Very true. You can't improve a language unless you speak it regularly. Of course, your friends must correct you if you speak wrongly, or else it will be of no use.

Btw, shamnemesis, your sig should read "In the Kingdom of the Blind , the One Eyed man is the king".

This post has been edited by Havoc Knightmare: Dec 30 2006, 03:35 AM

i dont know if this is weird,but i often talk to myself in english. coz.. it is rather shameful for me to talk english to my other friend,later they will all think me weird coz suddenly talk english to them..lol

I think it should be "In the Kingdom of the Blind, the One-Eyed man is<remove 'the'> king.

Anyway, as others have said before this, get a fluent English speaking friend and talk to him frequently to improve your English and ask him to correct you if you speak it wrongly. If you can't, try to find some cousins or relatives that can speak it well and make it a point to speak to them as often as possible.

For getting a better vocabulary, read books and highlight the words that you dont understand.When you finish the chapter(or lets say 20-40 pages depending on the difficulty of the book) list down the words and their meanings in a book so you can refer back to them for the meaning of the words you have forgotten.

For me, I managed to find plenty of new words by reading stories written by neopets writers and other books including Lee Kuan Yew's biography my dad happened to have. *Stop laughing, I know this sounds silly*

Also, Google is your friend here. use the command,
define:(type in your word here)
or answers.com/(type in your word here) answers.com has something that can pronounce the word for you as well which is very useful.

Sing English song is a good way, at least for me. If you want to talk English in a good speed like those foreign ppl, rap song do help you I think. Watch English channel / movie without looking at the subtitle(or without subtitle at all) is another way. Read English fiction is good too, play games do help.

There are plenty of ways to improve and talk English daily is probably the best.

During my school years, my english was pretty good because I always playing PC games. I like to mimic those voices and an English dictionary was always by my side when playing them.

same... OXFORD Wordpower always by my side too... pno doubt dat playing games might improve our english.. hehe..

take any engish short courses....my sister took it before entering matrix...the course is more to public speaking

is it really useful and helpful? those short couse from language centre is costly man..

A good way to improve spoken English may be to improve written English at the first place. From certain perspectives, writing English is much easier than speaking English.

You'll need more than just basic grammar knowledge to speak decent English. (You don't really need good grammar if you're going to speak lah-lah-lah English)

The problem with people who are not courageous to speak English to other people may just be that they're afraid of being looked at with queer eyes telling them that they're not saying good English. If you could get your grammar right, what fear should you have?

How you pronounce is not that bad actually. We could guess how a Russian might speak, daa? But the important thing is the grammar.

hail shamnemesis, we meet again...and again and again in every forum


agree with u a bit there.

Start by reading a lot of story books.

Talk to friends in english, and even see english movies. Playing games with a lot of conversation involved can help also.

most effective by far, and i see so far noone mentioned : WRITE WRITW WRITE your own stories. Not only can it expand your imagination, you can build up confidence in speaking english in real life. U can write your own short stories, maybe your own version of final fantasy with u as the hero, or a fan fiction of your favourite video game, and then ask your friends with good english or anyone else to read. in addition to that, its a better hobby than lepaking lol

like what my English teacher used to say, though it sounds stupid, reading fairytales story books do help. because they use simple English. Read it more than once. You'll naturally catch the grammer and all. Then you can go on to newspaper all and blahblahblah VOILA!

of course, speaking if more regularly, helps too. and i do agree that, if you used to talk to your friends in Mandarin, it's a bit tad weird to speak English out of a sudden. Ask them to help, for you want to improve ;p

And don't be afraid to make mistakes, because we learn from mistakes.

agree.. start wif those vocabulary and grammar dat easy to be understand 1st... do it step by step..

well, kidding or not kidding, that's not what I'm trying to say. My point is, do not fall for the common misconception that native English speakers all has got a good command of the language. Its rather interesting to take note of all the different slangs and so forth, but at the same time its also important to be able to tell what is slang and what is proper English.

thats pretty interesting view point.
what video games u play?

not really...some are affordable-worth the money
one that i suggest is this english course put up by UTAR (the one at PJ)
something on improving your proficiency in English....saw that in the newspaper advertisement ...for 12 weeks, got elementary, intermediate and advanced level....so need to take test...then they put you at the level u need 2 improve...

u can try lar..call the UTAR and check

This post has been edited by Je$$ie: Jan 5 2007, 12:06 PM

Given that English is the language of use (if not of choice) in the international community, it will always be important until they find something else.

Language is one of the best skills to master. You will never regret learning more languages. You've seen the Indian guy in the Astro ads? That guy is amazing - I've often wished I could speak so many languages fluently.

i guess that person has the flair for learning languages. i also wish i can speak japanese or french or spanish..... but till i am good or moderately good in one language mebe i will learn anotehr language

If u really wanna learn english, u've gotta constantly speak it. Mix around with english-speakers. And just as many other forumers say, listening isn't enough. I'm an indian (well, half) and i'm really interested in learning mandarin cos i mix mainly with the chinese crowd. I can understand words or short phrases but i'm not fluent enuf to hold conversation yet. But, whenever i can, if i wanna say something, i try to say it in Mandarin. Oh yes, you'll get laughed at, at first... Don't let it get to you. It's almost always from the guy frens (girls are more supportive hehe) but u know they're there to cheer u on!

Cheers mate!!

Yes, English is important now.
The more you spend time in this forum & meeting the people here in real-life in any of their gatherings, the better you'll be, even if some of them speaks broken English - it doesn't matter. What's important is having the confident to speak/read/write/understand.