WA/D2/TS1
I cannot describe myself as a personality who is inclined to write since I had
always preferred thinking to writing. To be frank, I have hated writing for a long time.
Because I have had a lot of problems in literature and composition classes in both
secondary and high school years. I had always been told to write generally on short
stories, that we had read in our literature classes. I had never interested in none of those
stories, even I was not interested in writing those days. In addition, knowing that my
compositions would at the end be graded by an „authority‟ had made me anxious and
nervous while working on them. That situation continued until I entered to university. In
that period of time, resistance in me (because of being forced to do something that did not
make any sense to me, and I have not interested in before) against the authority had
stopped me to concentrate more on writing and improve my skills. Therefore writing had
always been a real pain for me before and in high school.
Up until to high school, my writing experience was totally because of duties given
at school. No matter what language is in question, I was an „artificial‟ author, who was
writing when he has been told to do so. In that period, rather than writing I had spent a
good amount of time on observing my environment. I was trying to use everything that I
had learned from both classes and daily life to comment on events, which were
interesting or entertaining to me. In a sense, I was observing the world, and trying to
understand it. After a while, I started to feel the improvement that I have been making.
Then I focused on reading introductory books on philosophy to learn thoughts of famous
philosophers about life and the world. I was trying to enlarge my perspective on those
topics. In time, my senses and observation skills improved such that I could start to
1
realize the complex history or organization of some events, which were masked behind
simple images in daily life. It was so amazing that all of a sudden I was gathering things,
which were seemed to me unrelated before, and I was able to get meaningful conclusions
out of those things. However, I realized that I could not remember my observations in
detail, unless I wrote those down to somewhere. It was really a bad feeling to realize that
I would lose those beautiful aspects of life. That made me change my old feelings about
writing. I did not hesitate to approach it more peacefully then ever I did before. I began to
write my thoughts about daily life in a -what I called- pseudo-diary, since I am not using
it to describe events in my life. The language that I am writing in is still Turkish. Because
I feel more comfortable while writing in my native language. I can express myself
clearly, and even I can use my creativity frequently. Obviously, I could not express the
same things in English as I could describe those in Turkish. But it will not continue
forever. I believe I am going to switch to write in English when I feel I am mature
enough. That will also help improve my English.
Learning a foreign language is really close to one thing that all of us had done
once in our lives before. It is the learning period of our mother tongue that we all had
passed in our childhood. It is a dark long hallway where observation, patience and
exercising are keys for the doors that will let us go out of this darkness. But, I believe,
writing is a completely different phenomenon. Knowing how to read or speak in any
language does not necessarily mean that being a good writer in that language. I believe
nobody could be a good writer, unless one does not know how to think clearly and
understand oneself precisely. This is what my experience is. However, it is strange that
nobody had pointed out this before in my school life. What we were told was to write on
2
a given topic in an ordinary way. If somebody have emphasized the importance of self-
realization and clear thinking, it would have been much easier for me to get into writing
and improve my skills in Turkish and perhaps other languages. Anyway, I am still
satisfied by my standing and I at least know what to do for the future. That is I will
continue to write my observations in my pseudo-diary. May be, this innocent hobby will
be the source of a philosophical book which I might write in future, if I believe I am at a
level to write a book, though. Who knows? Of course, before that, I have to practice,
practice and practice...
3
WA/D2/TS2
When I was a child, one of my happiest things was to listen to the fairy tales and
stories told by my uncles and kindergarten teachers. Though most of the stories are out of
my memory now, I can still remember the great joy those stories brought to me. I believe
the stories can help to excite a child‟s imagination, which is essential to a writer.
From the third year of the elementary school, we began to learn writing
compositions in native language. It was always difficult for a little student with limited
vocabulary and little social experience. Puzzling about the assignments, sometimes I had
to go to ask my father, „What should I write?‟ In my fourth and fifth year, the Chinese
teacher was very good at writing, and he ever published several poems and novels in the
newspapers and magazines. He encouraged us to read and write. Gradually I found
writing could be an interesting experience rather than a painful one. I was really excited
when one day I heard the news I wrote from the school broadcast station.
Interest is the mother of success. In the high school, I read more Chinese classical
poetry because I was fascinated with their beauty and conciseness. Later I even tried to
write some poems myself. I benefited from lots of reading and I think my compositions
were good at that time. I could really find pleasure from writing and reading.
My first touch of English could be traced back to the beginning of middle school.
We spent most of the time on vocabulary, grammar, and reading with little effort in
speaking and writing. In the college entrance exam, we are required to write an English
composition for a given topic such as describing a given figure, your hobbies. Probably
because those compositions were relatively short and simple, we did not practice writing
in English much at that time.
4
In the first semester of my university life, I took part in a Chinese composition
competition held by the university and I got a prize. Soon after that I became an editor of
a university magazine published and read by the students. I together with other student
editors interviewed some eminent professors, wrote some reports and comments, and
revised some essays for that magazine. I always think writing plays a key role in our lives
because writing is an important way to express us and to communicate with others. I
wrote many letters to my friends in my hometown or in other cities. But after two years, I
found I had little time to read and write due to lots of courses and homework. Eventually
I nearly stopped writing and to write a good article became more difficult for me. Though
we have to write thesis to get BS and MS degree, the thesis is mainly based on the theory,
formulas, and calculations and requires little imagination and embellishment. Sometimes
I think if I majored in liberal arts instead of engineering, I would have been a real writer.
We still had little chances to practice writing in English except to prepare for the
exams. In most English exams we had to write a short composition, such as to describe
the life in the 21st century, or to give reasons and examples if you agree or disagree the
arguments. But we learned little about how to write well in English in class. We found
some good samples from books and imitated their organizations and styles. This was
useful for exams but did not really improve my English writing much. Sometimes I found
that most of the words I used in composition were learned in high school, not in
university.
After obtaining my master‟s degree, I came to Purdue to pursue my PhD. In the
first year, writing did not cause a lot of trouble to me because I only wrote several
projects which contained many figures and formulas. As for the research, in most cases I
5
showed the professors figures and numbers without many texts. In the last semester I
tried to write my first research paper in English. I wrote very slowly with one page each
day because of my poor English writing. Sometimes I had confusion in choosing the
words and sometimes I had difficulty in expressing myself clearly and accurately. I
realized that I had to improve my English writing in order to do my research well.
I think writing in Chinese and in English have some similarities though these two
languages are totally different. As for me, my largest weakness in English writing lies in
my limited vocabulary. I cannot think about something in English naturally. Then when I
want to express myself in English, I have to translate my thought to English. But the
words emerged in my brain are so limited that in many cases I have to use the
inappropriate words. Probably reading would help me to know how to use more words.
Now I am like a student in the elementary school to learn writing from the basic
steps. I wish after more reading and more practice in writing I could write in English with
ease and pleasure some day.
6
WA/D2/TS3
China is a long history country and full of the atmosphere of literature. At the old
time, if you want to secure an official position, the only way is to pass the imperial
examination, which is based on composition. This tradition has an important influence on
present day. So we practice a lot on our native language composition since our childhood.
We start our wring in primary school but not very much. Most of time, we make
sentences as patterns. However a lot of parents will enforce their children to write diary
or take writing lessons after school, of course of my parents. They think writing is the
most primary ability. The earlier their children start, the better they will achieve in the
future. Sometimes it is funny to write after school, but sometimes it isn‟t, especially when
you want to play or watch cartoon.
When studying in junior high school, we do more writing in class, about once every
two weeks. The topics is various, like talking about some famous person or someone who
most influence you, writing comments of a book, describing the most unforgettable
memory, or giving us a well-known saying as a topic of writing. Sometimes we do a little
different style, like poetry or practical writings, but most time it is the form of essay. We
put a lot of efforts on the composition and take it seriously, because it takes quite a few
proportions in the entrance examination of high school. Not only does your teacher give
you a lot of reading and writing assignments but also your parents. I start touch the
ancient writings and ancient poetry at this moment. The ancient works are really beautiful
and full of deep meanings; certainly they are difficult to learn. Naturally, our writing is
still emphasized on contemporary writings.
7
In junior high school years, it is also our first time to take English courses. I learned
a little English in my primary school, so it is easy for me at the beginning of English
courses. So I always get good grades in the exams. But it usually is not easy for others.
Our class put most efforts on memorizing vocabularies, phrases and sentences. There is
almost no speaking, listening and writing. Lots of vocabularies frustrate many students.
People who want to enter good senior high school will take additional lessons after
school. It takes tree times every week. The same as in school, they do review of the
textbook but give you extra materials systematically.
When entering senior high school, we have the same iteration in study Chinese and
English. It is much competitive between students because the high school education is the
preparation for the university entrance examination. We do more and more composition
in native language and memorizing more and more English vocabularies, phrases and
sentences. Of course the level is become higher, like the composition, most time the
teacher just gives us a phrase, idiom or epigram from ancient writings as a topic of a long
essay. It always takes much time to think about the extended meaning from the profound
topic. We start doing English writing at this time, but it is short and some kind like
making some sentences and putting them together. We do not do much on English
writing, because it has little proportion in the entrance exam, of course Chinese writing
still play an important role in it.
After graduate from high school, I seldom use English. All I have a chance to use
English is when I read my textbook in university. But it is not helpful for my English
proficiency. We usually only read the equations and terminologies and then keep the
8
textbook away. It is obvious that after six years spoon-fed education, no one want to get
involve in English. My English level drop gradually until I start to prepare for TOEFL.
Strictly speaking, my first experience in English writing was at the time when I
applied for the Graduate school in US. I needed to write a Statement of purpose. I had
never write such a formal and long topics like that before. It was just like at the first time
when you tried to write an article in the style of ancient writing. There was no ideal how
to start. The only way I can do was writing in Chinese and then translated into English
word by word. It was easy for me to write an article in Chinese. When I finish the draft, I
was very satisfied with my SOP. It looked having good content and well organized.
However, after I spent most time to find out those words I didn‟t know in English, it
turned out about twice the length of my original version and looks really like putting a lot
of separate sentences together. I tried to make it concise, but it didn‟t work. It seemed
that there was something different between Chinese and English. When I wrote in
Chinese, there is seemly no grammar in Chinese. However, I should pay attention to the
grammar when translating into English. Some times, I found a good saying in Chinese,
but there was no such a saying in English, or I didn‟t know. So I used the same sentence
patterns to write or write in roundabout way. Finally, I took some sample essays and tried
to find some similar sentence patterns and then made sentences modeled after these
patterns. Every time I found some useful sentences in other articles, I revised my SOP
and modeled after that. After a lot of revises, it eventually looked more like a “real”
English composition.
I think English writing is really a big knowledge. People who use English as their
native English are not necessarily good at writing, even people, like me, have poor
9
English. My vocabularies and phrases are not enough. The preposition is also a big
problem. Some words or phrases used in speaking are not appropriate to be used in
writing, but I always can‟t figure out. Sometimes I find some typical sentences patterns
used in topics. But when I write an article, I can‟t remember what they are. So it becomes
a translation again. Now I am in America. I should try to improve my English
communication in this good environment. I hope next time when I need to write a SOP or
other essay, I can make an English-like composition.
10
WA/D1/TS4
The oldest thing I can remember about writing is memorizing and writing my
grand parents‟, my parents‟, and my brothers‟ name in Korean, my mother tongue, and
Chinese. I don‟t know how old I was at that time, but I clearly remember that I really
hated doing that because I was not good at memorizing neither I was good at writing.
During my elementary school years, I learned new words, idioms, sentence
structures, reading skills, etc. in my native language, however I enjoyed none of them.
Instead of spending my time in reading and writing, I spent most of my time in making
plastic models, playing video games, and watching television shows. This lack of
interests on reading and writing kept me from having any chance of writing experience
except when I had to do it, such as homework.
My thoughts about reading and writing didn‟t change a lot when I became a
junior-high school student. Actually, my lack of interests on them became dislike when I
had to do reading and writing in both Korean and English. I do remember the worst part
of my school life at that time was sitting in an English class, reading, learning sentence
structures, writing the entire three text books in one semester. At that time I had to read a
lot of books for school works, we learned about 18 different subjects. However, I didn‟t
write anything but school homework. During my high school time, the situation of my
reading and writing experience was about the same as when I was in junior-high school. I
didn‟t have any chance to write except school homework, and I even hated doing that
homework. I think I worked very hard to avoid any chance to write in both Korean and
English.
11
Things were starting to change in my college years. Soon after I desperately felt
that I needed better education than I was getting from my school, I planed to study in the
U.S.A. Then, this question popped up, “What language do American use? Of course
English!” This was one of the most stupid questions that I had ever asked myself. My
decision was farm, and I had strong supports from my whole family members, so I started
to study English, my nightmare of last 6 years in school life. I approached English study
differently because I knew that the way I had been taught in junior-high and high school
didn‟t fit for me. First I watched CNN everyday, attended a private English school to
make chances to speak with Americans, and started reading English literatures! They
worked for me and I kept doing that the last of my collage years and also during my
military service years too. However I was still tried to avoid any writing chances and
didn‟t put much effort for improving my writing skills.
I came to America on January 2, 1998, soon after I was discharged from 3 years
of military service. I spent about 8 months in a language school in LA, California. There I
learned what I had learned long time ago in Korea such as, new words, grammar, reading
and writing skills. However, study environments were somewhat different than in Korea,
because the place was in the middle of English speaking people. I think I studied hard to
make good TOEFL and TWE scores, but I didn‟t just sit on a table to prepare for the tests
like other people do in Korea. Instead, I spoke with Americans, went movies a lot, and
even wrote some articles in English. At the end of the language school, I got the test
scores I wanted, I could communicate in English. Most of all, I was able to write my
thoughts on a paper without having hatred mind for doing that. Even my article about my
life in the language school covered the front page of the 1998 Year Book, made by
12
teachers and students in the language school. That time was one of the joyous moments
of my life in U.S.A.
Now as a graduate student, I‟m trying to do little more than just writing my ideas
and opinions on a paper, I‟m trying to write as good as average American collage
students do. This is my goal of writing in English, and I believe that I will reach my goal
someday soon. That day I will call myself as an average writer in both English and
Korean.
13
WA/D2/TS5
Thinking about my past experiences trying to study English, I have many things
to say about it. Especially, in the case of writing English, there were also many troubles
because I felt it was little bit more difficult than reading, listening, and speaking.
I was a member of writing club in my high school not by my will but by school‟s.
Actually, there was not special interest at my high school life. In the extra curricular
activity, I needed to choose one club. But I had to select writing club that is not popular
with the students, for my late decision. Practicing writing for every week in the small
group gave me valuable helps at that time. I had the many chances to write short or long
sentences in the form of essay about my thought or mind to feel wonderful nature outside
the school like famous palaces, other campuses etc. It was a really good experience for
me.
When I went to summer camp of my church back in 1990 at my college year, I
met a girl who was immigrated at 12 year old to US and raised there. She was studying
management in the college. She could speak both Korean and English like a native
speaker. It was the first time for me to talk in English with Korean looking American girl.
In the camp I asked her to introduce someone to share life story to each other in each
world in the letter because I wanted to improve the skill to write in English doing that. I
finally got a letter from US. It was interesting experience for me to correspond with letter
together even in English. But I felt it was hard for me to write in English because I was
not familiar with writing what I thought in foreign language. I tried to express what I
wanted to say looking for the appropriate words in the dictionary. Almost it took one day
in the library without doing anything to write a full-page size of letter at that time. I even
didn't know what kind of vocabulary I should use in the middle of the context. It was
difficult to choose suitable words good enough to say what I intended to express. I have
corresponded with the pal for 2 years in the mail and 2 years or so in the email. During
exchanging mails to each other, I felt my English writing skill was getting better though it
was a little bit slow. It was a really good result for me.
After graduation from college, I worked for electronic company. I had
many chances to translate many documents that describe the equipment produced, into
English. It was also helpful to me because I could come to know the jargon in my
14
interesting area. But choosing a suitable word in the documents was always problem. In
the problem like that, I thought if I could read many kinds of articles in English, it would
give me intuition what kind of words I should select in the context because I could
remember appropriate vocabulary in the situations. Actually, I tried to do read famous
articles such as 'Reader's digest', 'Korea herald'. It gave me abundant vocabularies for
writing English. Also, I read New Testament in English though it was not that easy to
understand because it was also hard to read even in my native language.
Studying Computer Engineering in Purdue, I decided to write some articles in
English everyday or weekly not hesitating what I should select from my mind but just
writing sentences felt from my hand so natural in the context. I think it was
approximately 500 words or so. But it was not to be continued for a long time because I
was not encouraged in the environment where I could feel the need.
I have read a book related to the method about studying English in my country.
The author is the professor in the department of English education of a certain university
in New York. He insisted that only in the case of practicing English in the whole way,
namely in speaking, writing, reading, and listening at a time, it has the effect. I agreed his
opinion and tried to study English like that. I think it works but it needs much interesting
to keep it continuously.
I would like to be a good writer in English even more than in my mother
tongue because it will give me much help for doing my works in the future. Being a good
writer also asks me being a good reader and a good speaker. So I am planning to have
much time to read many good books and many good articles participating in extra
activities in community where I can practice English many times.
Anyway, writing some good articles in English requires much works to be
done. Also I am looking forward to see myself improved in English writing after this
class.
15
WA/D2/TS6
I was borned in Brazil from a French family; my father and mother are French
and they speak only French at home between us. For this reason n my writer‟s
autobiography will be divide in three part (French, Portuguese and English.). Each part is
very different, as you will see.
I studied my first eleven years (until the end of high school) in a bilingual school,
almost trilingual, because the English was also important in Sao Paulo, Brazil. In reality
the first 5 years was 100% in French, the Portuguese and English was introduced only in
the sixth grade.
My writer‟s experience in French is what we can call “ very traditional” and also
very traumatic, with a lot of writing assignments; each one was usually divided in three
part dictation, grammar about the dictation and questions comprehension .Teachers
scored its in a hard way. I started in the first grade to recognized the letter and son and
started to read, but because I had a twin brother (twin in general tend to have slow
beginning development) and I was very introverted student, I didn‟t like and adapt well in
school atmosphere. I had a lot of difficulty to reach this level, and I had to retake the first
year because I was not able to read fluently and “correctly” for the parameter of that
school. In the second grade (my three year at school) the main goal was to write well in
the end of the year, we started a series of traumatic assignments in class and at home.
Basically dictation, grammar about its and also spelling words and a lot of grammar
assignments and reading assignments for homework .
One more time I felt to reach this second level and had to make again the second
year. This way my learning experience started very bad and had consequently not help
16
my performance and feeling about write for most of my high school period. This type of
"learning method was the same until the first year of the high school.
The high school in the French system is very focus in field or majors that you have to
decide. You have to decide which field you want to follow between four different choices
possible: Life Science, Human Science, Economics Science or Mathematic Science.
In any of those writing skills was very important. I choose Economic Science but any
way the teacher still very concerned about the way of you are writing, they still make
grammar correction, style correction but in a different way; more informal as bottom note
in the end of the sheet.
Finally I can say that my native language, the first that I really learned at school
and at home was the French and I had no good feeling about.
My “former “ writer‟s experience in Portuguese started in the sixth grade as the
English. It was also like the French very traditional .But it was more pleasant and started
more as“ a street experience”, far from “ the island “ of the French school, the nick name
that the student gave for it.
Because I was in a bilingual school with the first five year exclusively in French, I
first learned the Portuguese in the street, reading informally, listening and talking dairy in
Portuguese outside the school. It was very funny and without any obligation. In the sixth
grade we started with formal class of Portuguese .The methodology was very close to the
French one, but teachers was more friendly and scored in a more fair way; teachers most
of the time give you a second chance to correct you mistake or if the average score for
the class was too low ,they give a second chance. I was in the average this time and I
think that with a more friendly way of teaching and with already all the background of
17
the “street experience “ and French experience I learned easily the Portuguese. But I
really only write exclusively in Portuguese in the university, and I think that at this time I
realized that I can expressed better my ideas, and my Portuguese writing skill was better
than “ native students”, students that studied exclusive in Portuguese during the college
period, when we work in team and we had to turn in agriculture‟s project that have to
have some explanation part. My high school was higher quality than other Brazilian
schools.
My writer‟s experience in English started in the sixth grade as the Portuguese. It
was also very traditional and focus in grammar, composition and reading as the French
,but it was not focus in conversation and speaking. But the first 3 years was very “light”,
very basic level. In the high school level the experience was more difficult, the main goal
was really to write and read well, and we did a lot of grammar and composition and we
was oblige to read books and make long and very detail composition about its, give your
ideas and opinion about. I was as in French not a good student, because I had a lot of
difficulty in writing and use the correct grammar structure. But the big change for me was
at the end of the second year of high school during the holiday I traveled to US and lived
4 weeks in a America family and more 8 weeks in America schools. Then this experience
really improved my English and the way that I learned English in US school was very
pleasant, very focus in “real life”, they taught us how is America style of life, picked up
article from magazine, journal, work with thing that real interest the teenager .It was a
very good and productive experience, unfortunately not enough to real go back speaking
fluently English (too short time). After that I stay almost my all my undergraduate level
without any or few contact with English language.
18
In 1984 after I graduated I was in Israel and there I had to use my English to
communicate because I did not speak Hebrew .The three months that I stay there was
good enough to rebuild my English but not improve it.
After that I stay my last 15 years working in Brazil and without use my English.
Finally I started study again for the TOELF and GRE by myself in 1997 (I lived in farm r
far from any big city), but I really was in trouble when I start my master and I realized
that I just understand during the first month of class maybe only 50% and I really but a
long and hard time to “ delivery” my homework‟s and assignments.
The last year and half in the master was a mix of happy and unhappy moments,
some day I think that I did a lot of progress and some day I feel so “ stupid” and unable to
write and speak in a correct and basic level.
19
WA/D2/TS7
Writing is such an interesting thing that you can transfer your ideas into concrete
or abstract symbols and transmit them to others. However, writing in second language
may be another totally differently story, because there would be some difficulties that
need be surmounted, such as vocabularies, structures, and grammars. People might feel
some upset for their first time writing in second language. As for writing, I have some
nice experiences. However, while I got the first assignment of English writing, I just felt
it‟s full of challenge to me. Not like a native language writing, I might probably say, “it‟s
piece of cake. Just do it”.
I started learning how to write a composition since the elementary school.
During that period, we were occasionally assigned about 600-word articles to describe
our daily life or record some interesting tales in summary or winter vacation, and most of
them were just written by trying to imitate others‟ or written down directly what
happened. In my sixth grade year, it was my first time that I tried to contribute my article
on which I showed up a special skill for playing a game to a PC game magazine that was
issued in Taiwan. However, I was so eager that it could be accepted, and worked on it for
almost a whole week, though finally, it came out no responses at all.
My writing skills got significant improvement in the senior high school, and I
thank for the native language composition teacher. He didn‟t limit the styles we should
write and assigned every other weeks varieties of articles of different fields, including of
describing some abstract philosophies like friendship or something money cannot buy,
reviewing a book, writing a lyrical composition or special experiences in life, making a
comment for an essay, arguing about the current events, and so on. Every time teacher
would read the good ones so that we can learn from each other. Once gave me an
impressive memory, I couldn‟t believe that the one that teacher was reading was mine.
I‟m so surprised, and that indeed encouraged me a lot. Since then, I felt I had more
interests and confidence in writing. I even try to mail a short letter to radio station. I was
20
trying to encourage other students taking the entrance exams like me to change a different
spirits to face our life and experience a whole new world in such a mood, and luckily it
was accepted. While I heard my article was broadcasted in the air. It was so wonderful.
After I entered the university, not only did we learn the technique knowledge,
but also we were compulsory to learn more international language that is my second
language, English. However, we had only two hours per week. Professor just focused on
the reading abilities and structure comprehension, so there were less chances for us to
practice in conversation and even less in English writing. From reading abundant English
textbooks, my reading abilities and skills were getting better then. But my writing level
was still like high school level or even worse. During the university, the Internet was
exponentially flourishing, and we had an open area to write or publish our articles on
Internet, such as a series of long stories or a personal column on the web, and it‟s easy to
have some responses from the audience soon. It was quite fun that I can get lots of
positive or negative comments from them. However, it did nothing to help the second
language writing because most of the readers used the native language, and people
surveying the Internet just often skipped the articles written in English, and therefore,
those would get fewer responses.
This kind of deficient English writing wouldn‟t carry any big trouble to me
until my second year in graduate school. I got greatly frustrated when writing in English
my thesis and my first journal paper, which represent the wonderful results of my
research about wireless communication. My advisor scratched most of the sentences
throughout the paper, and the comments he gave me used to be listed in more than one
pages. After several times of revision to almost perfect, my journal paper was done. I
learned a lot from that, and I really appreciated of my advisor for helping my English
paper writing. It was also my first official academic article.
I found that it‟s not easy for me to write a good English article because I‟m
used to putting down a draft by a Chinese writing method and then translating into an
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English one. Therefore, not only the sentence reads incomprehensible, but also the
structure is quite different from the English writing format. Besides, after composing
several concepts, I try to plug these separate ideas into the writing and to connect these
points to a line and to a plane, but they are not easy to combine consistently in this way.
Therefore, the article won‟t be fluent enough. I often wish that one day I could write
beautiful English articles or papers, and my PhD thesis will be written in a fluent English.
Hence, I just try starting from reading, such as website news, to absorb the most common
vocabularies, phases, and usages of English to promote my English background, and mail
forwards and backwards to friends in English. Let myself exposed in English listening
and writing environment. However, English writing is still really hard. I‟m like a boy
standing in front of the ocean. I have so many to learn in writing.
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