English Corner
MY ENGLISH CORNER EXPERIENCE
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Over the years I have attended enough English Corers to know that it is better to avoid them like you would avoid SARS, they make me sick. Many foreign teachers have no choice; it is written in their employment contract that they must attend English Corner. No Chinese teacher of English is required to attend English Corner. Of course, many Chinese teachers of English can’t even speak English in English class, so why should they attend English Corner?
Every Chinese college and university has English Corner. There isn’t a single journal article establishing the value of English Corner. There is no scientific study confirming that English Corner has any material benefits to offer.
When I attend English Corner the students ask a set group of questions, and keep repeating them no matter how many times I answer them.
Where are you from?
Do you like China?
Do you like Chinese food?
Do you like Chinese people?
Do you use chopsticks?
What is your favorite color?
Do you play basketball?
Do you play the guitar?
Etc., etc., etc.
As the students complete their Q and A they move off to speak with one another in Chinese. English Corner never seems to transcend into any meaningful discussions. I guess the language barrier, age barrier, culture barrier and even gender barrier are formidable and insurmountable.
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Read the article on the download page China EFL: English Corner
When I attended the English corner in the first time, I could just listen and was nervous and was afraid of being laughed at for my pool oral English.
In the second time, I could have short conversation with others,though it was “do you like…” as mentioned above, but in the following times, I could have discussions with some foreigners.
My first time to attend the English corner was very interesting. I came there with my classmate who also wanted to improve his oral English. We consulted with each other that if we couldn’t find other person to join in we could talk with each other. At the same time we could also encourage each other. At the beginning, neither of us talked with other people initiatively, and then we came across an American teacher, he was so nice to invite us to join in. We attended their discussion, but we didn’t say anything either. Then the American teacher asked me why not talked about something, I said I didn’t know what I should talk.”Anything you like or dislike a story or joke is Ok! If you don’t want speak anything why you come here, take easy!” We were a little embarrassed and we should say something. The second time to attend the English corner I felt more comfortable. I first invited a girl who but could speak fluent English. I admired her, as she just learned English all by herself, even though she didn’t attend university. And she was working in a tradition company and she attended English corner every week. She just said to me several times couldn’t improve oral English, but if you persist, you would succeed in the end!
I am so agreed with you. Actually I only attended the English Corner once when I was a freshman at university. The reason I went to was many students thought it was a fashion and we could meet one or two foreign teachers. What’s more, we can communicate with English. That’s a chance and a fantastic experience for a student who is a freshman at university. You see this is the first time they talk with a foreigner, so they don’t know what to say and what to ask. It results in a lot simple, common and repeated questions come out. Of course this is also the reason why I have never been to the English Corner after the first time.
Indeed, I go to English corner very little. Initially, I did not dare take the first step. I am afraid that I can’t communicate well with others, when I went to the English corner. After taking my first step, I found that only if we try boldly, English corner is not as terrible as we expected. And it is also a nice place for us to learn English.
In the middle school, our school established an English Conner at that time, but I hadn’t grasped the opportunity. I feel regret until now. I am afraid of taking the first step. As a matter fact, we are not able but afraid. And to my way of thinking, people have huge potential for growth when we are forced we can create miracle. So we should have self- confidence, we have ability to communicate with foreigners.
I think the phenomenon the professor encountered is common in China. When Chinese students go to the English corner, they’d like to speak to the foreigners. But when they talk to them, they can’t transcend into any meaningful discussions. So they just repeat the Q and A. But if they speak to Chinese, they may have something interesting things to talk about. But this time they prefer to talk about these in Chinese rather than in English. I think English corner can not play an important role in improving English in this form.
In my opinion, there may be two main reasons which cause these results. Firstly, to communicate freely with strangers is not easy for many of us. We don’t know each other well, and many things should be considered. Specially, we are talking with foreigners.
Secondly, we are not speaking Chinese. If your English is not well enough, you may meet many problems when you are talking with others. Speaking in English freely is not easy for many of us. It is my view about this phenomenon.
As far as I can see, it is normal for this phenomenon take place in China. When we talk with foreigners, we must think how to organize our words in English and listen carefully. How we can transcen into any meaningful discussions at the same time. Otherwise, it is difficult for us to talk about meaningful issues with strangers even with Chinese. As the author said, there are too many barriers prevent us from communicating freely and these barriers are hard to overcome in a short time.
The condition of foreign teachers in language studies schools maybe much better. First, because there are a lot of students who are good at oral English, they already had the experience of communicating to foreign teachers during their high school, and then they talked something like Chinese culture and their joy of daily life with foreign teachers rather than the same and boring questions; second, foreign teachers needn’t to go to English corer every time, only attended when they would like to.
When I was a freshman in university I attended English corers frequently, I think that listening or speaking to foreign teachers or classmates in English is helpful for me.
I won’t like to take part in English corner. And the reason for this is that the situation there is not so good which made me difficult to adjust to it. You know, as strangers most of the people always start their communication by asking questions like” where are you from? What would you like to do in you spare time”. It is disgusted for me to ask the similar and meaningless questions again and again. It is certainly a waste of time. In other word, I can understand the feeling of English teachers. They are abuse in a reasonable way I would like to say. So sometimes they can refuse some invitation of English corner. I absolutely support this personal choice.
It’s my first time go to the English corner. Sometimes I feel it difficult to express myself, but I feel it’s less terrible for me to communicate with others in English. I’m not sad today due to my poor oral English, but I am pleased today because I just begin. I have meet and talked with five peoples. Two of them are my schoolmates from international relations, two have been working for years and one is a foreign student. The first two have the same background as me, so we just talk something about the studies. The other two just shared some working experience with me and some English-studying experience. And I asked the foreign student to make a friend with me. Who impressed me most is dick, who has worked for six years as a designer and a martial art coach. And he didn’t finish his high school. He spent his limited time to learn English all by himself. Maybe we will guess that his work needs him to study English. But it is wrong, he learn English just for interesting. And he told me that he can repeat most of the new conception. I am so amazing. He just teaches me a lesson. And looking at the corner, there are so many people who familiar or not familiar with the English, but they have one thing in common that they all try their best. How about me? I should think a lot.
I can image that it is really boring to be asked the same questions continuously. But on the other hand, maybe the students have tried their best to ask some special questions different from others’, at least they think that they have done so.
Tonight I went to the English corner with the purpose what on earth the corner is. There were many Chinese students stood there and talked with each other in English. I chose a group with a foreigner speaker and joined them. The speaker, from India, have ever lived in many countries, but he choose to spend his rest life in China and teach until he die, namely retire in his opinion. He is a passionate and exciting so that when someone argued with him on some controversial topic, his voice would gradually became aloud and I cannot catch his meaning, on some extent because of his Indian accent. Or, maybe, his passion and excitement are due to that he is also compelled to attend this corner and that he had explain the similar questions numerous times, as the upper author said. However, tonight is a great night, because at least I have learned something that I have to learn to argue in English before I learn English well.
Saturday night I came to English corner with one of my classmates and that was my third time being there yet the first time I had been saved from being asked those stereotyped questions, since I joined a circle where there was an Indian who alleged to be a philosophy teacher. Over aged 60, with white mustache and a strong Indian accent, he came up with a question that whether the graduate student is an educated person at the beginning and asked the rest for their opinions. Some replied with yes, some said it depends. He explained to us his own definition of education and thought that education never stops, just as the famous saying goes, “never too old to learn”. Then he asked us what wisdom is and in his mind, it is to do thing you want and the way you like without following others, and just go out of the box.
Afterwards, he found one student had a pronunciation problem and offered to help him with it. Yet meantime he advised us to speak British English rather than American for it is not original and it draw a challenging voice out from the circle, “what is wrong with bike when you prefer to bicycle?” the old Indian man rebutted the young boy what he called the vehicle for children with 3 wheels. The young boy reply no and the alleged teacher said it was called tricycle and told him that was why he should speak the original “bicycle” rather than the American “bike”. But the boy responded that it was common to us by saying “bike” and there was no communication problem even without the original since culture and language are changing. Guess what? His words irritated the man and he insisted that the original is original, won’t change at all. Somewhat，both started challenged each other and their tones became emotionally tense. To my surprise, the man threw a question to the boy, “what is asshole used for?” and the boy replied “shit” directly and this moment the man, almost exploded, shouted at him by telling what the non-original “asshole” has resulted in (actually I had no idea what philosophy behind and how it was associated with the original culture. Afterward I was told that the man meant anal sex which he resented). The outcome was that each went his own way, hopefully not seeing one another again.
It had been supposed to be a great talk in English corner. I cannot judge who is right but I do hope that a harmonious environment could be created while there is a conversation.
For the first time , I came to English corner tonight , to my surprise , there were not many students in the pavilion , where I saw professor smoking , on his left side a group of students were talking happily , the laughter can be heard in the distance . when I came up to the pavilion , I found none of my classmates there , all were strange , which made me confused . Suddenly, four girls came into my eyes, OK, just join them, I said to myself. ‘Excuse me, may I join you?’ ‘Yes, nice to meet you ‘, and then, we started to talk with the follow questions, such as ‘what is your major? Where are you from? Which university do have you graduated? Have you been to the other campus of SYSU? Of course we introduced ourselves first , we talked happily and I found that I can speak more freely than before which made me happy , because of this I refused to come back when someone asked me to go together , I stayed there and changed three group of students . In the last group, I spoke with three beautiful girls who were from the major of Economy, their spoken English were excellent, but mine was not bad, either. It was really glad to come to English corner; l am looking for the next time on Wednesday.
Tonight I went to the English corner. I got there a litter late, so many people were already there, and was at the entrance of the pavilion and said “Good evening” to me. I responded and found one of my English classmates right away, so I join the conversation of their group. Because Professor Martin was behind us, I felt a little nervous to talk. But after we introduce ourselves, I used to the atmosphere to speak English. The other four students were all Professor’s “Red Hats”, so we talk about the interesting when the bought the fish and ate the egg. And we all show care for Professor’s cold and hope he will become better soon. We talk about the sport we like, the movie we had seen, and what was talked the longest was the experience of Professor Martin’s class. We share the “love” sentence without the “L” word, and the way to find a foreigner to complete the homework, everyone talked happily and naturally. I’m glad to attend the English corner tonight. Compared to the ABC day, it’s a better experience to me. And when I recall the saying “steel sharps steel”, I understand it deeper.
Today for me is really a special day. I have set a goal. That is today I must find a foreigner and make a friend with him. I think a lot of ways, or on the road to find, or English Corner, or to the student building. On the way to English Corner we really met the two foreigners, but we back, I began to doubt my courage. Later we went to the English corner, from a distance of 10 meters I saw Martin and many students there, I began to fear but also back, is my good friend encouraged me. Because of the way in to English Corner my friend and I have been speaking English, so when I arrived I can speak English with my classmates naturally, I have the lung power. But the beginning we could not find the theme to talk, then we started talking about the situation of the various provinces and our Guangzhou’s views. I have to admit that my English sucks, so do not know how many English expressions, I realized the gap, I am ashamed. Finally a handsome guy joined us. He said I am a bit shy, partly because I think it. I think his English is fluent. Finally I have the help of friends and the handsome guy came to the Chinese Corner, inside the classroom are foreigners, I started a little bit embarrassed, until towards the end of the activities I have not met a foreign friend, I said to myself, must be completed task, in their class when I finally worked up the courage and say hello to a foreigner, and we talked while walking, and finally I know he is British, I left his contact, I hope after today, the more we share and help each other and become good friends.
Finally I would like to say, today is very meaningful for me. I first went to the English Corner, once again sparked my desire to learn English. The other is I met new friends, a Chinese friend and a British friend. After today I will go to English Corner every Wednesday, I think it is a place where I get exercise, not only the exercise of my English, but also the exercise of my courage.
I had a wonderful Friday evening!
Actually I haven’t gone to the English Corner before in SUN YAT-SEN university. I think I had made a big mistake and missed lots of opportunities to improve my English. But fortunately, it’s not too late and I have made up my mind to participate the English Corner every week. We should appreciate Mr. Wolff for his help and good suggestion.
I took part in three group communications in the English Corner, where I made a lot of new friends. We covered a lot of topics, such as our majors, past experiences, funny stories in daily life and so on. A boy who was majoring in philosophy gave me a significant impression . His spoken English was not very good, but he told us he spent more than three hours to practice speaking English every day. He said sometimes the foreigners understood him perfectly, however his roommates always couldn’t follow him. I shared my benefits in CHINGLAND with him and told him that English is just a tool to communicate, it’s OK when the foreigners can understand you no matter what English you have used.
Another handsome boy who was from Henan province also impressed us. He was an excellent student I believe, because he had two majors in a time and won the scholarship every semester. What’s more, his oral English was very good. I learned a lot from him, for example, be confident when speaking English and say it slowly and clearly thus you can express your ideas smoothly. Do not pay too much attention to the grammar.
As a matter of fact, we not only had an English Corner but also had an English Room. When it was late at nine o’clock, we said goodbye to our new friends in the English Corner and went home. At this time, one of my classmates suggested us playing UNO together and we all thought it was a good idea. We went to the dormitory and played the cards. Before we began to play, some specific rules were set up, no Chinese words, no four-letter words and no words that were not related to the game. If anyone broke the rule, he would get a punishment of having a full cup of water to drink. It was very difficult to obey the rules all the time, sometimes we would shout using Chinese. Everyone got punishment during the game. Finally, we were all full of water and couldn’t even drink drops. Game was over, but the laughter still remained.
I had a very good time in English Evening. Sometimes we have no passion about something just because we never do it. Life is full of passion if you are ready to have a try.
Last night, I went to the English Corner which was held by our teacher. There I met a lot of boys and girls from every class of HOLISTIC ENGLISH. But since we hadn’t known each other a lot, I just chose to join a special group where all the students coming from the same class and that was also my class. Since we had already known each other for such a long time, we talked about everything freely without asking those tedious questions like name, hometown, school or work place and so on. We were easily getting into deeply communicating and talked so much about our personal stories, about which might be difficult for us to talk in the class, such as love stories, opinions about marriage, attitudes toward changing wives like changing taxis, career plans and so on. Since everyone wanted to know much about their friends or classmates, these topics were so interesting that everyone was eager to share his or her wonderful stories with others.
After about two hours’ discussion, we had known each other much better than before and practiced our Spoken English a lot.
I felt myself having gained a lot of profits from this talking. Besides, this was also the most interesting English Corner I had attended.
From this experience, I felt maybe if English corners could be held among acquaintances, people would gain more. Since acquaintances tend to have more to talk about and have more in common, which will significantly help them to talk more and have more deep talks.
What a wonderful English Corner it was!
I had to apology that I was late for the English Corner yesterday evening. I thought it began at 9 o’clock, but when my friend and I left library and went there, we found that there were only seven or eight persons in the Xing pavilion. We felt so disappointed and talked in English there for 10 minutes, and then we left. We decided to come here next week.
I’ve never been to English Corner, it was my first time to go there last night . I went there with my classmate, we decided to chat with one foreigner together, so that we would not be so afraid. When we arrived there, we found no foreigners, but the foreign teacher and all Chinese students, so we talked with classmates in English . We spoke English with the natives ,which in fact was a funny thing . We did not care mistakes, did not be nervous,just said what we wanted . Sometimes the English dialogue made us laugh impudently, and the atmosphere was very relaxed. Although our English communication had some difficulties, we tried to understand each other. In short, I felt pretty happy this time.
It was my first time to attend the English corner. It was interesting, I got there about 8 o’clock last night and sew many of my classmate who were also there to improve their oral English. After greeting them, I began to join a talk with a stranger. He was about 27 years old and a handsome guy. He told me that he was working in KPMG as an auditor. Though his office language was not English, he had many chances to use English in his work, so he usually came to the English Corner in to improve his oral English. After that, I met a France born Chinese who speaks English very well, so many of my classmates asked him for his number for the purpose of making friends with him.
The highlight of last night didn’t come until I began to play UNO with several classmates. As it was our English night, so we set some specific rules for this special night. We can speak no Chinese words and no four-letter words in the game. If anyone broke the rule, he would be punished to drink a full cup of water. Actually, it was so difficult to obey the rules all the time that everyone got punishment during the game. Finally, we were all full of water.
It was a wonderful night, we have only practice our English but also enjoy a happy night. I think I will usually go to the English corner as it is interesting and useful.
After the practice of singing, I went to the English corner with my friends. For we came there a little later, there were not as many people as before. I found some of my classmates talking with a guy, so I joined them. The guy graduated from this university and now worked as an auditor in KPMG. He was nice and we had a good time together. Then we changed to another group. People in this group surrounded a guy and the guy in the middle was very lofty. He gave me a bad impression. He said he was from France. For Martin had given us a homework to pick up with foreigners and get their phone number, I thought about getting his number. But at last the guy made me feel uncomfortable and I didn’t talk to him.
After leaving the English corner, we went to Jacky’s dormitory and played UNO with English. It was interesting and we all had a good time.
Yesterday evening , I went to the South lawn pavilion at 7:00 . At that time I saw some students there and I join one of the groups to pratice my English. In this group there are 7 students, some of them came from school of Chinese , some of them were from school of business, and some from school of education. We started to talk with each other about the topic “tourism”, we described the experience that we had when we took our trip.I told them the story I visited HaiNan island in July last year . Hainan is a hot, tropical island. Unlike other well-known tropical resorts on the tourist route, we can still find bargains there, especially in some of the more remote areas of the island.
Actually I have found that English Corner is not only to practice your English skills ,but also a good place to meet new friends. When I went to English Corner yesterday， I came across a variety of students from different department of our university， who all had one thing in common； that is they wanted to communicate in English. So the atmosphere was relaxing.The time is quite funny as we talking something interesting. So next week, I will go to the English corner to communicate with other people .
It was my first time to attend the English Corner so I look forward to it very much.At five to 7 pm,my two classmates and I went for it together .when we arrived at the South lawn pavilion, surprisingly ,nobody was there ,so we just moved to the “xing ting”.Oh yes ,they were talking happily there.there were about 50 persons ,that is to say about 8 groups . First,I just did not know how to start ,so we three started to talk in english about the weather and hobbies,then there came a gentleman and said he wanted to join in us . He felt very surprised because the english corner always hold every Wednesday ,but this time so many people gathered and it was Friday .he introduced himself and his oral English was so great ,and he asked whether it was our first time ,we were just curious because he was right,because he said we looked a little confused and shy,then he continued and we knew that he had graduated from school of Lingnan and worked for almost two years .And he said he attended English corner every Wednesday to practice English ,that was why his English was so excellent,also he advised us to attend English corner .then he asked what we thought of our Professor Martin,we just expressed our opinions ,he thought he approved of Professo Martin’s suggestion about English learning and applauded it very though he had never seen Professor Martin.then he offered some good suggestions about all aspects such as job.we were so appreciated him and made up our mind to keep attending English corner every Wednesday from then on.it was so wonderful and a good way to make new friends and practicing english, I enjoyed It very much.
I went to the English corner at the South lawn pavilion, on Friday night. In fact, this is my first time to attend such activities.
At the beginning, I felt it very interesting, since there were so many students talking and laughing there. But after a while, it turned out to be a bit boring. Not only because they are asking and answering the same questions again and again, but also because there is simply not a single foreigner there! Besides, I cannot find a people I know. So I just attend a group of people, speak a few sentences and leave. The whole process takes about 30 minutes.
Maybe, I will go to the English corner for a second time, but only with my friends and foreigners.
Friday night, the end of weekdays, a little bit chilly outside. I speeded myself, heading for the pavilion. Actually it’s a my second time here and I bet, chances are fat for me to meet more fellows that we have one thing in common, we’re Martin’s students and treasure this moment of exchanging ideas while having fun. Circles scattered and commonly a scale of more than five students, which is a little bit HUGE as to go deeper in the nature of conversation. First I had a causal chat with two fellows from Ningnan, quite a warming up that sustained for only a few minutes. Then I came to a group of people flocked at the entrance of the stairs with two RED CAPs so glaring, happen to find that they are all from my center. Then we’ve been discovering interesting topics of Martin’s taxi theory, our philosophy towards love and practical issues of internship experiences and such and such. During my undergraduate periods, I’ve been an initiative or to say, organizer of the English corner in my university. Always there’ll be expected casual debates of a specific topic, or little scale of 3-4 students in a circle of casual talk, which means more fun and chances of opening our mouth and twisting our tongues. What’s funny is that once there’s a foreigner joining in, students in the CORNER would possibly rearranged in a way that the foreigner turn out to be a SPEAKER in the middle with POPULAR boring questions like “where are you from?” or “do you like china?”, weird huh? To me, I identify greatly with the “steel sharpens steel” theory and I’m not inclined to turn to a foreigner so earnestly like most of others, since I’m having fun my Chinese fellows in topics we are jointly interested.
English corner are very universal in many Chinese school.This Friday ,I went to English corner with excited mood,because this was my first time.
When I arrived there,I found there were many people having been there.But most of them were Chinese students.What’s more,there were many our classmates also be there.
It took me about thirty minutes to finish my first experience of English corner.Actually,I didn’y speak English too much and I just had conversation with my several classmates. We discussed some topics,eg “marry” or “single”.
I hope I can conversation with foreigner or other college students.Maybe next time I can.
It was my first time to join an English corner. Actually, I was expecting for a foreign friend there so that I could finish my homework when it seemed to be too hard to stop a stranger on the road. So it was a little disappointed for me when I found there were all our classmates. However, it became a wonderful time soon after we sincerely talked to each other in English, which gave us an unusual feeling of communicating and helped us to learn more what we had little chance to know during each one’s busy days. We also get more familiar to those classmates who might be only ‘hello’ friends before. We discussed the hot topics of different subjects and the differences between different stand points of the same subject; we exchanged interesting stories on different classes which we were not in at the same time; we made suggestions to each other where we could go to enjoy the special delicious food in Guangzhou; and the like. It was delightful to see the round of the talkers growing bigger. We also discussed how to finish the tough homework in the end. Totally speaking, I gained more than I expected.
First, I want to say I attended the English corner very little before Friday. I think that my oral English is very poor. I don’t have the courage to speak English with others. I am very worried that they will make fun of me. Precisely speaking, I dare not go to the first step. However, I was successful on Friday. When I got there, I saw many students were speaking English very loudly. I worked up the courage to say hello to one of the students. Just like what the professor said in the article, we only talk about some simple English. After a while, we were silent and did not know what to say. I only looked for another partner. What I said was similar to what I said previously. Although that, I learned a lot from the English corner. I dare to try to speak English at last. I will continue to go to the English corner and make efforts to improve my English.
I attended the English Corner tonight and it’s really an unforgettable experience for me. When I went into the South lawn pavilion, I was surprised to find so many strange faces since I thought the participators would be all from Lingnan College. I took a round and happened to find a discussion group from my college, so I joined them. Although we knew each other, we didn’t know what to say so that conversation was full of awkward silences. At that time, a girl came to join us and broke the ice. We are all curious when she mentioned she wasn’t a student of SYSU but Guangzhou University, and stick to attend the English corner from every Wednesday evening from University Town to this campus, and was excited to find there was another English corner tonight. We admired her determination and had no doubt that her oral English is so good although her school is not as good as SYSU. We had a pleasant chat with her, and just at that time I realize talking with strangers is more interesting that you don’t need to find a topic intentionally. A few minutes later another girl came to join us and said that she is also a frequenter here and was always the last one to leave. I felt shame as it’s my first time here and even didn’t know our English corner is so famous. Actually, it’s a good plat for practicing English, so when we ready to leave, we even found a father was convincing his daughter who seemed to be a high school student to talk to us in English. Now I no longer treat it as a task but a good practice fro oral English.
Last Friday night ,I went to the English corner. However, I fould only a few students. And most of them are the asistants. They knew each other and had a good talk. I wasn’t a asistant.I found it was a little hard for me to join their talking and I soon left away.
In fact, I sometimes go to the English corner which is held every Wednesday night. And I usually have a good chat with people there even though we all stranger to each other. In my opinion ,Going to the English corner is a good way to practise your oral English. When you speak English with other people bravely, you defeat your trepidation of English.
It is the first time I went to the English Corner on Friday. I have never been there before for as I think my English is little bit poor. This time I have to face the music so I went there with my roommates. At first, I feel a bit nervous to speak English in front of many people; especially I was not confident in my poor English. I just joint some groups to talk about some simple topic which covered our majors, spare time, and hobby and so on. Also it occurred to me that there are lots of words that I couldn’t express precisely or sometimes I know the meanings but fail to speak it out. Additionally, what’s important is that it becomes much easier if I take the first step. Later I found that a language needs to practice everyday to get a well communication with other persons and agree with the methods and demands made by our teachers.
I went to English corner last Friday night, which was the first time I attended to. Frankly speaking, I found it boring, for most of the time we just kept introducing ourselves. When I joined the group, I introduced myself, and other people in my group introduced themselves one by one. Several minutes later, someone new came in, and we repeated introducing ourselves again. I was not shame to speak English myself, and I tried to find something else to discuss. But it seemed to be a failure to do so because it was interrupted again and again by the new comer and the repetitive and endless introduction.
I went to English Corner last Friday evening,i met some classmates and some students whom i didn’t know before such as Jack (Chinese department),David (Educational department).We talk various topics,such as movies,love,hobby ,dancing.Jack was fond of dancing,but i don’t like it at all.” will hane a try about it ,if i have spare time”I promise Jack.
David is a little shy in English Corner,he did not speak much.I called him a “good listener”.
I also talked with some girl(maybe lady)on Chinglish,That’s very interesting.
I have to mention that,when I arrived at English Corner,Professor Martin give me a warm greeting,and had a handshake with me.
EDITOR’S NOTE: DO YOU KNOW WHAT A CORER IS?
“Over the years I have attended enough English Corers to know that it is better to avoid them like you would avoid SARS, they make me sick. ”
THE passage above is quoted from your artical.I want to tell you ,you made a spelling mistake in the first line.THAT SHOUD BE “ENGLISH Corners” instead of “English Corers “
As a person from a shame making culture, one usually felt embarrassed to speak English outside the English class or in some circumstance we thought unnecessary. English corner supplied people a platform to use English in practice.
I used to go to English corner in the first two years of university. I considered it as a good chance to make new friends, especially foreign friends. However, actually most of the time we talked with Chinese because there were not enough foreigners for so many Chinese students with the same mind of talking with a native English speaker, and each time, when we found one, there usually had been a crowd around him/her, and what we could do was only listening. So we usually talked with Chinese students in English corner. We usually chose the topics we were familiar with and had less difficulty in expressing ourselves, such as which association were you from and what activities did you operate, what was the impact. In fact, I did made so many friends as expectation through the English corner, because each time when we wanted to discussed deeper, we could not use language to expound our views skillfully. Now I found it is better for us to discuss something with our close friends or familiar classmates because the high context will help us to understand each other and we can continue our talk easily. When we met something unknown, it is natural for us to look it up in the dictionary so that we also learned some new words.
Last Friday I went to the English corner partly because of the professor’s homework, furthermore, I have never been there before, and really want to have a look. That night we got the pavilion with the discovery that we were all Chinese, none of us were foreigners. From that time, I had been worried about my homework. And the frustrating story just began. When we talked with our classmates about the population and different customs in our hometowns, there was a strange boy who wanted to plug in with love. He said “why not to talk about the romance, I think we are here to find our own romance”, then he said to my male classmates “what’s your conditions for a girlfriend?” We all felt embarrassed at this question, so nobody answered. He tried again regardless of the others antipathy, “Are they your targets?” he asked my classmate with a finger pointed at me and my roommate. I was really infuriated by his behavior and reluctant to talk again. Few minutes later, I went back to my dormitory with other disappointed girls.
Actually, it is a wonderful night I have spent in the English Corner last Friday.
Because of something important, I was late for the beginning of the English Corner. But I know that the door to learn something will never be closed if I have a learning heart. I arrive at the corner at about 8:00pm. Thanks gods, there were still many students in that place. I joined the brother Po’s group. What we talked about didn’t make sense because I had opened mouth during the discussion.
The meaningful things happened when Lily introduced his two friends to us. One was an foreign friend from France, the other was her fellow men. I showed great interesting to her fellow men. He was a guy who worked in PwC. You know this is a great company for us. I told him that I may find a job in a foreign company, but the English was an obstacle for me to enter the company. He encouraged me that I should go to English Corner more often. By the way, he told me that he went to the English Corner every Wednesday even when he was on the job. I felt guilty at that time because I didn’t go to the English Corner even if I had so much time. He also told me that, in his company he didn’t have to use English on the dairy work even though the official language of his company is English. He also gave me courage by saying that just relax and be yourself when you have an interview with the foreign company so that I would succeed. We also talked about the consulting firms. We talked the life of volunteer. It was a pleasure to have a deep talk with him. It was a pity that I forgot to ask his name and E-mail for further connection. But I know that we can talk more in the future.
After the English Corner, I spent the rest of night with my classmates to playing the UNO. It was different from the former playing because we used English during the game. It was interesting even though we didn’t speak fluently at the beginning. Anyone would get a punishment if he/she speaks Chinese instead of English. So everyone obeyed the rule throughout the game. I dare to say that these were some kinds of thinking in English and speaking in English. During the game we were supposed to have quick mind, so we didn’t have the time to think in Chinese when we all heard English. I also was a judge of the game. I must mention that thinking in English was more important for me. I should pay much more attention to the game than the others, and listen carefully to the others.
Well, after all,it was a wonderful night I have spent. It is worth memorized.
Well, I came to the English Corner that night, and came across several students from Chinese Department. At first, we told each other some jokes, to make the circumstance much easier and comfortable. Then, I told them a movie I had watched the last night. It was a true story about a Chinese student lived in Canada. During the study time, he came across several girls, but every time he felled in love, they broke up. Because girls like to marry to rich men, no matter how old they are. As a result, the poor young man did not believe in love again, and in order to live in Canada legally, he marries to a local Canada girl. It was a tragedy, so we talked about the love and belief of life. Finally, I found my classmates and went to them to say hello, they told me there would be a new exhibition in the Guangdong Art museum. I really enjoy the English Corner this time, because I not only recognized new friends but also got the information of exhibition.
That’s the first time I took part in English Corner on last Friday Night in my postgraduate study life. Well, something happened like my thought, such as introduce ourselives and most of time we should use simple word to describe our meaning. The process sometimes boring. But if you foucus on one person, talk about something deeply you will find it’s very interesting and the results often out of your surprise. One case was the first boy I meet on Friday night, he came from Chinese department and learnt contemporary literature. We talked about youth writers in China, and he sent his opinion on them. To me, that’s a good experience to learn academic view.
After talking with him, I changed other group they came from Lingnan College. Three girls have different thoughts on the English Corner, one of them just wanted to practise english, but other guys wanted to friend some handsome boys, so sometimes I was a “useless” or “redundant”during them. Fortunately, one of them is assisstant of Class 3, so we have same experience on telephone call. She said one time when she call a lady in english, the lady answered her in Chinese all the time and final question was “ Can I pass the text?”, so she has to answer “How do you think? You speak Chinese to me from the beginning.” And I also shared my experience to her, one time I called wrong number and the opposite side spoke vulgar Cantonese “Gweilo” to me.That’s funny.
I left English corner at 8:30 pm, at that time I found there were so many students in the pavilion. So I thought that was successful activity for students to practise their english, meanwhile promote their barve and ability!
Last Friday, I attended the English corner. I have participated in English corner several times before, so it had nothing special that day. I arrived there in time; there were some students there already. Though I wanted to practice my oral English, I didn’t like to find some one talk to me until a lovely girl came to me and introduced her to me. I think English corner is a good place to practice English, but for me, I’m always to shame to speak a word loudly. This is an important problem in my English study.
Last Friday I attended the English Corner. This is my first experience English Corner, and I didn’t know what people would do in the English Corner before. After attending the English Corner this time, I just want to say: “Wow, it’s wonderful!”
When I arrive at the Xing Pavilion, there had been many students there. I saw some of my classmate there, and then I joined their group. Our group had about 10 members to start with, most were from philosophy department as me, and the others were from anthropology department. When I joined in our group, my classmate asked me:” What’s your name?” I said: “My name is Paul, and I am from philosophy department.” “Paul? Did you just come from Rwanda?” Every member in our group laughed. “No. It was just coincidence that I have a same name of him.” After my introduction of myself, another student introduced himself, too. He is from anthropology department. Then we spoke freely, discussed some questions just like “Are you busy these days?” ”Why were you so busy?” Etc. Soon we felt a little boring because we can hardly think of any interesting topic. Then two girls from anthropology left our group. I regret their leaving but I can’t do nothing to remedy.
But after a while two new girls and two new boys joined our group. Two girls were from Lingnan College, and two boys were from logic major in our department. The two girls burned with curiosity about our majors. They asked my classmates, who majored in science of religion, a string of questions. “Do you believe in Buddhism?” “No, I’m not. I don’t have religious belief now. I choose Buddhism as my research direction only because I am interesting in it. ” “Will it interfere with your study? If you study religion, but you don’t have a religious belief, it just like that you want to see what is inside the wall but you stand outside the wall.” “Well, there are two directions in religion study. Some people will consider religion as a belief, and some people will consider religion as knowledge. They are different. But both of them are practicable.” “Is it better that if the learner has a religious belief?” “It’s up to you.” The two girls’ spoken English are very good. They not only expressed themselves in English well, but also had beautiful intonation and pronunciation. After asking questions to my classmates majored in science of religion, they went to talk to my classmates majored in Logic. The boys who were from logic major had good English speaking, too. So their conversation was light and gay.
When the girls from Lingnan College were talking with my classmates majored in logic, I was talking with the girl whose research direction was Buddhism and the girl whose major was similar to mine. We discuss some questions about Buddhism, just like why some Buddhist members can get married, the difference between the Buddhist members who were married and the common people, the difference between the Buddhism in China and the Buddhism in Japan was the Buddhism research in Japan more advanced then in China, etc.
The English Corner activities of our group lasted about one hour. Then we left Xing Pavilion and went to have a drink. The English Corner activities sparked my interest in improving my English. I am strongly desirous that one day I can express myself freely, too.
Last Friday, when I got to the English corner, it had been lots of students there. I joined a group immediately, because I found one of the members was my classmate. After a short self-introduction, we talked about our majors. I found that except my classmate Linda and me, others were all major in philosophy. They were curious in our fieldwork, which is seemed as the symbol of anthropology. However, we have not much interest in common. So the chat became boring, and we divided into two groups. One was taking about the ex-change program, and the other was talking about the post-graduate thesis. I was in the thesis-group. We mentioned the details about open article, and the information about the thesis oral defense last year. That was the most valuable thing of the Friday’s English corner.
Tonight was amazing. After practicing singing, I went to the English Corner with my classmates. As it was raining, we were wondering whether there would still be some people at the corner. And I was touched by the scene when I saw there were still many people there. So we just emboldened ourselves to join them.
We encountered a crowd of Chinese students standing around a foreigner. He was sitting at the stone fence at the Xing Pavilion. The old man in the center was speaking with high spirits while the students around were listening with full attention. But it confused me whether they would improve their oral English if they did not open their mouths. Listening was one thing, while speaking was another.
Then we came across a man in middle age. He spoke very good English and we even took him as a foreigner. But he said he was a local. He also praised that our accents and pronunciation were good. What was amazing was that he could even figure out our majors from our accent!
Another person we met was a handsome boy from Thailand. He was studying Chinese in our university. We all were very excited when we found that he had experienced so many things at his early age. He had been to U.S. for ten years before college and he had visited many places in China within the two years he arrived here. What touched me most was his determination to work so hard all the way to fulfill his dream.
Tonight I found English Corner to be an amazing place. You would never know who you were going to meet and what they would bring to you. I could learn a lot in this place, not only English, but also the people I encountered.
On April 16 night,my friend and I went to the English corner,When we had arrivaled,there were many stumdents in the corter.Most of them are our English professor’s students.Of couse,we had knowed each other before.Quickly,we found several partners to chat.we just talked about our study,our life and what we had done in the past week.we also exchanged our methods of English study.In a short,we chated and laughed.Maybe it is a good experience for us to improve our oral English.But what I want to say is that If there were some foreign students,the English conversation would be better.If like that,we would not only execise our English,but also can make communicate with foreigners in English.so we can really be in the English environment.I think this would be more attractive for us.
English corner usually leaves me good impression in my campus life. I remembered the first time I went there was the first year in the university. I just went there to accompany my roommate to practice my oral English, but the experience aroused my interest in English because I found that putting my English knowledge into practice is so interesting and useful, I really recognized that I can talk in English but not just read English. From then on, I came to believe that I can speak English well by more and more practice. I have got to know that what you learned is not yours while what you say and use is really yours.
I feel very sorry to hear about this and also I totally agree with you! Professor has got the key point. In most of college in China, the English Corner is just the form just like other activities in China, we can’t use it completely. I attended the English Corner in my college time, I still remember that we circle around and hear a girl singing the song, after that, everybody find their fellow to talk about something, I don’t know whether they communicate with each other in English. And then, time’s over and we are back to our dormitory. You know, I didn’t speak anything and didn’t communicate with anyone although I desired to.
Well, to be honest, I still hope the English Corner can be the best place to improve our English.
We have spent almost ten years in English learning, but almost find that they can’t communicate with people fluently when they graduated from school. And also, I face the same situation. What a pity! So ,I think it is not me but most of us need the help.
Last night was so important to me that I decided to join the English corner every week after I came back from it, which made me so excited. I enjoyed a lot in the English corner holding in the “xingting” every wednesday in SYSU. I have heard of it for a long time, but I do not ever try to join it before which is a kind of loss for me.
Originally, I went there on purpose for two reasons. Firstly, to complete my homework of my oral English class, secondly, to encourage myself to move forward to better my oral English. It turns out to be interesting. I took steps to the xingting, and there were already quite a few people here. Two or three people were talking together, some discussing in groups. I had no ideas what they were talking about, walked around a few steps and scanned the whole scene. I found a girl sat on the railing alone, then I carefully walked up to her and said “Excuse me, may I have a talk with you, please?” She looked at me and said with smile “OK.” After a brief self-introduction, we got some idea of each other. Most of the rest time, I listened her talk about her work related to securities which interested me. Having had the little practice with her, I felt more confidence to talk with strangers. Afterwards, I met with two men. one is working in HSBC, and the other is graduated from chemical college in SYSU. In addition, a foreign student came from India. We carried on a pleasant conversation, and it seemed not so difficult for me to speak English.
Last week, I went to the English Saloon. Because the weather was not so good, there were less people than before. As I could see, there were only about 20 people. First there was a game, I though it was not interesting, so few people engaged in this game. Then we began the free talk part. I joined a group. The people in the group were all from different field. There were four persons that already have had their own work. However their work was different too. One worked in foreign companies. One person worked in the government organization. One of them worked in commercial bank. There was also one person who worked as an administration teacher in Sun Yat-Sun University. I learned a lot from their working experiences. I met two students also from Lingnan College. They are going to graduate this summer. We talked a lot about how to choose a offer between state-owned companies and foreign companies. They analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of these two types of companies. After all, I had an interesting and useful experience in this English Saloon.
I went to English corner last Friday. Believe it or not, it is my first time to English corner. Therefore, I could not be sure of the exact location of English corner. But don’t worry; I saw the red caps when I went out of library. I came up to the classmates around there, to my surprise, I saw a girl who was a classmate when I was in high school! I didn’t know she became the student here now. She told me after the study in Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, she passed the examination, and became a student of Lingnan College here. She introduced the other three classmates there, all came from different departments. We talked about our experiences in English corner, even the topic about Xinghai choral festival. Unfortunately, I had to attend an activity at 20:00, so I had to leave with only thirty minutes’ stay there. However, it is an interesting place for us to practice oral English; I will go to English corner as frequently as possible in the future.