My Personal Challenge in Studying English Grammar.

English is my third foreign language. I had been studying firstly Russian and German
for 12 years with graduation at Germanic philology. In todays global world, the importance of
English cannot be denied but learning a new foreign language is never easy because my
experience with Russian and German. Three years ago I got a gift from my pupils an
English course for Germans. Learning a foreign language with a help of a foreign language
with its subtlety grammar had proved my personal challenge. I was 43 years old but it's
never too late for studying. Nevertheless, my former master thesis was entitled Learn
languages as adults. I knew the methods of teaching and learning well because I am a
teacher. I needed only motivation and a lot of time. My motivation was very high and I started
my studies with my adult son I English philology, son - computer science. After 20 years I
became a student again. The simple truth is, every beginning is hard but not in English.
English grammar is at first is very easy. However, the more advanced we are, the harder it is.
It is quite contrary to other languages. In my opinion, English is one of the more challenging
languages to learn and due to that its acquisition makes us more satisfaction.

Every language is a system of rules and vocabulary. Although the rules or grammar of
English were less complicated than my native language Polish. This hasnt necessarily
meant it has been a simple language to master. I had to face many challenges, first of all with
grammar. My favourite challenges of grammar are verb tenses and modal verbs. English
tenses are complex, difficult to remember, master and use logically from view of Polish
learner, so I have studied it in German and English. In addition, great help for me in learning
is the Internet with online exercises, commentaries and videos.

That is all together has brought great results and I havent needed to resit a grammar
exam so far. The correct grammar usage can be tricky. Let us consider:
Jane never left Jamestown. Bob has never left Jamestown. Who is still alive? We use the
Present Perfect to say that an action happened at an unspecified time before now, so the
answer is Bob.

And why modal verbs are not so easy? Because of express the same idea in differing
levels of formality for instance: Can I have a slice of cake?, Could I have a slice of cake?
and May I have a slice of cake?

To sum up, I think English speakers are incredibly proud of the language and look
negatively on it being used incorrectly so we should strive for perfection but not only in
grammar and vocabulary but also in pronunciation whereas bad pronunciation can confuse
the person we are speaking to and even change the meaning of what we are communicating.