another useful tip:

don't watch mr bean the comedy series...you get nothing from it

just read newspaper everyday. guarantee 100%become good after 1 year.

try to speak and speak and speak... that's the only way to improve your command of language, no matter in the sense of writing or speaking...

good luck

My method: watching movie without subtitle... haha, actually, it quite hard.

First step, learn how to read. So, you had to read more english papers. I suggest The Star. I think this step won't be a problem for u.

Second step, learn how to listen. So, listen to english radio and watching english movie.

Third step, learn how to write. You try write blogs in english. there are a lot of weblog that you can subscribe e.g. http://wretch.cc/ or http://www.blogspot.com/

Final step, learn how to speak. Try to speak english with your friends, family, colleages and teachers.

-learning to speak fluent english is a long but not too long process-

pay more efforts and good luck

marry an english man/woman...

thread starter english is okay. maybe you are not confident in speaking the language?

check out an example of bad english here..

http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/382202

do u all think mandarin is important than english?
my fren keep argue wif me that mandarin will b international language in the another few yrs...wtf la...now china ppl learn english oso le...where got western ppl learn mandarin rite?

although i m chinese...i dun ever think mandarin will b inter language....english is the best!

Actually, Mandarin is useful if you're conducting business in China, Taiwan and Singapore. But, don't stick to one language only. Broad your perspective by learning some new languages like Spanish, Japanese, Arabic and Hindi. In Eastern Europe and Central Asia, you have to speak Russian. In Latin America, you have to speak Spanish. It's fun to learn new languages.

This post has been edited by APIITian: Dec 28 2006, 02:50 PM

That's what my father has been claiming, as well.

Well, to be honest, I wouldn't place my bets on whether the Mandarin language will overshadow English in terms of being an "international language", I suck at predicting stuff.

But one thing is for sure, China is booming with business opportunities and its potential is growing by the year. You'll definitely have a solid advantage if you are fluent in Mandarin. There are a lot of companies and businessmen in China, and it's quite likely you might have to deal with representatives from Chinese companies if you're working in a multi-national company. So, being able to speak Mandarin well would definitely help you in your job.

Well, yeah, considering English is the current international language, people in China are making efforts to learn the language in order to get ahead.

mandarin is already international. globally, more and more people are starting to learn mandarin/chinese which obviously is due to 'the rise of china' phenomenon.

i do hope as a chinese, you know how to speak, read/write chinese.

www.time.com/time/asia/covers/501060626/story.html

Chinese won't rise as the most international language on Earth at least for the coming few decades.

Let's see, can you write computer programs in Chinese?

Would some of the chinese parents in Malaysia or in some other countries start to teach their children Mandarin of which they won't teach if not for the language's future usefulness? (Here I assume learning one's own mother tongue is not for any other reasons but for the cause of our color skin)

Mandarin is and would be an important language, but it should not 'take over' the role of English as the most international language, at least not before those who are in the generations to be able to see this thread die.

heh, that's what most ppl tend to think. That's a big misconception actually, as most ppl never tend to look deeper. Being native speakers to the language, the one thing that they've got is confidence in using the language orally. However should you look deeper than that, there's quite a number of them with rather bad spelling and grammar when it comes to the written stuff.

we can't really discard chinese/mandarin since China now is on the verge of becoming the one of the world's most important economy or super power. so it would be wise to be multilinguistic. as for the improvement of english, basically, reading would be the best option to do so. reading improves the vocab, watching english shows (preferably English - English and not Yankee - English) does improve the pronounciation of certain words.

if u guys do wiki or google, u'll find out that mandarin is the most spoken language (as a first tongue) in the world. this followed by spanish, and english on 3rd place. thanks to chinese emperors who conquered and united china thousands of years ago.

however, english IS more widely used and already established itself as the international language. since more people have taken english as their 2nd language, this number is still growing. thanks to the british who colonized the world hundreds of year ago.

For me, having good English language through listening and reading is not enough. You need proper conversations. Yes, that's what I am lacking of and I think most people do. Try to make more conversation. When going to LowYat Plaza for example, I try to speak in English. Practice it with my friends and lecturers. Watching movie without subtitles or at least, English subtitle is quite fun too.

sheeshh..I was just kidding...Dun take it so hard...But, of course not MOST people do think that they should marry a person just to improve the language,don't they?..it so..then it spells 'ridiculous'....

Ok..now i serious here...
The key factor in mastering a language is to maintain consistency.Once u dysfunction the application of a language for a period of time..then it is more likely u lost.After that, u gotta start from scratch again...English is no different..Read books,talk more in English, express yourself in forms of writings,competitions,tv..internet..

I see a debate going on between Chinese and English educated Chinese here. Since I have NBTD, I'll post a long confession here.

I'm an English educated guy and a pretty white banana , yes, I'm not scared to admit that. Ok, I used to be like some of you English educated people here during my school years (just last year actually), I thought that English will continue to be the dominant language in the world and blah blah blah with all that. At least, I always hoped things stayed that way for my sake, as I only know very basic chinese and can't converse properly. Fast forward a few months, and I'm out of school.

It was then that the realities of life in Malaysia hit me right in the face. Among them, the statement by a minister (I can't remember who), said that employers should drop mandarin as a requirement for hiring workers. Btw, as a banana, although I obviously stand much to gain if implemented, I opposed that statement on principle that the minister was clearly only interested in helping a *certain group of people*, and surely he did not have people like me in mind. But that's not the point, after discussing with a few people working for various recruitment agencies, coupled with some research, I learnt that employment opportunities in the private sector are far greater if one can speak mandarin, so the minister is right in that sense (that Mandarin is becoming a necessity in the private sector).

Secondly, I've been living in PJ my whole life, and all my friends are like me. English is more than sufficient for surviving in Klang Valley, with a smattering of cantonese to get by. Ever since leaving school, I've ventured beyond Klang Valley into other parts of Malaysia for a variety of reasons, only to experience a huge culture shock. Yes, I came into contact with other Chinese dudes my age who could barely speak any English. Bleh..... I soon realized that I was an extreme minority outside PJ. And as of now, in my college, all my friends speak mandarin among themselves, and its awkward for me to ask them to translate all the time. So it got pretty lonely at times as a result. No one likes being marginalized from their own kind.

Ok, as of that point, which was about half a year ago, I decided to overcome my fear of Mandarin and start learning it myself. At first I wondered if it was ever possible for me to be a fluent mandarin speaker, but as I learn, I realize that slowly, the "machine gun fire" of my friends begin to make sense, albeit bits and pieces here and there. Well, I started to attend some classes and by now I can recognize easily more than 100 characters. Well, I don't suppose I can ever catch up with those who have been learning chinese their whole lives, but if I can pass off as a mandarin speaker, that's an achievement by itself.

Well, so the truth is mandarin is gaining importance in Malaysia. Anecdotal experience suggests that Malaysian Chinese are sending their children to Chinese schools rather than national schools. This by itself shows that mandarin is gaining prominence in Malaysia. So, whether English will lose out to Mandarin or not, our local situation matters most. Besides, it will not change things much as both languages are set to remain the two most influential languages globally in the foreseeable future.

All in all, learning Mandarin will undoubtedly benefit you guys, for those of you who can't speak Chinese. Put aside that prejudice which probably stems out of fear. I don't know exactly what we fear, it could be that we fear what we do not understand. However, don't get me wrong as I'm not discounting the importance of English. English will remain an important language for many years to come as well. What I'm proposing is that if we can master both languages like the Singaporeans do, the world will be there for our taking. Go start learning! It's never too late.

This post has been edited by Havoc Knightmare: Dec 30 2006, 02:29 AM

Since when? Haven't you heard of Romanian? Polish? Latvian? Kazakh? etc

This post has been edited by feynman: Dec 30 2006, 02:45 AM

It's like, Russian is widely used especially at the former Communist states.

This post has been edited by Dark Steno: Dec 30 2006, 02:47 AM

you must have a friend that speak english and practice yourself with english daily ,by the time your english will be improve , my frend went to english class but still not much different because you must learn to communicate with english from now on ,though it may be broken sometimes but improving alot , myself cannot speak english well when i was in school but abit better after worked and had to comminucate english