Anything can help to my english grammar?

@laurika (4532)
United States
March 12, 2008 10:36am CST
I have to say english grammar is pretty hard for me, since it is very different with my mother language. I thought if there is something like spell check today if there isn't soemthing similar for grammar. IS there somewhere program like that? Or how you practice the grammar? I can do all those test , but when i am writing something, i have no idea if it is coorect or not.
2 people like this
9 responses
@daeckardt (6237)
• United States
12 Mar 08
I think that is a very common problem for any student that is not a native speaker of English. I was teaching writing last term and that was the biggest problem that I saw. That and Chinglish (I teach in China). If you have an English version of word, I think it recognizes both spelling and grammar. It isn't always correct, but it might help a little. I don't think that the way they do it in China is effective because as soon as you finish the test, chances are you will forget it. If you want, I can check your grammar and spelling in here, but if I do, I would probably pm you rather than making corrections for everyone to see. Let me know if you want to do that. I will probably start a discussion (or even an interest) for people who want to improve their English writing. I am not perfect, but I have been writing and speaking for over 40 years so I think I can help. Good luck!!!
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
12 Mar 08
Oh that is a such a great idea. I think you should really do that, if you have time for that. there are so many of us, who need some help with english and i am sure many of us will appreciate it, or at least I will. That would be great. Thank you
1 person likes this
@daeckardt (6237)
• United States
13 Mar 08
I will let you know when I have added these discussions. I will probably add an interest area: Calling all Chinese students wanting to improve English. In there, I will ask questions and give specific suggestions to you on the response you make. I don't know if it will help, but it should be fun. Talk to you later.
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
13 Mar 08
Ok, thanks a lot.
1 person likes this
@sminut13 (1783)
• Singapore
12 Mar 08
i don't think i can help you out much here but all i can say is reading helps to improve and you'll slowly see the improvements. but you can buy grammer books and practise them at home. after doing many similar questions, you'll more or less know what is correct or wrong in a particular sentence. but even if you don't know, you'll learn from your mistakes. don't worry. you won't be perfect, in fact no one is. me too. we will always keep making mistakes, be it due to carelessness or due to us not knowing our work. but we learn from our mistakes so don't lose heart. my best advice would be to read more and try out grammer books. i feel bored if they have comprehensive grammer(where they teach you why it's like this or that). i prefer ones where i can try it out after a few examples and then check my answers. at first, i'll definitely have many mistakes but that will improve if you are determined. so best of luck with your grammer and i hope others can help you out too.
@laurika (4532)
• United States
12 Mar 08
My problem is i don't know when i am making mistakes, so i cannot learn from them. Ok all those grammar books, i can make tests in them and I will have almost everything corret, but when i write article or so, i don't know if I have it correct or no. And reading? i read around three 500pages books a months what is not that bad i think, but still improving very slowly. But anyway thank you for your response.
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
13 Mar 08
Yeah i am sure myloters will help, thank you for all your help too and reposnes.
1 person likes this
@sminut13 (1783)
• Singapore
13 Mar 08
well, many people have given good suggestions and links. you might want to try them out. for me, i just did self help, had no help at that time you could say thus i'm learning real slow. but i'm learning by myself and it gives me a sense of satisfaction when i find out that i'm on the right track. you could try that suggestion given by someone who said that before you write or publish your articles, you could pm it to be proofread or checked you know. i'm sure mylotters would be glad to help you out, same going for me. at least 2 or 3 of us could check it out and once we feel it ok, then you could publish it. best of luck to you.
1 person likes this
• Philippines
14 Mar 08
Well, you'll learn through time. For spell check, I am using my handy browser, FireFox. FireFox automatically checks the spelling of words in forms, etc. It comes very handy when you are inputting your blog posts, MyLot responses and such. To improve your vocabulary, I suggest you play at freerice.com. It'll make you smarter and at the same time help hungry people around the world. You won't learn much if you just study in the net. You need to practice and study grammar.
@laurika (4532)
• United States
23 Mar 08
Thank for that website, I have to try it. I already hear about it in the magazine, but forget about it, thank for remainding me.
@ElicBxn (63235)
• United States
13 Mar 08
http://www.wintertree-software.com/app/gramxp/index.html Another option is to ask a friend to check you. I think you do pretty well, considering that the language differences.
@ElicBxn (63235)
• United States
14 Mar 08
MEN!! I can't spell very well because of a language learning disablity. I do know when something is WRONG, but I can't tell you WHY its wrong.... But its a joke. My former roommate once asked me how to spell "personal." Well actually what she said was: "How do you spell.... I'm asking the (me) how to spell something!" I said: "Ask, maybe I can point you the right way." So she did. I said: "a and 1 l is what you want, e and 2 l's is where I work." We laughed about it. So the next time she started to ask me how to spell something and repeated her previous quote I replied "I can spell personal, ask!" She wanted to know how to spell "khaki" I wasn't sure about that one so I said "Its something weird like 'kh.'" "Kh- kh- NOTHING starts with kh-!" she said. "Just look it up!" I replied and she did. She couldn't believe that it really did start with kh- until she learned it was from Swahili!
@laurika (4532)
• United States
23 Mar 08
LOL, that was nice story, thank you for sharing.
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
13 Mar 08
I think this is what i need, what a shame it isn't cheaper. And you are right the best option will be ask my hubby , but he is too lazy and sometimes he is the one who ask me for spelling and grammar and he is american.
1 person likes this
@drannhh (15219)
• United States
12 Mar 08
I would suggest that you read some children's textbooks on any subject that interests you. Generally, they are written with exemplary sentence and paragraph structure. Because the content would be familiar to you, whether it is about science or geography, you would be able to absorb the grammar easily as you would not be struggling with the content. Start is as low a grade-level as is comfortable without being too boring and work on reading as fast as you can without loss of comprehension. Then work up to higher grade levels. Another advantage to this method would be the exposure you would get to your new culture through it's art and ideas. This is the method I use to brush up on other languages that I have learned besides English. Enjoy!
1 person likes this
@laurika (4532)
• United States
13 Mar 08
I go this Saturday to a library and will look for some children's textbooks, maybe I will finally learn it.What other languages you speak?
1 person likes this
• United States
12 Mar 08
You are doing pretty good with your grammar! It's not too bad. There is a website www.dailygrammar.com that has lesson plans teaching you about grammar, then there is a website www.grammar-monster.com they might be able to help you. Keep up the good work!
@laurika (4532)
• United States
12 Mar 08
Thank you for recommendation for those sites, I will look at them.
1 person likes this
• Hong Kong
24 Mar 08
I think you are doing pretty good with your grammar. I learn my grammar the old fashioned way - reading grammar books. Maybe you could go to the bookstores and see if there are books like that available. Also, currently I am watching DVD with English subtitles to help improve/ keep up my English, so far, I think that's the most interesting and effective way for me to learn English.
@chrislotz (8137)
• Canada
26 Mar 08
Well I think your grammer is pretty good and you are being too self concious about it. I think that if you keep posting in mylot and keep thinking about what you are saying and posting, it will continue to get better. I have seen that many of the members here don't have English as their mother language and I think you are all doing very well. If you just keep reading other people's discussions and responses, you will also learn from them. I don't know of any site or grammer check, in the internet. Just keep reading and posting and you will do fine. I don't have any trouble understanding your topics, so just keep working at it.
@Graagh (95)
• United States
24 Mar 08
You are doing well for someone who is learning English; it isn't a very logical language sometimes. As people have said, the best way to learn grammar is to look at examples of standard written English. Read books in English often (don't use internet writing as your standard, as it is often shortened or changed to be easier and more casual). Children learning English tend to pick up grammar through imitation rather than instruction, so I think that is the best way.