Neslihan Astan is a freshman student at Sabancı University in
Turkey. She has been studying English for 11 years and German for 6 six years. She has had opportunities like translation and voluntary teaching to improve her English. Neslihan is interested in the movie industry. She wants to develop a career in film making and marketing strategy.
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My Journey in Foreign Languages
Neslihan Astan
My journey in foreign languages started in primary school when I first met with English. First, English was all about songs and games for me. Because of my age I was not aware of the purpose of learning English, but thanks to my parents and older brother I knew that this ‘English’ will be after me for years. By fourth grade, when grammar lessons began, English turned into a “memorization course”. Year after year, English lessons became more serious and harder. Besides, there was hardly any speaking practice. By the end of primary school, which is grade 8, I began to think that I will never be able to actually speak English.
As I grew older my personality developed and my interests started to take shape up. With the help of the internet I soon got into touch with English pop culture. I listened to English songs and watched TV shows. My interest in movies also started in those years. I not only watched Hollywood movies in their original language but also used English subtitles. The more I was absorbed into pop culture, the more my interest in this foreign language increased. In my preparation year at high school I realized how much my language had improved through my own interests. Even though I hadn’t had a chance to practice speaking English, listening to English served me well. In my preparation year I began to read English books. Not books required for the school but novels that I chose. As a result of my interests outside class, my English remarkably improved and I came first at the end of the preparation year was a highly motivating achievement for me. Through high school my success in foreign language learning gradually increased. I continued being a fan and follower of English pop culture. I knew that if I was to communicate and integrate with the rest of the world English was a key requirement. Using my English knowledge for these purposes made me more enthusiastic about being better in that language. English became a necessity for me to maintain my social awareness.
In the fall of 2010 I began my Foundation year studies at Sabancı University and my journey of/in English was about to reach its peak. With the Foundation year English became a necessity for my academic success and development. As
part of a civil involvement project I voluntarily taught English to kindergarten children for four months. Teaching English, even it was at kindergarten level, made me feel more satisfied with my English. This experience also taught me how to communicate with kids and how to be patient. So, it was both an academic and social experience for me.
The biggest and hardest opportunity of my journey of/in English appeared at the beginning of 2011 when I was given the opportunity to translate a self- development book from Turkish into English. The book is named ‘Miracles of the Soul’ and was published in the United States. It wasn’t a long text but it was full of specific terms. I must admit that translating something is much harder than I thought. With this experience I learned lots of new words and phrases. It improved my language more than I had expected. I think my last two experiences, teaching and translating, were the manifestation of my journey of/in English. Now it’s an absolute fact that English is and will be an essential part of my life and thus my journey will continue. If I would express this journey through a graph I can say that my success and motivation rates have grown exponentially. At the beginning of primary school I felt neutral towards English, and then I became obsessed with the grammar and experienced a sharp decline. However, through my own interests my success and motivation gradually increased. And finally it reached its peak with teaching and translation experiences.
Meanwhile, my second journey in a foreign language has already begun. I started to learn German in high school as a second foreign language. As I’ve mentioned before, at that age, I was aware of the advantages that a learning a foreign language could provide me with. As I’ve learned from my last experience I didn’t become alienated from German just because of the linguistic rules, like I did while learning English. I’m not involved in German culture yet, but I’m open to every opportunity to practise speaking. I also want to make German a necessity for my academic development. I’m taking German classes at Sabancı University and I’m planning to go to Germany on an Erasmus project exchange. To sum up, I have always thought if I have had more chance to practice speaking I would have more rapidly increased some of my foreign language skills in the graph of my journey in English. Nevertheless, now I’m able to use English in my daily life. Apart from that, as a German language learner I’m yet at an early stage of my journey.
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