학내 언론사

Kicker: COVER STORY (STUDYING ENGLISH)

Useful English Study Tips for Sangmyung University Students

Useful Websites, SMU Lectures/English Programs & MORE! 

By Sarah Chae, Editor-in-Chief, Eugene Ha, Reporter

sarah3fran1@naver.com, eugine16@naver.com

  During the semester,it is difficult to study English professionally and there are a lot of students who want to study properly in this summer vacation. Many of our readers read our newspaper to study English, and we were asked to write an article about how to study English too. In this article, I want to tell you useful ways to help you study English during summer vacation.For our readers, we would like to tell you many useful ways to learn English effectively during this summer vacation. 

How to study English?

  How should we study English? In general, when we study English, we divide into four areas. It is speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Some will speak well, some will write well, and others will listen well. There is no order in English and there is no set stage, so you must first figure out what you are vulnerable to and what you are good at in this field. Once you are done understanding, you can study by keeping up with what you're good at while filling in what you are lacking. The SM Herald would like to tell you how to study English in each area.

Speaking

  First of all, it is necessary to try to speak confidently without being afraid of English. Do not try to avoid saying that you think you are going to be wrong and that your pronunciation is going to be bad. Even if it does not make sense, we have to keep talking to convey the meaning. Since there are so many applications these days, I will introduce one.

▶Speak application

  This app introduces words and sentences that are frequently used in various situations such as daily life, travel, and flight by a short video. It is a good application to study while moving simply rather than feeling that you are studying. It also allows you to communicate with other people by leaving questions and receiving feedback in real time.

Listening

  We can study English listening in various ways. If you have a favorite American drama or a foreign movie, I recommend listening to it without subtitles. There will be vocabulary that you can keep listening for. Then, it is one of the ways to train your ear and to have fun studying, predicting what it means in context. And students who study TOEIC could buy a textbook for the TOEIC listening part and solve problems together while listening to pronunciation of various countries. Another thing is if you like English pop songs, let's write lyrics while listening to them. If there is a word you do not know, you can naturally listen to and speak English if you sing along with it. These exercises do not work in a day, so let's continue to exposeourselves to English and make it easy and fun. A useful site for listening practice is BBC Learning English.

▶ BBC Learning English website (https://www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/)

  This site is provided by BBC, a public broadcaster in the U.K., and has various contents such as expressions, pronunciation, and textual explanations used in news articles. Also there is an application, so you can easily move to your cell phone and study English enjoyably while watching videos.

Reading 

  Reading is not just about the ability to read what is written. Reading and even understanding what it means are included in the reading area. Therefore, you should know and remember various words, expressions, and phrases. Let’s read English books and translations together. Then you can learn how the words and sentences expressed in English books were translated into Korean translation and see how they expressed the same contents in words. Let’s read English articles. Let's read The New York Times or our Herald articles and think about the overall flow and content, and keep reading while checking if you do not know any of the terms used in each paragraph. There is a site related to English articles. 

▶Breaking News English website

  You can read English articles tailored to your English skills, have recent articles, fill in the blanks under them, and learn them enjoyably. 

▶English-American literature classical text collection site

  This is a site that organizes famous overseas English-American literary works such as Shakespeare and links to sites with multiple texts. I think it would be good to look for books here that are difficult to buy in person.

Writing

  In fact, the writing part can be the most difficult part. Because grammar should also be studied. But you should not be afraid to write because of grammar. Like speaking, even if you make a grammar mistake, it can gradually be developed by writing various writings, such as the habit of continuing to write and writing essays on your own.

▶English Maven is a site where you can study English grammar by yourself.

   In this part of the article, the SM Herald got help from our fellow SMU students and readers. We asked SMU students about their own tips for studying English, and what was hard for them. Let’s take a look at some advice, SMU’s English study programs, and SMU’s recommended English lectures from the SM Herald and fellow students.

The Difficulties of Studying English

  Why do you study English? Some of us study English because we are interested in it, but I think most of us study it for a similar reason. Before you became an SMU student, maybe you have studied it to get into University, and now you are probably studying English to get high TOEIC/TOEFL scores to get a job. In order to get good results, you need to know what is difficult when you study English. Let’s see what fellow SMU students think is difficult when they study English.

 57% of the students said speaking in English is difficult, and about 27% of the students said English grammar is difficult. 

Tips for Studying English

  Motivation* and having fun is very important when you have to study or learn something. Around 30% of the students said that they watch or listen to English dramas, movies, or songs. On the other side, some said that they need a curriculum and tight plan for studying English. Take a look at various types of tips for studying English from the picture below. 

*Motivation: Your motivation for doing something is what causes you to want to do it.

SMU’s Recommended English lectures

  Students from both campuses said that the basic liberal arts lectures are suitable for lower grade students (freshmen and sophomores) who are sick and tired of English from the College Scholastic Ability Test(수능). Take a look below for more helpful English lectures fromthe Seoul and Cheonan Campuses.

SMU’s English Study Programs

  Going overseas as an exchange student or for language training is a good way to study the English language and different cultures. SMU has both of those programs, but we all know that now is not the most perfect time to go overseas. Thankfully, there are other programs that we can use to study and test ourselves at school. Take a look below and maybe you will find the perfect program.

  Did you find any useful advice that you can use for studying English during summer vacation? Was there the perfect website, application, or school program and lecture to help you study English? Maybe you found a helpful event that can help you test your English abilities. If you forgot what kind of advice there was, take one more look at the picture below!

  The SM Herald will always support and cheer you on to study English. We also hope you will come back to school next semester as a master (or maybe an almost-native-speaker) of English! 

Source:

Survey Results – Sangmyung University Students' English Study Methods, 51 students, 2020.05.15~2020.06.06