TIPS AND TRICKS

bởi PHƯƠNG ANH
I also agree with us, don't afraid and we have to practice speaking & listening much. My listening skill is bad so that I can't understand what did you say. Anyone have ways to plactice listening skill, please show me

I hope you don't mind if i may want to correct your message.

"I also agree with you that we shouldn't be afraid, and should keep on practicing our speaking and listening skills. My listening skill is so bad that I can't understand what others say. Could anybody tell me how to improve it?"

I have refered to this solution in the earlier message: you should try to pronounce the word correctly first, then you can understand. Since English is a language with multi-syllable words, the stress on which syllable is so important. If you are not sure which syllable you should put the stress on, don't guess, look it up in the dictionary.

Btw, I started my listening skill by listening to the VOA (Voice of America) Special English (www.voa.gov, I guess. You can always search for it on Google). Would you like to try??

bởi childlike mother
A story:

But How can I know, their sound so strange....

I agree that people from different areas may pronounced a little bit differently for the same word, so sometimes you may need to guess from the context (like the security did). It's normal in all languages, even our mother tongue: one from Hanoi may need to guess what a person from Ho Chi Minh City is talking about and vice versa.

bởi mẹ Linh con
The security guard came over and said to me: "They asked you where REX hotel was"
Oh, God. I knew exactly where REX hotel was, which was very near here. But I couldn't catch its name because of the gentleman's strange accent ....

I guess in this context, you should use simple present tense, even you are telling a story which happened in the past, since these sentences describe a truth.

bởi Mẹ Anh Minh
OK, các mẹ vào trang này: http://www.hp-vietnam.com sau đó vào phần TOEFL rồi vào mục dowload bản dùng thử. Các mẹ thử làm bài thi năm 2004 xem sao nhé. (bài thi này đòi hỏi khá nhiều thời gian đấy). Khó lắm. Phần vì lần đầu thi thử, phần vì làm chưa hết, mình làm khoảng 2/3 số câu hỏi mà mới được có 200 điểm thôi.

This is a trial version, so it doesn't come with the grader, I guess. 200 is the ground score that one can earn when he has registered for the test You should check the result after the pop-up window telling your score is off. I've got 30/50 for the first section (listening); 34/40 for the second; and 31/50 for the last part. This link shows how to estimate scores for your practice test.

http://www.press.umich.edu/esl/testp...fl/scoring.pdf

But they (the compilers) don't guarantee if it reflects the scores in the real test However, I think it's good anyway for your reference.

bởi PHƯƠNG ANH
Thank you Lullaby, I hope that you will correct my message if it is wrong because when I write I don't know where it is wrong , if you write again I will know I write wrong to correct it.
Thank you very much for your website, I will try studying form it.
I write right or wrong?

Hi, Phương Anh, I would love to tell you some key grammar rules if you would love to learn. I hope these may help you write better. Please tell me what you think about that. In the meantime, just a tip for you, don't translate into English from what you think in Vietnamese, try to think in English.

bởi Duvi
Oh god, I send this time is 3 times , I'm newcomer, my English very badly, this Topic is helpful for me, if I make mistake, please tell me. Thanks.

"I've sent the same message 3 times. Thanks God, it's gone through finally. I'm a newcomer, my English is very bad. This topic is helpful for me. If I made any mistakes, please tell me how to correct it. Thanks."

Actually, I'm not sure about the conditional tense that I've used in the above sentence I used the present unreal type, since you might not have made any mistakes. Could anybody explain this further?

bởi ACKHIP
Hi all mums, I have to teach my nieces (10 year old) English in the next summer. I do not how to begin and I've never taught E before, pls kindly share your experience of teaching E from ABC. Thanks in advance and looking forward to hearing from you.

You could start with the alphabet then some simple words. You should teach her using body language, instead of telling her the meaning of the word in Vietnamese. You could use some items to facilitate your teaching. For example, if you would like to teach her the word "apple", you can either make a gesture that helps her imagine of an apple, or you can have an apple to show her. The purpose of this method is that when she sees something, she would recall the English word, instead of translate a Vietnamese word to English. This method is modelled on how a baby learns a language. Hope it helps!

bởi hadungtdh3
Hi all,
I have been learning English for many years, but I speak English not exactly. I would like to make friend with everybody who like speak English with me by telephone. My phone number is 04 7830636 and my name is Ha. Please leave your phone;I will call for you. Moreover you can contact with me by Yahoo nick Hadungtdh3, I am very plearsure to meet you.
I am looking forward to hearing from you soon.
Best wish,
Ha

I hope you don't mind if i may want to correct your message.

I have been learning English for many years, but I don't speak English well. I would like to make friends with those who would prefer to communicate by phone. My phone number is 04-783 0636 and my name is Ha. Please leave your number, and I'll call you back. In addition, you can contact me by Yahoo messager. My nickname is Hadungtdh3. It is my pleasure to chat with you.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best wishes,

If i have made any mistake, please feel free to correct it. I'll very much appreciate

bởi mẹ Linh con
Things to take note:

- Thank you for doing sth/having done sth; (1)
- Single/Plural forms (eg, a business letter vs business letters) (2)
- to listen to sth/sb (3)
- to spend time on sth/doing sth (3)
- a lot of time ('many' is used for countable things, eg, many books; time is uncountable) (2)
- 'well' is an adverb and used with verbs, whilst 'good' is an adjective and used with the verb 'to be'. (4)

I agree with mẹ Linh con that we should start by reviewing all the parts of speech and the most basic grammar rules.

As far as I've known, there are 9 parts of speech in English, which are nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, articles, conjunctions, exclamations. Normally, Vietnamese don't think these are so important, but they are. So, practise how to use these first, before you may try other more complicated rules. You may want to visit Daily Grammar for more exercises. When you would master how to use all parts of speech, you may understand what mẹ Linh con has explained at point (4) above.

In addition, I would like to modify some tips that mẹ Linh con has refered which, I think, may help you write English better.

(1) after a preposition, we use noun functions. For your information, noun functions are words that function as nouns, e.g. nouns, pronouns, gerunds (or you may want to call present participle phrases), and the like. So, if you may want to express an action, you should use the gerund form of the verb. You may express your idea in the past tense (having + past participle) or present, or even future (V-ing), depending on when it has occured.

(2) There are two kinds of nouns in English, uncountable and countable. In general, we use an article in front of a noun. And you may know that there are 2 kinds of articles which are definite and indefinite. The indefinite article, including "a" and "an", is used in front of a singular, countable noun. And we use it when we may want to talk about something unspecific, e.g. a chair, a topic. We don't use indefinite articles in front of either plural countable nouns (since "a"/"an" means one) or uncountable nouns. However, when we specify a thing, or repeat things that we've mentioned, we use the definite article (the). Vietnamese have never got used to these rules I couldn't do right sometimes, either.

The pronouns used with nouns are, therefore, different. If you are not sure which pronouns you may use, I would suggest that you may use "a lot (of)" (instead of many), "a little (of)" (instead of a few). They work with both countable and uncountable in any circumstances.

(3) These requires you to memorize and get used to. No other suggestions

bởi PHƯƠNG ANH
we open web that you introduce but I don't know how to use, you know my English is so bad, please tell me how to use

In order to listen to articles at VOA Special English, you may need to install Real Player .

To everyone, I will appreciate your taking the time to correct my mistakes, since sometimes, I have written something by... feeling.

bởi mẹ Linh con
- a lot of time ('many' is used for countable things, eg, many books; time is uncountable)

Another tip

Countable or uncountable nouns are recognized sometimes by their meanings . That is to say, "time" could be uncountable or countable depending on which meaning we are referring to.

If I would say I log in WTT 5 times a day. Then, "time" is a countable noun (which means "lần" in Vietnamese ).

But I would say I have wasted a lot of time everyday, surfing internet. Then, "time" is an uncountable noun.

bởi Manly 2005
My boss asked me to get TOEIC test but my English is very bad.
Can you help me?

To Lullaby: Did you receive my message in yahoo? Your pictures are very nice, I like it.

Hi Hương,

You've just come at the right place and the right time . We are discussing tips that may help you improve your English. Hope that you would take advantage of them.

No, I haven't received any messages from you. Which pictures are you talking about? I presume that you've mentioned the series of cherry blossoms that I have posted to "tips for travel" at the box for American mommies, haven't you? Oh, I was so lucky to come at the right time when all the cherries were blooming. It was raining the day after, and everything's gone.

bởi mẹ Linh con
To Lullaby, I like your explanations on speech parts, sounding very much like a pro teacher of English!

Thanks a lot for your support.

Yes, you are right. I've taught English for more than 3 years at a language school in Saigon (but don't ask me which one ). However, it's not my full-time job, so I haven't invested sufficient time to improve my knowledge, although I enjoy teaching. Therefore, I do appreciate what you've contributed to this topic, since I've always learnt a lot through conversation. Please keep sharing your tips with us.

bởi mẹ Linh con
You are welcome! I am happy to share my experience in learning English with all of you, too. I also used to give English tuition years ago. I guess English always fascinates me, although my most preferred language is French. I took up French, but never got around speaking it fluently, which is really a pity.

What do you do, Lullaby? I saw from box America that you are in the US. What are you doing there? Who takes care of your daughter while you are away?

You don't need to learn French since your English is super You could survive wherever you've been to. Actually, I have also learnt French for 3 years, but haven't got any good outcome. I'm so lazy to memorize all its complicated grammar rules and structures. English is much better that I don't need to learn by heart, for example, how to conjugate verbs for every single personal pronoun. I couldn't do well with Chinese either.

I wished I would teach English since I was very young. However, I am never good at literature, so I dared not take the entrance exam to the English faculty of either HCMC University or the Pedagogy University. I attended the part-time course at another university after I'd got into Law School. So I do have both degrees. That was how I have been employed by a language school in Saigon.

I am the lecturer of Environmental Law at HCMC University of Law. But I'm now in the US to do some research on legal protection of cultural heritage on Fulbright Grant. I will go back late May or early June. My mom and my husband are taking care of my daughter since I left. It's good that they gets along very well and she always thinks that my mom were hers. I hope that she would not call me... sister when I'm back.

Anyway, thanks for your concern. I hope I haven't told you more than what you've expected. If I did, please excuse me. You may know that I used to be an attorney-at-law.

And how about you? could you tell us something about you and your family? I recall you've said that your daughter is named ruby too. How is she now? And I'm also curious on what you do for your living.

bởi T&V
Ministry of civil Services affairs and housing

(I don't know if my understanding is right, but I would suggest.)

Bộ công chánh

bởi T&V
A natural or juristic person.

thể nhân hoặc pháp nhân??

bởi mẹ Linh con
Thank you for your compliments! Not in China though, where it's not widely spoken because not many people are good at it, nor in France and Germany because of the people's nationalistic pride in their language! hehehe.....

I have experienced the same in Russia. My Russian friend and I went to the train station in St. Petersburg so that he could help me buy a ticket to Moscow. We were in line for 30 minutes and were advised that the ticket booth was for Russians only (no sign showing that). And the saleslady didn’t know where the counter for foreigners was. We had to go around, and fortunately, we found it in the corner. And you know what, each foreigner was accompanied by a Russian to help her/ him communicate with the salesperson.

The same thing might have happened to me in Italy, if I couldn’t have recalled some French vocabulary. I was looking for an ATM, but couldn’t ask anyone since they speak either Italian or French. Finally, I could manage to make an understandable sentence “ou est la banque?” . Hopefully, I found the bank where employees speak English.

In this point, I think Germans are a little bit nicer. They talked to me in English when I was there.

bởi mẹ Linh con
Have you heard about President J. Chirac recently walking out of an EU conference when his Finance Minister started addressing the audience in English?!

No, I haven’t. We are collecting funny stories about leaders in Entertainment Box. Why don’t you contribute yours? (if it is funny, of course. But I’m sure it is.)

bởi mẹ Linh con
Hihihi... your worry is not unfounded! Has she started speaking? It's amazing to hear your child's first word. I was in awe the 1st day my daughter pulled herself to stand up.

She didn’t speak anything when I was in Vietnam. Whenever she wanted something, she just pointed at it (and she got it). After I left, she spoke some single word (so her words sounded bossy). When she started kinder garten, she has become so talkative that the babysitter always complains with my husband.

bởi mẹ Linh con
Not at all! It's nice to get to know people from all walks of life! Then why did you switch to lecturing?

I didn’t. The new ordinance on Legal Profession doesn’t allow us (employees who work for the Government) to practice law. So I still have the license but I couldn’t represent any clients in the court. Actually, before it went into effect, I had 3 jobs, and now 2.

bởi mẹ Linh con
Thank you for asking! My daughter is almost 1 year old. We will be throwing her a celebration party next week. We are living in Singapore. So next time you have a chance to stop by here, do give me a call! However, our roots are still very much in Vietnam, as my parents live in Hanoi and my husband's in HCMC.

Happy birthday to Linh con then .

I went to Singapore for a training course at NUS in 1998. Actually, I don’t like this country, because everything is artificial, even the clean environment. But, how come that you are living in Singapore now?

bởi mẹ Linh con
hehehe... on this point, you'll be sorely disappointed! I am holding the most unglamorous but very meaningful job, a fulltime stay-at-home mom! I stopped working when I had Dan Linh. Now that she's almost old enough to enrol in a playgroup, I will re-join the workforce soon. Previously, I worked as Assistant Trader in a Jap co, and then as Contract Admins Exec in a US co.

Sleep tight !

I really can’t stay home full-time. It’s stressful. So I went back to work when DQ was almost 4 months (fully obeyed the labor code on maternity leave ). When you go back to work, please tell us how you feel about that.

...

Hình như đến đây là trở về Việt Nam nên... stop communicating in English, hị hị...

Đọc toàn bộ topic at http://www.webtretho.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13919