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Tell me what’s wrong with my English | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| tornus Diglot GroupieRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4952 days ago 82 posts - 113 votes  Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish, Swedish, Danish | Message 1 of 8 28 April 2011 at 6:01pm | IP Logged |
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I've recorded myself and I have uploaded on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BnShFX7f20 please help me, I've to take the TOEFL test soon and I'm not ready yet. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| JasonE Groupie Canada Joined 4879 days ago 54 posts - 78 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 2 of 8 28 April 2011 at 6:41pm | IP Logged |
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Are you reading from a script or are you making this up as you go along?
If you're not using a script I'd say you're doing pretty good. There are a few slight errors, but overall your English is pretty good. I don't know what is required for the TOEFL, so I'll let others comment on how far you have to go yet. You've got a strong french accent, but I don't consider that a bad thing so long as the rest of your English is good. I had a teacher from India in one of my classes this past term, and although he had an indian accent, he had an excellent hold on the English language, so much so that I would say that he likely knows the formal rules of English better than I do. He may have grown up bilingually with English, but he still had a noticeable accent. The accent however didn't matter at all once I realized that his English was so good. If you really want to lessen your french accent, you'll have to make a focused effort to do so. I have an uncle that moved here to English speaking Canada from France nearly 30 years ago, and he still have a strong french accent. He is surrounded by English, but he hasn't tried to change his accent. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5190 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 3 of 8 28 April 2011 at 7:40pm | IP Logged |
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Je t'encouragerais -- pour l'oral à tout le moins -- à te concentrer tout d'abord sur l'accent tonique des mots et des phrases. Tu utilises souvent le mauvais accent et c'est un détail qui déstabilise facilement l'auditeur. Essaie aussi d'éviter de dire "euh" trop souvent; ce petit détail pourrait faire une grosse différence immédiatement, avec peu d'efforts.
Généralement, on a arrive bien à te comprendre et tu te débrouilles très bien, y a pas de doute, mais je dirais qu'il y a encore beaucoup plus de travail à faire au niveau de la prononciation. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5184 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 4 of 8 29 April 2011 at 3:05am | IP Logged |
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I think your English is very good. You do have a strong accent, but it did not interfere at all with my ability to understand you (and, frankly, I wondered if what I was noticing was that maybe you have a British accent due to studying British English?). I do suggest that you practice pronouncing words that start with H. All things considered, I think your English is quite good. Good luck
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| tornus Diglot GroupieRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4952 days ago 82 posts - 113 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish, Swedish, Danish | Message 5 of 8 29 April 2011 at 10:01am | IP Logged |
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Thanks!
JasonE > I'm making this up on-the-fly Accent is hard to lessen indeed. Lately, when I listen to English, I try to repeat it with the same intonation, I think it'll help. Arekkusu> Oui j'ai du mal avec les accents tonique, il faut que je travaille ça! on dit qu'en français l'accent tonique est toujours à la fin, c'est surement pour ça. James29> I'm studying British English at school and my teacher has a strong British accent (he doesn't like US at all and love UK) but in my everyday life I listen mainly to american media. So my accent should be a mixture of french, american and british ! and H are silent in French, so this is why I tend to forget to pronounce it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 newyorkeric Diglot Moderator Singapore Joined 6188 days ago 1598 posts - 2174 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Mandarin, Malay Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 8 29 April 2011 at 11:07am | IP Logged |
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Please include a translation so that everyone can understand your posts.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| tornus Diglot GroupieRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4952 days ago 82 posts - 113 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish, Swedish, Danish | Message 7 of 8 29 April 2011 at 12:12pm | IP Logged |
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I just told Arekkusu I have problems with stressing. I heard in french stresses are always at the end of the word, it's likely why I have problems with those in English.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| NickJS Senior Member United Kingdom flickr.com/photos/sg Joined 4768 days ago 264 posts - 334 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 8 of 8 29 April 2011 at 4:39pm | IP Logged |
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Your English is very good in terms of the way you grasp the correct words for the correct
situation, the only error I noticed was you had to repeat yourself in some cases on certain words, but that is not problem at all, even I mispronounce sometimes if I feel I cannot put enough emphasis on a word. I noticed above that you stated about the stresses being different, which is rather noticeable when you talk due to the light nature of your voice, but as previously said that is due to your strong French accent, but it isn't that bad, maybe just focus a little more on this. Edited by NickJS on 29 April 2011 at 4:40pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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