Hi Valentin,
How are U? I hope you’re doing great. We, to some extent, are in the same boat. Your English is very good and I think that you will want to teach me whatever you know regarding this English stuff. Let’s go, exchanging new things back & forth. Thanks.
Noren Lee
NEPAL
Hello Mr. Torsen
My name’s Salwa. I’m from Egypt.
I’ve just received your seconed E-mail. I’d like to tell you that I read the first ten lessons
they were too easy for me.thank you so much. I really didn’t know how to contact with you . About my results in the DRIVE CAREFULLY was 10/10
respectfully yours,
salwa
Hi Salwa,
Many thanks for your message. You can take more tests to practise and improve your English. Also, you might want to repeat the tests you have taken so far to improve your results.
Best regards,
Torsten[YSaerTTEW443543]
TOEIC listening, photographs: A flower shop[YSaerTTEW443543]
Hello dear Torsten!
I appreciate your lessons and tests, but I think I have any problems with my progress report, because although I do many tests, I don’t realize any change in the results.
Best regards.
Abdelhamid.
Hello dear Torsten!
I appreciate your lessons and tests, but I think I have any problems with my progress report, because although I do many tests, I don’t realize any change in the results.
Best regards.
Abdelhamid.
Hello Torsten! My name is Catalin and I am from Romania. I am a new member here and I would like to thank you for the first lesson you sent me. I am looking forward to receive all the others because I would like to improve my English the soonest possible.
Many thanks.
catalin
Hi Catalin,
How are you? With the help from him (Torsten) and other members, you will improve your English much sooner than later. And, don’t be shy to post your problems. Keep on visiting this Site, make friends, write to them, respond to their messages, etc…
With Thanks
Noren Lee
Dear all,
I am Nicholas. Just call me Nick* . I am from Toronto, Canada and I am an immigrant from Hong Kong. My mother tongue is Cantonese and I can speak Mandarin as well. Honest speaking, I don’t want to learn Engrish in this site although it is fun. However, I would love to improve my English here with all of you through the interaction in this forum. I am a Real Estate Agent in Toronto. If you want to buy or sell properties in North America, I can help. My Email address is nckwok88@hotmail.com . If you want to discuss English problems with me, I would be more than happy to discuss them here in this forum so everybody can join in and correct my mistakes and I will correct them accordingly. Teaching and learning are beneficial to each other. ( Improvement = Deficiency/Mistake + Correction ).
I think part of the objectives of this site is to teach/coach us to practise proper English, not the chat room lingo which confuses some learners. As a new member of the learning team, I would like to see everybody here have a good practice of using proper English, written or spoken, in order to minimize the work load of the coaches, spending time unnecessarily on pointing out how to use the Capital letters repeatedly all the time. I wish my request is not too offensive to somebody but I really do hope that everyone in this forum has a good practice. It’s beneficial to us all. On the other hand, using proper English also shows your seriousness, at least a minimal courtesy to others as well as setting good examples to the new comers. Think about writing an application letter for a job, which type of English should we use? Sometimes the same word with Capital letter and small letter are different in meaning. For instance, the word “China” with capital letter “C” is the name of my home country in Asia while the word “china” with small letter “c” is a kind of clay used for making cups, plates or pottery.
My strength in English is that I have some foundation in grammar because of my background of learning English in Hong Kong. They emphasis very much on grammar. My weaknesses are listening, speaking, vocabularies, prepositions and especially phrasal verbs. I want to clarify that “strength” doesn’t mean “very good”. It is only relatively good when compared with “weaknesses”. My common mistakes are using Chinglish occasionally. With the help of you, the members and the coaches, I am confident in turning my weaknesses into my strength sooner or later. Hopefully it is sooner than later. Let’s keep on learning from each other. Any corrections to my mistakes, suggestions and/or advice will be highly appreciated.
Very best regards,
Nick*
P.S. :
Chinglish is a portmanteau of the words “Chinese” and “English” combining together and usually refers to phrases or sentences with English wordings but Chinese syntax. Please refer to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinglish
If you want to have fun with Engrish, please go to engrish.com/.
Hopefully the counter examples there will make us more cautious in spelling, in a funny way.
As a new member of the learning team, I would like to see everybody here have a good practice of using proper English, written or spoken, in order to minimize the work load of the coaches, spending time unnecessarily on pointing out how to use the Capital letters repeatedly all the time. I wish my request is not too offensive to somebody but I really do hope that everyone in this forum has a good practice.
Hello dear Nick!
I am not encouraging laziers, but I think this site is made for all who want to improve their English, beginners, moderators or advanced.
So, please, let the site’s team to express their opinion on member’s qualities.
Best regards.
Abdelhamid.
Hi Torsten. This is the very first time I use this way of comunication so I feel a little bit nervous. I hope you pardon my mistakes but really I want to improve my poor english and ask for your Knowledge
My best regars.
Leopoldo Gonzalezpolo
Good morning Nick. I found your post both interesting and extremely polite.
Your English is very good, with few errors.
I am neither a teacher, a moderator, or a team member, merely a native-speaker who tries to help ease the load of the Forum staff.
If you feel I’m able to help you in any way, you are more than welcome to send me a PM, when I will do my best to be of assistance.
Hello everybody,
i’m Margosse, i’m a new one here. Looking for all possible ways to improve my English. The main problem for me is the lack of practice…Unfortunately none of my friends speaks English, but I need communication in English very much.
My best regards,
Margosse
Hi Abdelhamid,
Thank you very much for your response. I absolutely agree with you. Everybody here should be encouraged to express his/her opinion freely regardless of whom they are.
Other than foul language, we can accept any types of errors and mistakes such as grammatical errors and spelling mistakes which may be beyond our knowledge and control. We can also accept some careless mistakes and typo errors because we don’t always have time to make the corrections although we know that the mistakes can be minimized if we are careful enough. What I think the problem is is that some members keep on making the same mistakes, especially the “i” instead of “I”, again and again. The problem is not only the use of incorrect lower case but also, the most important thing is, the practice itself.
May I take this opportunity to tell you something happened to me recently? Not long ago I received an email from my old friend. The email was related to the selling of her property so I considered it as something formal. But in the entire email she used “i” all the time. Twenty years ago her English was already better than mine now since she’s the secretary in our department in an American firm. She could write and type perfect professional business letters instantly without error. I couldn’t understand why she used the lower case “i” in her email because her English and typing skill are so good. At the very moment, I had some hard feeling as I felt that I was not being respected. I queried whether our friendship is not even worth than the smallest movement of her finger tip by pressing the “SHIFT” key. I supposed that there shouldn’t be any hardware problem with the “SHIFT” key since there are two such keys in the standard keyboard. One on the right and one on the left. The feeling was somewhat similar to somebody talking to you without looking at you and even with the back on you. When I calmed down after a while, I realized that that was not her intention to use the lower case but just a “habit” she has established here in Canada.
Actually, I am in a dilemma. As a good old friend, I need to tell her the problem. However, I understand that she has the knowledge but the problem is just a habit. Should I correct her problem? If I do so, I think the only consequence is that our friendship will be jeopardized. Could I change anything even when I speak it out? At the time being, the only thing I can do is to keep my mouth shut.
In our forum, nevertheless, the situation is absolute different. Almost everybody here claims that he/she is “WILLING” to “[color=blue]IMPROVE” his/her English. To me, the word “improve” means to make something [color=blue]change and make it better. I think the members in this forum should not be “takers” only, but “givers” also. Today, I would like to give my best friendly advice to others to “improve” their habit. In Chinese, there is a proverb “ 教學相長 ”, meaning that “ Teaching and Learning are Beneficial to Each Other” .
Anyway, whether they are willing to take the advice and make their improvement are solely their personal decisions. But I am wondering why people still insist in [color=blue]NOT pressing the “SHIFT” key. Oh, is that really their intentions? Hopefully not !!!
Best regards,
Nick*
Teaching and learning are beneficial to each other
Hello Kitosdad,
Thank you very much for your kindness.
When I was drafting my post, I encountered problems with singular and plural subjects. When we use “everybody” and “everyone” , are they singular or plural?
Can we use the possessive adjectives as follows ?
Everybody has [color=blue]his opinion. ( consider “everybody” as a singular pronoun )
Everybody has [color=blue]their opinion. ( consider “everybody” as collective pronoun for plural subject )
Everyone has [color=blue]his opinion. ( consider “everybody” as a singular subject )
Everyone has [color=blue]one’s opinion. ( consider “everybody” as a singular subject, neutral gender, instead of using “his/her” )
Everyone has [color=blue]ones’ opinion. ( consider “everybody” as a collective pronoun for plural subject )
Everyone has [color=blue]their opinion. ( consider “everybody” as a collective pronoun for plural subject )
In my first post, I have used the following sentence:
“I would like to [color=blue]see everybody here [color=blue]have a good practice of using proper English”
Can I use “[color=blue]have” even “everybody” is considered singular because of the next verb after the “[color=blue]see” is an infinitive such as “I [color=blue]see you [color=blue]go”.
I am quite confused with the singular and plural nature of “everybody” and “everyone”. Could you please give me a more detail explanation with examples? I really want to distinguish the differences between them. By the way, is there any singular possessive adjective with neutral gender for “everybody” such as “one’s” for “everyone” ?
Thank you in advance.
Best regards
Nick*
Teaching and learning are beneficial to each other
Hi Margosse,
I can see the obvious improvement of your English in your post. You started with the incorrect “[color=blue]i”s in the first sentence. After warming up, you changed to use the correct “[color=blue]I” in the last sentence. Congratulation !
Just like you, I am still finding ways to improve my English. In this site, there are plenty of resources helping us to achieve our goals. I think we can make improvement even just by reading the messages of others in this forum. Actually, this is the way I am doing now. If you like, you can have never ending practice here by asking and answering questions. On the other hand, doing the tests will consolidate our foundation.
Best regards,
Nick*
Teaching and learning are beneficial to each other
Hi Catalin, I hope your English (International) is being improved. Best of luck, keep coming here.
Noren Lee
Hi.My name is Monika.I am from Slovakia.I live in Stoke on Trent.I am 25 years old.I am working in Tk Maxx. I need improve my English.
Hi Nick,
I agree with you. Thanks a lot for your message and your advice. We are human beings and we all make mistakes (unintentionally & with other reasons).
I really liked your opinions; you said, “I think the members in this forum should not be “takers” only, but “givers” also.” And, this one; "Teaching and Learning are Beneficial to Each Other” Thank you once again.
Regarding your confusion, I think you should know much better than I (here again which one is safe to use ‘I’ or ‘me’). Frankly speaking, I am not a purist.
(a) Everyone was waiting when I arrived, and I greeted them all happily.
(b) Since everybody understood French, I spoke to them in that language.
Well, these sentences may not be excessively “pure” English; but they are a lot more natural, more sensible, and more common among educated speakers than the forms, which the precisionists would ask us to use:
(a) Everyone was waiting when I arrived, and I greeted him/ her happily.
(b) Since everybody understood French, I spoke to him/ her in that language.
To me these sentences are indubitably correct, but sound slightly insane, as if uttered by some poor soul who had just had himself a nervous breakdown caused by studying too much grammar.
When you say: “Everyone decided to go home.” You are certainly implying the existence of more than one person. You are therefore speaking logical, correct English if you change the sentence to:
“Everyone put on their coats and went home.” Such a construction is part of the idiom of the language—it is acceptable in informal conversation; educated speakers use it; it is, in short, not a sin.
I use such expression in my everyday speech.
Noren Lee
NEPAL
Dear all,
Use such sentences, don’t be purists, don’t be afraid;
" As soon as everyone had arrived, we started to speak to them."
" Everyone was here, but they all left early."
" If anyone is waiting, ask them to come in."
" Everyone arose and took off their hats." etc. Thanks.
Noren Lee
NEPAL
Your comments, criticism, or whatever are welcome.
Hi Noren,
Thank you very much for your information.
The “[color=blue]I” in your sentence is correct. The original sentence should be :
Regarding your confusion, I think you should know much better than I [color=blue]do . . . . OR
Regarding your confusion, I think you should know much better than I [color=blue]know.
Where the word “[color=blue]do” or the word “[color=blue]know” is understood and hence omitted accordingly.
On the other hand, if you say :
John is your best friend whom I think you should know much better than [color=blue]me.
In this case the sentence means :
John is your best friend, I think you should know [color=blue]him much better than you know [color=blue] me.
If I have made any mistakes, please feel free to correct me. At least let me know.
Noren, I have read some of your posts in this forum and I’ve learned a lot from them. Your English is excellent and you are so enthusiastic. Thanks again.
Best regards,
Nick*
Teaching and learning are beneficial to each other