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Need help form English and German people!


Koala

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Hello! I didn't know where to post this and finally I post it here, I think is the best place.

Well, I'm from Spain and I've been studying English for nearly 6 years. Last Christmas I took the FCE (First Certificate by Cambridge) and now I don't know what to do.

What should I do, keep studying English and go to the Advance level or just keep reading and stufying on my own or should I start with German?

I've always wanted to learn some other language but will I forget English?

 

And how is it seen to have the FCE in England?:wink3:

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I'm neither English nor German, but here's what I think.

 

When you've reached a certain level in a language it's certainly possible to continue studying it on your own. It might even be easier and better because you can decide for yourself what you want to learn or get better at. The most important thing to remember is that you only really learn a language when you are using it. So you could keep your English up to date by reading books, watching movies, using the internet (writing on English message boards etc.) and probably most importantly: continue speaking in English. That can be challenging because you don't live in an English speaking country, but in my experience it's the most important part of really knowing a language. However, a disadvantage could be that you have to do everything yourself so you need to have enough motivation and there's no one correcting you or telling you when you're learning or doing something wrong.

 

To be honest, I don't think an FCE is all that useful because it's not really a high level certificate. So it doesn't prove much. For example: if you apply for university in the UK almost all of them require at least CAE (or alternatively CPE), depending on the university. So if you really want to have a relevant certificate in English, I think you should try for CAE or TOEFL. I took CAE and it isn't difficult at all. But then again, they're just pieces of paper so I wouldn't value them too highly.

 

As for the English/German part I couldn't give you any real advice. If you want to learn more languages, go for German and if you want to improve your English skills further, go for English. I guess the advantage of choosing German is that you can continue to learn both languages if you choose to.

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I'm neither English nor German, but here's what I think.

 

When you've reached a certain level in a language it's certainly possible to continue studying it on your own. It might even be easier and better because you can decide for yourself what you want to learn or get better at. The most important thing to remember is that you only really learn a language when you are using it. So you could keep your English up to date by reading books, watching movies, using the internet (writing on English message boards etc.) and probably most importantly: continue speaking in English. That can be challenging because you don't live in an English speaking country, but in my experience it's the most important part of really knowing a language. However, a disadvantage could be that you have to do everything yourself so you need to have enough motivation and there's no one correcting you or telling you when you're learning or doing something wrong.

 

 

I have to agree with this.

Especially when it comes to English there are many ways and means to help you with it. be it books, shows or the internet.

Just keep up with it and continue practicing it and like anything

it will just become easier.

 

I actually really like German and i would find many similarities between English and German. A plus in your situation if you decided to take up the language. Once you get over the grammar it's not too difficult.

and if you learnt English, you could master German.

 

But do what you feel is best for you.

 

 

 

*edit*

would there be any courses there for which you can learn german through english?

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would there be any courses there for which you can learn german through english?

 

I don't think so, that's ask too much... the problem is that not much people speak English and much less German ( usually people go to French because it's much more easier when you speak Spanish, and it's the nearest country :rolleyes:).

 

I love English and I want to live during a period of time in England, Ireland, Scotland.... don't mind. But I have nobody to speak to in English (only in English class and not always). I'm starting to read everything in English because I don't want to lose it.

But German is so interesting... however, the problem will come if I need a ACE for university or something like that.... I don't know what to do...

 

Thanks anyway

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You could actually learn French through English and vice versa. Yes, the grammar is different but I am always amazed how many similarities there are in the vocabulary. That's harder with German.

 

You just have to be passionate about the language you wanna study. Have a look at reading material/events/courses by the British Council and Goethe Institute. Maybe they even have offices in your city?

 

In terms of university... do you need it for a university in Spain? Coz you shouldn't worry about IELTS or TOEFL if you don't wanna study at a British university. Too expensice anyway...

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Yes, the grammar is different but I am always amazed how many similarities there are in the vocabulary. That's harder with German.

 

I don't think so.

 

 

I speak both English and German. I'm not sure what to advice you though. It's up to you really. I wouldn't bother with the Cambridge Advanced Certificate. They'll teach you how to write a formal letter but I don't think it will help you to improve your English in general. I don't think British employers will ask you for a language qualification. Some employers have their own language tests that all applicants have to take. As for universities, I think some will ask for the TOEFL.

 

I'd just spend some time in and English speaking country if you really want to improve your English.

 

If you want to learn German, I'd say go for it. You need to be aware that learning a new language is gonna be hard work though. German isn't easy to learn, German grammar can be very difficult as there's four cases and three articles. You pronounce every single letter in German (there's a few exceptions to this but they're easy to spot) which makes it relatively easy to pronounce/ spell things correctly.

 

Anyway let me know if you need help with either language. :)

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I don't think so.

 

 

 

Are you English-native? Coz I think that English ppl don't notice the similarity of their own language to French. Hope I'm not insulting you. lol

 

I am German native but have been living in the UK for 5 years. I learned French since the age of 14; also worked in Paris for a while. Whilst being at uni in London I took a French intermediate course with some English natives. Believe me, it happened more than once that the teacher asked us to translate a word which happened to be exactly the same in English. I have a French-English dictionary at home but gave up using it after a while because most of the vocabularly is nearly the same (not good if you know neither the French or English word haha). Usually I understand a French text coz I know the English equivalent; the German word is mostly different. OF COURSE THIS IS ONLY A GENERALISATION. But I think sometimes the British don't realize how much easier it is for them to learn French than for natives which language originates from a different historical context e.g. Scandinavians, Germans, ...

 

Now I am not saying there's absolute truth in my theory and I do understand if you still think there's no similarity. But I find it interesting that most of my friends from other countries than the UK agree with me whilst every friend who's a native in English isn't convinced. :D

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Guys! I also got a question... Reciently I took the internet based TOEFL exam (English is not my native language)... and I got 97/120 as my score.

 

Do you know if this is a very good score? or just plain good? is it good enough for having good chances in international universities applications? >>> (Because that's really the main reason why I took it. I had heard that for international students, having a high score in that exam really makes it easier, to get accepted.)

 

--

 

Edit... I just found some random page where they show the equivalencies with the Common European Reference Framework and 96-120 makes a C2 level. So I guess, that it is really good? :p

 

But oh... most important American and British universities recommend a 100+ score... for example the MIT, asks for a minimun of 90+ and recommends 100+ so I guess I barely made it? :dozey: :(

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After a short internet revision, I've come to realise that my score is good... But not as good as it should be (100+).

 

Fortunately for me, there's this option of having rescored the "Speaking" and "Writing" sections in the TOEFL exam, which were actually the ones in which I got the lower score ("Reading" and "Listening" were great somehow). It isn't nearly as expensive as taking the whole exam again (Great, only USD 60 per sect). I think I am definitely taking them again!

 

btw, do you people think my writing skills are that bad? cause it was actually my worst score. :wtf:

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After a short internet revision, I've come to realise that my score is good... But not as good as it should be (100+).

 

Fortunately for me, there's this option of having rescored the "Speaking" and "Writing" sections in the TOEFL exam, which were actually the ones in which I got the lower score ("Reading" and "Listening" were great somehow). It isn't nearly as expensive as taking the whole exam again (Great, only USD 60 per sect). I think I am definitely taking them again!

 

btw, do you people think my writing skills are that bad? cause it was actually my worst score. :wtf:

I don't know anything about TOEFL, but for Cambridge certificates UK universities require a good mark on C1 level, but if you take C2 basically anything is good. (that's an average though, prestigious universities like Oxbridge have higher standards than, let's say, Dundee university) I guess 100+ is the score you want to have (can't go wrong with that), so I'd definitely retake the parts if you think you can still improve. :smiley:

 

Judging from forum posts it's hard to say whether your writing is good or bad, but I'd say it's pretty decent. There is a big difference between this and writing a formal letter or essay though (that's what I had to do for my CAE test).

 

And you can get accepted to prestigious universities with a bad score on a test like this. A classmate of mine got into Cambridge with CAE (C1) grade C. She screwed up though. :lol:

 

 

Writing was my best score as well. :nice:

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Thank you girls for your comments.

 

And yes, I would definitely feel more confortable with the 100+ score and raising my writing score about 5-6 points, will definitely do it. So yes, I'm re-taking that section again... I believe in about two months. The funny thing is, I've always taken for granted that my English level is good, so I didn't really bother studying much before the exam. This time, I'll really put more efforts on it. :)

 

fietssleutel, you're talking about the ESOL examinations, right? are those exams (like the CAE, you mentioned) equivalent to the TOEFL?

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Yeah. I think TOEFL is internationally accepted while ESOL is only accepted in the UK. The tests are probably more or less the same, but to be honest I don't really know. I took CAE (advanced certificate) in 2008 because my school offered it, though in hindsight I should have taken CPE. I scored an A (>80% according to wiki) without preparing anything at all and not paying attention during the audio test (they scheduled it at the end of the day :facepalm:).

 

CAE (certificate in advanced English) is C1 and CPE (certificate of proficiency in English) is C2, the highest level you can test for.

 

I think with your score you're borderline C2 at the moment, so you can definitely reach C2 after you've retaken your test if you put a little effort in it. Writing is probably the easiest to improve in, because you can just rehearse the rules/your vocabulary and practice really easily. :nice:

 

 

Are you planning to apply for a UK/US university?

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You did very good on your CAE. I mean, it's impressive... For me British English is so hard to understand and I would probably have got a really low score compared on that test. :p Btw, do you know any hint or advice that could help me improve my writing skills?

 

I bet the listening section at the end of the day of your test must have been a pain in the ass. I remember mine, which wasn't at the end of the test but just before the 10 min break we had for eating something right in the middle of the test... There were so many audios and situations and I was really tired and hungry, that in the last 2-3 audios' questions I was like: "when did they ever mention that"? lol.

 

And no, my main plan is applying to a University in Germany or some surrounding countries (within Europe). Hahah, I'm studying German also and I quite suck at it. But obviously I would apply to a postgrade in English, and I believe a very good score on my toefl could really favor me. Somehow. :D

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Is there a possibility of viewing your test to see what you did wrong? Because if you know what your weaker points are, it's easier to improve them than when you don't know. (Gee, surprise surprise) Did you follow a course or something before you took the test? There are loads of exercise books on the internet, maybe you can use those. I'm sure at least some of them have answer keys as well. And it really helps if you know someone who is a native speaker or studied English who can check your writing.

 

If my old computer still works, I can check for you if I still have those exercise books later this week. Or you could search for yourself on torrent sites or something (that's where I got them from). :nice:

 

 

I didn't just pay attention during my listening test, but didn't fill in any answers in a really big section. So, suddenly the test was finished and I had a lot of open spaces. It's kind of a miracle that my score turned out well. :D I think American English is easier to understand, but British English isn't that much harder. It just takes a bit more practice and (mainly) concentration. But in Europe, we hear a lot more British English than in South America, I guess.

 

Is it unusual in Colombia to study German? It's kind of a strange choice, but still pretty cool. I can't imagine studying German (although it's sort of similar to Dutch), but my German is absolutely atrocious. :sweatdrop: I'm sure a good score on TOEFL will help you get accepted to European universities. If you hadn't already taken it, you would probably have to anyway if you are going to do an English course.

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No, I don't think that is possible, but I could see that I screwed in the "Writing based on reading and listening" and I did good on the "Writing based on knowledge and experience". It says that my bad performance on the former was probably because I didn't get to understand the lecture or reading passage or due to many gramatical errors. I really don't know what could happen there, I really thought I nailed that topic and I totally understood it. :blank:

 

And no, I didn't do any toefl writing excercises on the internet. Actually my biggest practicce is when I come here and I've been doing that for a while. :lol: This time I will take the thing more seriously and search for some test practicce on the internet... You could help me a lot if you shared with me those books. :p

 

Well... unusual... maybe. I guess that besides English, people here would rather learn French, Italian or Portuguese. But I really like the German culture and language... Let's see if I get to go there anytime soon. Oh the future... :P Btw, you're from the Netherlands, right? are you studying there or in other country?

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Forgot about this. :facepalm:

 

 

Yeah, I study in the Netherlands, but I considered studying in the UK (Scotland to be exact because it's quite cheap for EU students). In the end it turned out to be too expensive and I didn't really know what I wanted anyway (still don't have any clue :\). :sad: I actually study Dutch at the moment, but that's extremely uninteresting and boring. :disappointed:

 

I'll see if I can find any of those books I mentioned. I have them stored on my old computer at my mums house, so I can't access them now. They'll probably still be on torrent sites though. :nice:

 

By the way, feel free to send me any kind of message if I forget to reply again. I'm very chaotic. :shame:

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Don't worry. :P

 

Btw, it's funny that you say that you find extremely uninteresting and boring what you're studying atm. Don't you really have any other better options in mind? like English, Spanish or even something engineer like? ;) I dunno... I would like to help... since I totally despise that sense of vagueness and feeling quite lost, not knowing what to do... It might be really frustrating sometimes. Maybe I'm starting to feel a little like it now that I'm about to finish my career and I have not much certainty of what I'm going to do. :mean:

 

About the books, I'll make a little search then... I'll let you know if I find something. :smiley:

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Yeah, I'm looking into other courses now, but if I change, I have to start over. Not really looking forward to that. :disappointed: I'm used to not knowing what I want though, I'm queen indecisive. :cheesy:

 

I'm going home this weekend, so I'll dig up my computer then. Unless I find something in the meantime (which would be way easier, so I'm gonna have a look right now). :nice:

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