Some time ago I wrote about the reason ‘Why I write English‘ here at this blog. Now I want to go a little deeper, about the way I’m training my english besides writing this blog. One thing to start with, it’s definitely not just school!

Actually my opinion is that school’s good for the basics but the german schooling system for languages is definitely no more than for basics. I started to learn english at school at the age of nine and since than I had no single year without english. But as far I can tell, my knowledge was little till I stared some training by my self. My main intention was to get better in speaking and understanding. School manly teaches how to write and how to read. Not even that! Manly they teach vocabulary and grammar.

My way of learning English started with watching movies in German. Some of them were so good that I watched them so often that they got boring cause I was able to switch the sound of and tell what the actors were saying. Someday I thought about simply watching the movie in English. Told, done! Sometimes it was hard and in the beginnings I had to turn on the subtitles.

Since than I’m watching movies manly in English — if possible, friends of mine don’t like to watch movies in English so I have to watch them in German with them. One thing I didn’t liked about watching the movies in English were the subtitles, I tended to just read the subtitles and no more actually watch the movie. Someday I just switched them off, to prevent just reading and no more watching and if I wasn’t able to understand a speech, sentence or conversation, I rewinded and listened again with subtitles and switched them off after the conversation or speech was over.

Since some years now I’m able to watch movies in English without any subtitles and without any problems. But not just watching movies in English made my English improve I also started reading books in English. Some funny fact — I’ve never been someone who read much and I’m still not a book worm but if I read a book in English it’s most likely to hook me. One of the books I first read in English was ‘Into The Wild’ by Jon Krakauer’ which I read after watching the gorgeous movie. Besides reading books I’m reading many blogs — mainly English once — my MacBook OS language, keyboard layout and mobile phone’s language is set to be English.

I’m sure that this factors are responsible for my improvements in the English language — not just school. Again, schools OK for the basics but the use of a language just can’t be taught with the methods used by the German school system. I’m happy that I’m able to understand nearly everything and am for sure going on improving my english skills. All I can say and what proves that my way is right, is that my marks have improved since I’m learning English the way I learn it. And I just can give you the tip: if you struggle with learning languages, get it into your day, watch news, read books or write a diary.

I’m still not perfect and may never be perfect in speaking, writing, reading or understanding English but I’m training to do the I can!

And one thing is for sure — English is the language I’m — maybe most people at this planet — going to need most in my life!