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Yanjun Cai Professor Jan Rieman English 1101-119 September 16, 2012 The Journey from Chinese to English Since my tongue language is Chinese, I would like to start my journey with it. I remember

that the first time I could completely understand a whole piece is the moment I listened to the tape telling stories. The story impressed me most was A Puppy Is Hooked on Being Sick, which

told a puppy admired a sick kitty being looked after well in bed. So the puppy intentionally got wet in the rain to catch the cold, and expected his mom to do everything for him. It did affect

on me that never gain something through doing harm to myself, which would make others caring about me feel bad. Thanks to these stories, I started to comprehend paragraphs and have the most initial sense of cause and effect, which helped me learn to express my feelings in a more completed way. Later, I learned PINYIN, the Chinese phonetic alphabet in class and started to spell by PINYIN to recognize character. Till now I still remember I struggled to pronounce gourd in Chinese by

spelling. Although I knew how to speak it out naturally, I could not spell it as a whole like g-u-a to gua. This experience gave me a deep impression of being good at PINYIN is the cornerstone to be a fluent Mandarin Chinese speaker. Hence, I found out books with PINYIN

corresponding to each character to expand my volume of recognized Chinese characters.

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Meanwhile, since my books were related to natural science and the animals, I accumulated knowledge in the domain of natural world and developed interest in this field, which I benefit a lot from the law of nature. Sometimes I would share my reading experience with my parents I was

and they encouraged me to log down my own thoughts about these pieces of stories. gradually led to the world of writing by logging down my daily life.

At that time, the Chinese famous literary work: Pilgrimage to the West, was published in cartoon books. With lively and vivid pictures and some simple dialogues, the series of 52 books adapted the piece of work presenting a popular literature, which children could be readily receptive to. It was the first time that the books gave me exposure to the literary world; through

which I was initially conscious of the way people performed their writing through brilliant structure and the splendid threads of a story. Gradually, I got accustomed to the activity of writing and set forth to keeping diary, which is the best format to reflect on myself thinking logically and expressly. just kept writing without pause to relief myself. During my diary time, I

Things about my school affairs, some reflects

on my experience, encouragement for myself to strive for my significant goals, even some divergence of views between my parents and I occurred in my diary. occasionally to explore some genre to adequately deliver my sentiment. I would take risks It seemed that I was

another person to review a girls feeling and inner world through her free expression after reading my previous diary. It was amazing that I viewed my progress step by step as well as

pointed out my weakness sometimes to remind myself doing better in the future.

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As I was in Middle School, our Chinese teachers introduced the narration to us. Every semester in the middle school, we not only read plenty of narrative articles to practice our comprehension on narration, but also practice completing narrative related to various of themes. In the meantime, I was hooked on the fairy tales written by Zheng Yuanjie, the tales magnate in China. In his short story, the plot was simple and the conversation between two characters was

uncomplicated. However, it was the mirror of some negative phenomena in the contemporary community, which led me to deep thinking, about the interpersonal communication and the social issue. From his full-length novel, the descriptive statement was detailed, which was required element to attract readers. I learned a lot of skills applying to my narrative writing,

such as dedicated description, dialogue or some make-up stories to reflect on my thoughts. Through the interaction with the stories by Zheng, it has sharpened my understanding on the principle of who, when, where, what and how to make adequate arrangements for my articles. Argumentative writing never seen before appeared at the spot of High School. During the

whole page of argumentative writing, I was required to establish my own point of view concerning certain event or a saying by famous people, as well as convince other people my perspective by argument that carries convictions. It is not only the excellent logical thinking,

but also the explicit expression. Stringing together ornate phrases could confuse the readers. Hence, I expand my readings to all sorts of materials, which could provide me a border thinking when comprehend a certain case. Step by step, I learned how to form my standpoints and explain my positions differ from the common view, which can make myself conspicuous.

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Required reading exists side by side.

I made good use of them as chances to know about It is amazing

other countries cultural backgrounds through these famous literary masterpieces.

that the characters existed hundreds of years ago is interlinked with peoples personalities today. From their tales, I could find the reflections on current life, which instructed me how to extricate myself from a difficult position as well as how to overcome in straitened circumstances. On the other hand, the textbook reading experience is totally different from the leisure reading above. When reading the textbook, I have to be absorbed in the subject, and constantly looked upon on knowledge I gained as the basis to interpret new knowledge. Deepening my comprehension on specific definition is crucial, which could be the shortcut to further study. Every time I reread some definitions I omitted or misunderstood, I got a better insight into the chapter. The habit I gradually forming in high school was taken into my university studies, in

which courses required solid foundations for further research. When it comes to my learning experience on English reading and writing, it is dissimilar to my Chinese learning. Due to the limited English cultural background and lacking

English-based communication among peers, our English learning is mainly focus on the reading and writing but neglect the importance of listening and speaking. I remember the first time I

was told to read passage and simply answer questions based on my reading when I was 13 years old, during the reading I just needed to find the related words or sentences to pick up the answers. The English examinations lay emphasis on reading several passages with multiple choices based on the comprehension. Through this form, we developed the habited of reading for answers

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without having a conversation with the author. limited-time reading task.

We missed plenty of good pieces for the

The writing section requires some arguments concerning social issues, which we just followed the format and used some phrases and sentence pattern to complete our composition without creative thinking. And I think the way we writing was kind of like the translation,

which was short of English style of reasoning. It might lead from being wanting in intensive English reading instructions. Although I was tired of this way of learning English, it did help

me accumulate words and instruct me how to write a simple essay at least. The time I enjoyed most studying English was the travel to University of Queensland, Australia. In the daytime, I had English classes introducing culture and talking to the At night, I had dinners with my home-stay

undergraduate in UQ from all over the world. family filled with relaxing chat.

They were curious about my hometown in China and the In return, they

Chinese culture, so that it was a good chance for me to practice my oral English. were enthusiastic about introducing local customs and practices to me.

Sometimes it could be

embarrassing that I forgot the words, but they were patient to guide me using another expression. Whats more, I completed my presentation with the help of my host, who introduced me several significant festivals or some local specific holidays in Australia. I gradually adapted to

communicating with others using English, as well as understanding some ideas more deeply, such as being open-minded to different cultures, being confident to share our ideas and thinking with comprehension and respect, more exploration and searching needed into Chinese culture as

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the foundation of my expression as well. As for some special reading experience in English, the instruction of installing DVD occurred to my mind. It is one of the most exciting things I have done ever, for I could

understand the guidance instructed in English, and I temper myself through the assembling. Verbal expression in the instruction is totally different from the piece of works, since its objective is to make people understood and follow the steps easily. So the whole process is like a class advising my procedure. However, it could be frustrated and upset reading this kind of expression filled up whole pages, for readers could not catch the authors emotional activities either his logical thinking. From my perspective, I will pay more attention to writing in a lively

style in order to keep touch with my readers.

Self-assessment: It is the first time I write a whole passage using English reaching 1500 more words! I did think about how to recognize my structure to make the passage logical.

Since Jan reminded me I could do the comparison between my Chinese literacy background and English learning, I logged down them to reflect on my study both languages. I analyzed some points like my learning English methods well and ending my passage with the example well, I guess. However, I did some translation when I depicted my Chinese background, for it was Furthermore, I really appreciate my peers

naturally to recall Chinese using Chinese.

comments on my passage with encouragement and they did point out my weakness, which instructed me to add more details to explain my thought and experience to make the statement more vivid and lively. Overall, it is a bittersweet experience, and I hope I could do it better!