no context to associate with anything in the actual language.  So let me ask you guys, whats the best way that you learned English...what did it for you?  Did the grammar really need to be done first or just getting a feel for the language vocabulary was what kick started it?

[Nico]

How I did? well, zarax summed it up neatly.
As for the very start? When, I have memories of " the cat is in the tree" and "the umbrella is yellow".
Yeah, hem, really. It was when I was a kid, probably 6 or 7. I remember when I was in primary school, my mother had me intend after-school classes. it probably helped much, but I do believe that most of my english has been mastered thanks to my old ( 286, wheeeee ) PC, and then later, thanks to internet, mainly HLP, chatting all night long with people like woomeister or killmenow, and the countless anime fansubs, too .
I've been watching non-dubbed movies for a while, too.
I'm a strong believer that theory is useful, but can't compare with actually using the language daily. That's why my japanese doesn't improve much, actually, I have nobody to speak/ ICQ-chat japanese with.

[Rictor]

Originally posted by IceFire
Interesting...see I guess its the immersion in the language that does it.  I for the life of me, despite starting French in grade 4 in public school, have not been able to pick up any French.

But here's the problem: they teach frickin grammar for 7 years and I learned nothing but verb conjugation to which we had no context to associate with anything in the actual language.

Same deal. Damn uppity Quebecois and their inability to conform.

[Swamp_Thing]

Originally posted by IceFire
So let me ask you guys, whats the best way that you learned English...what did it for you?  Did the grammar really need to be done first or just getting a feel for the language vocabulary was what kick started it?

For me, it was basiclly TV and movies, actually. I started to speak english years before i started to learn it in school. Over here movies are not doubled by some half witted voice actor, we get the real thing. After watching thousands of movies with subtitles, you start to connect the dots, per se. At the same time you listen to the actors speak, you read the subtitles and start to get a grasp of syntax and vocabulary. English lessons in school only refined it, the majority of the work was done while sitting on a couch eating popcorn, and watching "The Godfather".
With french it was the same, only to a less extent. Our TV runs 80% english movies and shows, 15% french, and only the remaining 5% are portuguese spoken.
You´ll be hard pressed to find a portuguese guy under 30 and over 10 yrs old that doesn´t speak english, thanks in great part to our TV subtitling way. Compare that to a doubling country, like Spain, where they double every god damn thing (even the songs), and you´ll see a big drop in percentage. It´s not an educational system thing, it´s a cultural thing. You should see/hear the voice they gave Darth Vader...

"Tu tienes la Fuerza, Luca!"*
or
"Utiliza la Fuerza, Luca!"*



*For those non-spanish speaking, it means "You have the Force, Luke", and "Use the Force, Luke!"

[mitac]

Originally posted by IceFire
Did the grammar really need to be done first or just getting a feel for the language vocabulary was what kick started it?

I don't really know the grammar of my native language, let alone the english grammar. It's just a feel to use language, either through practical use (Zak McKracken was my best english teacher ever ) or through consumtion, i.e. books, TV series or movies. That's where a lot of my vocabulary comes from.

[Cabbie]

Learned English as a second language here. Half of the subjects taught in my school are in English so that helped a lot.

[Windrunner]

Originally posted by Ai No Koriida
I've been reading english in school since, was it 2nd or 3rd grade? A long, long time ago though, but that doesn't matter unless you are interested in the subject. I guess I'm just a quick learner, I've always considered myself to be pretty damn good at english, so there you go

^^^^ There is your answer

[IceFire]

So immersion is the way to go

I wish we spent more time in French class listening to people speak it and then trying to speak it to ourselves...

[Tiara]

Well, WE HAVE SUBTITLES AND NO WRETCHED DUBBING![/u]



But really, that helps A LOT. Children from the youngest age are watching English programs with Dutch subs. Almost every person here litterally despises dubbing.

*looks at the Germans and spits at them for ruining perfectly good shows*



That, and English is a mandatory course from a very low grade (can't remember the exact one).