Trellum

Dank je wel Ik ben wel trots en blij Maar ik moet meer nederlands leren (en oefenen), mijn niveau is nog steeds vrij laag Ik ben zo blij omdat ik het examen heb geslaagd! Sadly I'm starting to forget Dutch I haven't practiced for a while... the fact I've a neurological problem (will talk about it in the next mail) doesn't help... it affects my memory badly :'( By the way, is Basia a Siamese cat?

I agree! I had the same trouble when I went to take my inburgering exam, one whole exam was centered around reading comprehension, it sucked because it was timed! I was not surprised to see that I got only a 9 in that exam, the fact they used words that weren't even in their course didn't help me either.

i think I have already talked about how I learnt English on here, but oh well, here I go again: I learnt English when I was around 15 or 16, I learnt English online by just spending enough time in Yahoo chats! After I gained some confidence forming sentences that made some sense I started corresponding with pen pals who spoke the language I also chatted with English speaking people too online after a while. I learnt a lot by making a ton of mistakes and being corrected. Back then it was so easy for me to learn English... now learning English is as hard as losing weight, lol, both of those things were so easy when I was younger

I totally love this one and I believe it to be 100% true: “The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of the infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.” ― H.P. Lovecraft

Personally? I prefer the way British accent sounds, I like it much better than american English, but sadly the English I speak is American. I guess that is because I am so close to the US, and all our TV shows are in american English, no British English It's a shame, my sister in law does speak british english, but then again her husband speaks it and she grew up in Europe. Darn!

Awwww, one of the nicknames I use to refer to my fiance is ''hubby'', and he often calls me ''wifey'' Lol, I was surprised to read dude and OMG have been around for so long Mind blown! Not surprised about LBD though Women have been wearing black dresses for a while

I prefer to watch and read everything in its original language, because in my country they dub everything nowadays... and it's amazing how much the dialogues between characters are when compared to the original version D: It's really bad Sadly almost everything is dubbed now, and I often end up watching dubbed movies! I believe with books is not as bad as it is with the movies, but i still prefer to read everything in its original language. I mean, who would really like to read ''100 años de soledad'' in English? YUCK!

Google is good enough, but it comes with limitations, because well that is how it is with free stuff But if I had to choose between Bing and Google i'd choose Google. Sometimes you can get some really good translation, specially with short phrases, but with longer sentences or whole paragraphs it can be so tricky. A good level of common sense is required.

Right now my best friend is the ''Naar Nederland'' course I like it because it comes with the most basic words of the Dutch language (some are not so basic though), so when I am in doubt about the pronunciation of any given word I just check their word list. In my opinion there is no other method that excels at teaching you how to properly pronounce most words than listening to natives. That and getting a good phonetics book f the language you are trying to learn, as simple as that.

Black berries Yes, I like the idea of starting my day by drinking a big smoothie made with blackberries (along with other things, like for example: cocoa powder, nuts, kale, etc). I've noticed that by starting my day with a nice breakfast things seem to go smoother in the learning area. Nothing worse than studying s language or anything else on an empty stomach.

My brother in law is said to have done that while he was learning Dutch, it's said that helped him a lt to learn and master dutch. I heard he even had a very successful forum and all that, he managed to attract a lot expats to that site. A real success or so they say, I don't really know though, because I never checked said site.

I've found songs in Dutch over there But then again you need to know what you are searching for exactly, band's name or song's name You can find practically everything over there. I only use Spotify for fun though, I'm not into translating songs to learn a language anymore, I was when I was just starting out as a teen though.

Oh no, I'm not there yet, but I am supposed to be there very soon. I am waiting to get a notification to get my MVV So it's been a lot paper work lately, but hopefully soon it will be over. I just need to get a couple documents and I'll be done (hopefully).

We have TV show on cable that is supposed to be a great aid for people learning English. It's filmed in my own country, with the contributions of several persons who often make an appearance in the show. Most of them are native English speakers, so it's quite cool. Sadly I found it too late, otherwise I think this would have helped me a lot back in the day.

My mom taught me to read using that method: the look and say one. She made her own material, because she was a teacher for a long time and she got first grade several times, so she often recycled her material Well, she'd form whole sentences, and instead of writing the word on some cards she draw the the object (when it was possible) instead of writing the word. So she made me reach word by word just like that, those cards were useful for building my own sentences. It was very fun

This is in the teaching a language section, so I will assume this question is about swearing words and teaching those to students So no, I never taught my students swear words, because well, those swear words are all over the place and they don't really needed the help for that. Plus that wasn't part of the study plan And to be honest I am not a big fan of swear words, because they remind me of my awful biological dad, who was an awful man with no manners, respect to others or a pinch of decency in him. He swore a lot on a daily basis, so vulgar. He also yelled to me and my mom a lot ,always starting fight after spending days gambling and coming back home, getting angry because my mom didn't receive him with a big smile and open arms... Yep, a complete jerk and poor excuse of a man. He is everything I never want to be: an abuser and more. So when I think of swearing I think of him, and I want to stay as far away from that as possible, because I NEVER want to be like him. I have a strong aversion towards swearing... specially in my mother language, but sometimes some swear words escape from my mouth in English, but I always end up feeling bad about it, because I know I am not acting like myself.

You do it like most teachers with a very international class do: You do it in the language you are trying to teach them, because you are never supposed to ever use the native language of the person to explain anything. I learnt this very early on when I was starting to get into teaching people as a second language... many years ago This is basically the first rule they teach you. Another thing you must keep in mind is also creating your own lesson plans. The advantage you have over teaching languages on Skype is that the person who is paying you for it is really interested, so you don't have to deal with class discipline, rules, etc. Believe me, the latter is the main reason why I hate teaching and I'd never work doing tht again. But online you an give one on one lessons You have the student's full attention! So you just need to get creative with body language, and visual aids... you might have to create your own material and teach new words or idea with the ''look and say'' method they use with children. As simple as that Think of it like this... how would you teach a child to read? How do you think ESL teachers teach English to Chinese students online?

You might want to check the ''Naar Nederland'' course approach The first 20 lessons are meant to teach an illiterate person the Dutch alphabet and its sounds. Yep, it's supposed to work for illiterate people speaking any kind o language, even Arabic. They must learn this well, so they can pass their examination abroad, otherwise they can't make it to the Netherlands. So it must work. By the way, they always use Dutch always, so yeah, it's better to never use the student's mother language to explain anything, it's better to just start slow Start with the basics and work with examples.

Well, I have traveled quite a bit but for some reason the only language I could practice was English I will try to practice Dutch as much as possible once I move there, but other languages? Well, when I start with french and we visit Paris I might give it a try, but I am kind of shy when I am just starting to learn a language. I used to be way more outgoing and open when I was younger, and I think that is what helped me learn English faster and better.

In Spanish from Mexico it would go like this: No puedo imaginarme un solo día sin ti. Very romantic actually, awesome idea for a thread actually We needed something like that, I specially appreciated the Dutch translation I might surprise my fiance with that one He doesn't think my Dutch is that good (I haven't studied since I passed my exam - very bad, I know!).

This year I'd like to master my Dutch. I plan to use a couple courses for that, 2 audio courses and some books and Ukrainian friend gave me. I might get a subscription to Dutch 101, just because I find their approach so very motivating, but I have yet to find a decent physical Dutch course! So yes, this year I must dedicate myself to this language, I need to find a job as soon as possible! For that I need to learn Dutch QUICK.

I added a few Spanish translations today, I will add more but there are some idioms I am not very familiar with. English idioms are not specially easy to translate into Spanish, but I will do my best

I have the Dutch one, but I haven't gotten past from the first unit. So far I think this course is awesome, but only if you have some basic knowledge on the language, otherwise it might not go as smoothly as intended. I look forward to really get into this course again In my opinion this method is really great, specially for those learning Dutch... it makes it easier for those trying to grasp the word order in Dutch.

I'm not personally looking to learn any other language that is not dutch right now, but this sounds really interesting I'm sure some members here will find this interesting, we have several members who are into lesser known languages, so I am sure someone will be interested. Meanwhile why not post your resources?

Well, there were so many misunderstandings with my future father in law several times because his English is just too crappy, and my dutch was just nonexistent back then. Oh yes, things will be very hard until I can learn proper dutch and can get my point across It's so hard when you move into a new country, fortunately most people in the Netherlands speak English, not all of them of course, but many of them do or at least the one I have met so far