Is my way of talking giving my teachers the wrong impression that I "know" my grammar and vocabulary?

Question

For some reason, teachers from one educational institution are getting the impression that my English is pretty good judging by the way I speak to my teacher. I'm now a 21-year-old who still hasn't assimilated the English language due to the lack of English education in my primary/secondary school years.




I am trying to look for that English component that allows me to understand what I'm reading and what helps me to differentiate between a verb, noun, proverb, adjective, pronoun, contraction, etc. I was actively denied this in my primary/secondary school years as a student, which only made learning much more difficult than it should.

Answer 1

There is a difference between BICS (Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills) and CALP (Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) What I think you're saying is that you have good BICS, and people are assuming from that that you have the academic language needed for school work.

Now- learning to name the parts of speech will NOT help you comprehend what you're reading. Reading is a skill that is developed through practice. You need to do a lot of reading of gradually more difficult material. Academic texts contain a lot of sentence with noun clauses, adjective clauses and adverb clauses. The sentence contain a lot of complex references and comparisons. Learning ABOUT grammar does not help you to comprehend those texts. Only practice can do that. You can look for advance ESL classes, or you can just do a lot of reading on your own.

Answer 2

Ever considered being responsible for yourself or like Old Bludger that is a bridge too far.

Answer 3

I'm now a 21-year-old who still hasn't assimilated the English language due to the lack of English education in my primary/secondary school years.



MOST on the planet learn to use about 30,000 or less of 180,000 words of the English language.

The average person uses about 20,000 of the words.

You can communicate most things with learning about 5,000 words.

A technical/academic type might use about 60,000 or about one third of the words in the language.

Words special to their field of expertise.



I am trying to look for that English component that allows me to understand what I'm reading and what helps me to differentiate between a verb, noun, proverb, adjective, pronoun, contraction, etc.

MEMORIZATION

There is no list of rules for what you seek for all words all sentence possible word arrangements.

As general rule the position of each word in relation to each other determines the details.



proverb is not the word you are wanting.

Auxiliary verb is more likely the term you are searching.

The principal ones are be, do, and have they help to form the various tenses, moods, and voices of other verbs.

I AM reading a book now.

I WILL read the book tomorrow.

I DID read the book yesterday.

I WAS reading the book yesterday when you phoned me.





hasn't assimilated the English language To be correct when writing has not is written out. The contraction is the spoken verbal sound.

Assimilated is not the best choice of word.



comprehend

grasp

understand

Would be three better word choices to use for this situation.

Get over your detailing minutia MOST only use and understand less than 20 % of ALL English language words.



MOST never learn all twelve standard tenses of a verb.from a book or in the classroom.

Simple Present

Present Perfect

Present Continuous

Present Perfect Continuous

Simple Past

Past Perfect

Past Continuous

Past Perfect Continuous

Simple Future

Future Perfect

Future Continuous

Future Perfect Continuous



There are some more complex ones Passive verbs for example.



There are many many different DIALECTS of English in use around the world. Words can have a different meaning depending where you are on the planet.

Word choice and word order is just different place to place. NO SET RULES it is just something you learn by using.and memorizing the many subtle exceptions to the general most of the time rules.



"Appearances can be deceptive". Is an English proverb.

"Don't sweat the small stuff". Is another one for your situation.



"If at first you don't succeed try, try and try again" Also a proverb.

Answer 4

In adult education classes, sometimes offered at a local community college or an adult school within the local school district, you can get what you're looking for. They call them ESL (English as a Second Language) classes.