I am learning English again~~

[Doris]

大家好！I am Doris. My friend Batur and Batman told me this forum. They said this is a very good forum for language learning. A lot of really scary people here, who are very good at learning languages. So I am here, begin my language log. Hope I can improve my English.
I am a Chinese, and I started my English learning since I entered middle school about 12 years ago. I like English very much. Reading English books, listening English songs. But, I can’t speak well. Oh, my poor spoken-English.
What’s worse. When I entered college, I chosen Japanese as my major. Then I focused my attention on Japanese Learning, and got the Certificate of N1. But I gave up learning English. Gradually, I forget lots of words, grammar, and do not know how to express what I want to say in English. After I graduated from college, I entered a Japanese company. I do not have chance to use English at all. Sometimes I want to start learning English again, I wish I could understand what the person say in the drama. I hope I could communicate with the foreigners who speaking English and make friends with them. This time, I hope to achieve these goals.
Nowadays, I use APP Baicizhan to increase my vocabulary, and use APP Liulishuo to practice my spoken English. Maybe I could spend more time on speaking, like joining English Salon. And write at least once per week or more, to improve my writing skills. Reading English books also will be helpful.
Well, I’m going to start learning English again. Please let me know if you have any good advices.

[Batur]

Hello, Doris! Your English writing is great! I hope we can encourage each other to go further in English learning.
From my experience, patience is important, it's normal to feel frustrated and doubt if it works or not.
Whenever you feel lazy and frustrated, keep in mind that you have friends around. We are here.

[Tristano]

Hi! Good luck with your English!
It's nice to find people that are studying English because here it looks like they are all C2 or native speakers.
My English kind of sucks and I don't have real plan to improve it because it's good enough for my purposes and I both need to improve my Dutch to native levels and I find other languages more interesting than English. I learned most of my English watching tv series with italian subtitles first and with english subtitles later but I guess it's not a good method coming from such a different language as Chinese. But you're lucky! English is everywhere! You look to know already a good amount of English so probably you are comfortable reading. I stopped reading anything in Italian and started to read only in English, that helped me a lot with learning vocabulary. With speaking there is no shortcuts; I had to speak the language every day in order to improve my speaking skills!

As we say in the country where I live: 'Succes'!

[Batman]

Hello, Doris! Glad to see you here=)
Have you considered trying Glossika? https://glossika.com/courses/fluency123 ... an-english
I heard a lot of good reviews about that course and trying to work on it myself (but on my Chinese).

Also, I believe that watching TV shows in English (without Chinese subtitles) is very good for your spoken English. Do you watch anything right now? I know that Batur is watching "The Fosters" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Foste ... _TV_series)
Maybe you want to watch it too? Then you can discuss episodes, some words or sentences (their usage) from the TV show together.

And to improve your writing you simply need to write. Do you keep a diary? If so, you can do that in English too, at least partly. (I am not doing that myself in Chinese , but I do that in English).

And what you're reading now in English, what book? I remember, I was starting reading some book about crusades with Batur, but we both stopped at some moment. But I read https://twigserial.wordpress.com/ on my phone. It's good for vocabulary. There are some reviews http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25116766-twig
Also, Chelsea from our group is reading "A Study in Scarlet" by Arthur Conan Doyle ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Study_in_Scarlet ). Maybe you can start reading that book too?

加油! (hope, that is appropriate usage of that )

[Doris]

Hi! Good luck with your English!
It's nice to find people that are studying English because here it looks like they are all C2 or native speakers.
My English kind of sucks and I don't have real plan to improve it because it's good enough for my purposes and I both need to improve my Dutch to native levels and I find other languages more interesting than English. I learned most of my English watching tv series with italian subtitles first and with english subtitles later but I guess it's not a good method coming from such a different language as Chinese. But you're lucky! English is everywhere! You look to know already a good amount of English so probably you are comfortable reading. I stopped reading anything in Italian and started to read only in English, that helped me a lot with learning vocabulary. With speaking there is no shortcuts; I had to speak the language every day in order to improve my speaking skills!

As we say in the country where I live: 'Succes'!

Tristano,Thank you for telling me how did you learn English. I didn't use English for a long time. It's a little hard to read English books, but, I will try my best. I think I need to choose a book that is not too difficult to understand now. Is there a good book you recommend?

[Doris]

Hello, Doris! Glad to see you here=)
Have you considered trying Glossika? https://glossika.com/courses/fluency123 ... an-english
I heard a lot of good reviews about that course and trying to work on it myself (but on my Chinese).

Also, I believe that watching TV shows in English (without Chinese subtitles) is very good for your spoken English. Do you watch anything right now? I know that Batur is watching "The Fosters" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Foste ... _TV_series)
Maybe you want to watch it too? Then you can discuss episodes, some words or sentences (their usage) from the TV show together.

And to improve your writing you simply need to write. Do you keep a diary? If so, you can do that in English too, at least partly. (I am not doing that myself in Chinese , but I do that in English).

And what you're reading now in English, what book? I remember, I was starting reading some book about crusades with Batur, but we both stopped at some moment. But I read https://twigserial.wordpress.com/ on my phone. It's good for vocabulary. There are some reviews http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25116766-twig
Also, Chelsea from our group is reading "A Study in Scarlet" by Arthur Conan Doyle ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Study_in_Scarlet ). Maybe you can start reading that book too?

加油! (hope, that is appropriate usage of that )

Hello,Batman.Thank you for you advices.
I'd like to ask Batur where I can watch "The Fosters". Maybe we can make discussion about it.
I did not keep a diary. But, I will write something here per week. Hope my writing skills will improve.
Besides, I'm looking for the right book for me now. The book which is interesting, and not too difficult to understand.

[Ani]

Welcome to the forum Why don't you tell us what types of things you like to read, or even a TV show you really liked, and perhaps we can recommend some books. Adventure, sci-fi/fantasy, non-fiction, "chick lit" (books written for women), historical fiction.. ?

[tarvos]

你好Doris.

我现在在学习中文，可以帮助你学习英文。 最好的是你看很多书，但一定不太难的，而且也不太简单的。最重要的事找一本合适的书，让你提高你的水平，但是也让你明白书里面的故事。我的问题跟你的一样：我现在也不会看中文书，但是会说的时候还可以，虽然有时候我的意思也不清楚。

我想问你一下: 你最喜欢的书是什么种的？ 英文老师经常推荐太难得书，都是文学作品，那如果是这样的话，人人一定不马上了解，也对看书不感兴趣。 我看最好的办法是找你最爱种的树，这样你有喜欢又练习，后来，越学习越好的水平。 你有什么感觉呢？你怎么看？

加油！

[Tristano]

Tristano,Thank you for telling me how did you learn English. I didn't use English for a long time. It's a little hard to read English books, but, I will try my best. I think I need to choose a book that is not too difficult to understand now. Is there a good book you recommend?

I think you can start reading short stories. You can find a ton, but for example: this website has a nice collection to start: http://www.english-for-students.com/Sim ... ories.html

Then you can move to some fairy tales books and then increase the difficulty. Non-fiction books are always easier to read than novels so it's also a good intermediate step. Wikipedia has articles written in "Simple English" https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

You can virtually read everything as long as you don't get frustrated if you miss words or entire phrases. I read my first Dutch book and had a comprehension of the 10% and it was a very frustrating and autopunitive experience, but I was also happy to get the gist of what was going on.

[Doris]

Welcome to the forum Why don't you tell us what types of things you like to read, or even a TV show you really liked, and perhaps we can recommend some books. Adventure, sci-fi/fantasy, non-fiction, "chick lit" (books written for women), historical fiction.. ?

Hello, Ani. I like reading and reading books on different types. Such as literary works, Japanese suspense novels and so on. I have read A Brief History of Humankind, which is wroted by Yuval Noah Harari . Lean In wroted by Sheryl Sandberg. And I am reading Nonviolent Communication wroted by Marshall B.Rosenberg now. Most of the books I read is Chinese version. Some is Japanese version.
Could you recommend some books to me?