Have you ever wanted to learn another language, say Japanese or French or Spanish? I started and stopped and started again trying to learn conversational Spanish. The online tool I was using was fun and easy to navigate, it even awarded badges for meeting certain milestones. Then I began to put myself into the shoes of non-English speaking folks, and asked myself, “How does someone learn to speak and understand a language as complex as English, let alone comprehend all the nuances, punctuation, grammar, hyperbole, spelling, the ins and outs?” With that thought in mind, I summarily stopped trying to learn conversational Spanish...again.
If English is that hard (and I am immersed in it every day), how frustrated must others be who are trying to learn it? Take this example, for example: “Present, Present, Presence, and Prescience”. Putting all four words together to convey a single thought might look like this:
“Thomas was to present his findings to the investigative team in the presence of his superiors. At the conclusion of the presentation, the team presented him with a present in appreciation of his hard work. If only he had had the prescience of the positive response he would receive in the present, he would have presented much sooner.”
English is hard and there are online tools to help you learn to speak it conversationally. The written word can be a bit trickier, but there is help out there for that, too.Take this example, for example: Fresh Eyes Proofreaders. Enough said.
