Email Service Notes (Jesse)
Your Original Email
Dear Jesse,
It was great to talk to you yesterday. The evaluation for my English level was very helpful. Thanks a lot. Yesterday you asked me why I wanted to improve my English, in fact I don’t have a clear goal such as taking IELTS test or going abroad, etc. I just hope that I can use the language to communicate with other people and express my points of view clearly whenever I need it. One can never know what will happen in the future, so I need to get well prepared.
Yesterday you told me my problem is vocabulary, I was totally agreed with you. Could you give me some advice to improve my vocabulary, please? I have tried lots of ways to recite words such as reading vocabulary books and using words Apps, but the effects are not so good. The problem is that even I could remember the meaning of a word, I still could not recall it and use it when I spoke English, I would still use the word which I had learnt in high school. The other reason is these methods are so boring, they make me exhausted and sleepy.
Anyway, it’s lucky for me to find Smart English, I think the way you teach English may really help me find my weak points and improve my English. I’m looking forward to the future study.
Best regards,
Jill
Your Edited Email
Dear Jesse,
It was great to talk to you yesterday. The evaluation of my English level was very helpful so thanks a lot. Yesterday you asked me why I wanted to improve my English, but in fact I don’t have a clear goal such as taking IELTS or going abroad, etc, I just hope that I can use the language to communicate with other people and to express my points of view clearly, whenever I need to. One can never know what will happen in the future, so I need to get well prepared.
Yesterday you told me my problem is vocabulary, which I totally agree with. Could you give me some advice on how to improve my vocabulary, please? I have tried lots of ways to learn words such as reading vocabulary books and using word Apps, but I have never found it to be effective. The problem is that even though I can remember the meaning of a word, I still cannot recall it and use it when I speak English, so I still use the words that I learned in high school. The other reason is these methods are so boring, so they make me exhausted and sleepy.
Anyway, it’s lucky for me that I found Smart English. I think the way you teach English may really help me find my weak points and improve my English and I’m looking forward to my future studies.
Best regards,
Jill
Hi Jill,
Thanks for your lovely email – it was really nice to read and hear your thoughts on our service.
So, the reason you’re going back to the words that you learned when you were at school, is that you are most comfortable with these words and are totally familiar with them. This means that learning new vocabulary by reading vocab books or using apps is never going to help because the new words will never be as familiar as the old ones are.
The way we fix this is by getting you to speak and write about topics that you are familiar with, and suggesting new words that you can use next time, talking about these new words, and then asking you to use them in your next piece of writing or speaking. The most important part of this process is that you continue to speak and write about familiar topics until you do not make simple grammar mistakes and are able to use different words for the same thing. It’s a slow process compared to memorizing words to use in tests, but it is more permanent so you won’t forget the words soon after learning them.
Once you have become very familiar with the new words, you will start using them naturally instead of using your old vocabulary from high school.
Just remember these few points:
1. Review your notes as often as possible.
2. Use the words we have taught you in your speaking & writing
3. Find new words for things you are very familiar with – then use them!
4. Use English with us at least 3-4 times every week.
If you do these things, you will improve quickly 🙂