Posts Tagged ‘england’

Since I’m from a country where the native language is not exactly widely used around the globe, English lessons are mandatory in school. When I was a kid we had our first English lessons in the 3rd grade in elementary school, however, that has changed many times since then. According to some, kids in the 3rd grade is not mature enough to learn a second language, so some years the students didn’t begin their English classes until the 5th grade. Then it’s been changed back again to the 3rd grade and so on. For a while it was different for every year actually.

Anyway, no matter when the student had their first English lesson, the grades have dropped a lot since I was done with school and these days it’s also very rare that anyone will choose a third language when they reach collage. You would believe that at least a second language would be very useful and valuable since anyone can look for work within the EU countries…and to be honest about it, very few people in any other EU country is speaking Swedish. It’s not exactly a big language.

So last night while I was counting Daddy Longlegs in the bedroom ceiling, being unable to sleep as usual, I remembered something that our English teacher made very clear. A piece of information that I sincerely hope not every English teacher is giving their students these days. By default, the English they teach is British English. If you have an American accent you won’t get any grades in English, it’s that simple. And I doubt that changed much. However, from what we were told by our teacher the accent doesn’t really matter much because no one in the UK would understand a word of what we have to say anyway. She made it very clear that the version of English they taught us was pretty useless if you took it outside the classroom. How’s that for encouragement?

And after living here in England for almost 7 years, to an extent, I agree. But it also depends a lot on where in the country you are. Besides, as Robin said, a lot of people here will seize to understand English the moment they hear that you’re not a native. So it’s not so much about the language itself as it is about attitude. But no one told us that in school.
It happens now and then when I order something in a pub or similar that I have to repeat myself, only to have the person in the bar look at me as if I was from a different planet. When they see that I’m getting frustrated they all of a sudden understands me perfectly just to repeat exactly what I’ve said. And how the hell you can pronounce “Coke” in more than one way, I don’t know. Robin told me that sometimes I pronounce it in an American way, but I don’t even know what that means. Or what the difference really is because I can’t hear it myself.

Why so many students ignore to give a second or a third language a chance in Sweden these days, I don’t know. All I know is that it’s rubbish not to teach a second language earlier in school. Kids are not in any way less mature when they are 9-10 years old than they are a couple of years later. The younger, the more they behave like a sponge and learn faster. Especially when it comes to expressions and words.
I think that overall there would be a bigger interest in this subject if the kids were allowed to start a bit earlier. Because it’s more fun and more interesting the younger you are, and later in life it feels more natural to use a second language if you start out when you’re a kid.
Also, there’s very little consideration taken to the fact that a second or third language is not very useful unless you learn how to socialize while using it. No one ever told us during our English classes that in order to communicate in a second language, you also need to think in the same language. Otherwise it will sound as if you translate.
I believe that the younger a student is, the easier he or she will have when it’s necessary to switch language and use it in a natural way.

They say that when you teach a toddler how to speak correctly, you take away 99 other languages. And if that’s really the case, it should be a piece of cake to teach a toddler a second language as well. Maybe it’s time to start teaching a second language from the first grade in elementary school. Because later at least some students lack interest in any language.
Just like me, my son had his first English lessons in the 3rd grade, and then the following year no 3rd grade had any English lessons at all, while the 5th grade began their very first lessons instead. It also means that when they mess around with the system at school, some students have had 6 years of basic English, while others have only had 4 years.

In any case, I sure hope that my English teacher was a big exception from others. She was a very good teacher and she gave us opportunities to learn a lot of things that was not even on the schedule, like conversation in English…even if it wasn’t mandatory. But she could have kept quite about her insights around our basic English and what was around the corner in reality. That’s no way to encourage kids to study a second language.

I am aware of that both this blog and the one at Paperbag Designs have been very quite lately, and it’s not because there’s been a lack of things to write about. The only excuse I’ve got is that during the weekend I vanished into Photoshop, and since then time passed very quickly. So I’ll start making up for it today :)

Above is one of the things I did last weekend. It’s a painting for those of you who enjoy bright colours and the style of traditional fine art more than realism. The place is the entrance to Scarsdale Hall and it’s  the gate seen from the Hall itself.

And this is an old shed that I’ve painted before, but outside the screen. The shed itself can be found where we live and it’s in a real need for a pickmeup :p However, I kinda like it the way it is.

Both these paintings have a texture of canvas, which means that in print they get a look that is very similar to the real thing. Unless of course you get too close or actually touch them. But framed and in a distance it’s very difficult to see the difference.
Style is a bit impressionism, which sometimes looks better when it comes to landscape and architecture than realism. These will be in my print store hopefully a bit later today :) We’re off to have a late lunch up at the Hall right now, so I will probably put these up when it cooled off a tad and it’s possible to breath in here :p
I also have a new video of my grandson and a couple of photo’s that I haven’t posted yet, and I’ll try to do that as well a bit later :)

Hope your day is as sunny and nice as ours :D

The picture above is of a big sandbox (sort of) not far away from where we live. I’m sure it doesn’t look exactly like this today, but I wonder if they knew that they were digging Bart Simpson out of the ground… :p

Anyway…we took off to look at another apartment this afternoon. As many of you probably already know we had absolutely no broadband from the moment I stepped out of bed…which was kinda annoying. It’s been coming and going ever since.
The apartment was not something that I would jump and go “Huzzah!” over…not even if I lived in a cave in the middle of nowhere and needed another place to stay. It would be like moving from one dump to another really. Besides, the guy from the agency who showed us around told me that the former tenant moved out without a word, quick and with no warning, and that’s never a good sign. It usually means that either the neighbors are a pain or that the tenant got sick and tired of the landlord. Or, of course, the former tenant could just have been a terrible person overall…but you never know these things unless you get all the information.

There was a lot of construction problems like uneven floors that left gaps at the walls here and there…some rooms had no carpet or any other kind of flooring and the landlord was not even willing to do anything about that. It was very spacious with two double bedrooms and a smaller bedroom upstairs, two reception rooms (or living rooms) downstairs, but if you took two steps out the door from the kitchen in the back, you would literally end up in the neighbors kitchen.
And living here for more than 5 years, where privacy is really the only positive thing I can think of right now, it would make me go nuts to have the neighbor so close. Especially when you have no clue what kind of people it is.

Since it’s a rather expensive thing to move I much rather wait for a bit longer and make sure we find a place where we know we can stay. I don’t intend to move in and then leave 3 months later again because the landlord refuses to fix things that a tenant shouldn’t have to pay for, or because the neighbors have parties in the middle of the night on a weekday. Another thing that I noticed was that the place was very cool and nice…probably because it was a stone building. But…at least I need more from my home than just a decent temperature.

Other than that not a lot happened today. It’s time to start dinner and I need to wake Robin since he’s fallen asleep :p He’s snoring so I bet the landlord can hear him…and they’re like 300 yards away :p

Hope you had a sunny and warm day like we have :D

My grandson had his very first bib overall the other day, which I have to say is one of my own favourite kind of pants….or trousers if you’re here in England :p Especially if they are big and with a loose fit :D
But of course a bib overall is not even half as pretty on me as it is on Alexander :p Everything is cute in a smaller size, just the way it is :)

We have a grey, but not too cold day today. Actually, the sun is up there somewhere and it’s trying it’s best to peek through. I’ve got a painting to finish and that should keep me busy for the rest of the day. I’m also going to spend half an hour with Paul McKenna in the afternoon today, trying to do as I’m told for a change and put away the cigarettes. Still got that cough and it’s not easing off any, so I guess it’s time. Rather not have bronchitis during the rest of the summer if I can help it.

And Alexander’s mom is 21 years old today :D Hip hip hurray!! :D If I was there I would bake a cake and bring over…at least :) But since that’s not possible and since sending a cake would probably get messy in the long run, I’ll have to do the congrats virtually instead.

And as I suspected, the house we were looking at last week was already gone today. Someone managed to call the landlord yesterday and grabbed it. To get out of here is like trying to leave Hotel California….and this place doesn’t even have room service :p There’s a new local paper tomorrow though, so we’ll keep looking.

Now it’s time to start doing something creative here. And don’t forget to have a great day :D

The photo of Alexander in this post is from the other day at the playground while he was looking at girls ;) I believe she was twisting his head around a few times while she was running by. I know that his mom was trying to get a picture of herself and Alexander too that day, with mixed results since there was too many other things to look at :p

He’s a cutie in any case :))

Today it’s Sunday and I’m alone and unsupervised as usual. I still got this nasty cough, but at least the headache lifted and took off with the rain clouds during the night :) It’s sunny out there without being too hot (so far) and there’s some summer clouds here and there. We never got any thunder yesterday even though at least my head was in a great need for it.

So today I’m doing everything at the same time while I can :p And while I’m alone. Cleaning up in the kitchen at the moment. I’ve got a fan on the floor in front of the bathroom to dry up the insulation mats on the floor a bit. The darn toilet’s been leaking for ages and I’m hoping that the water stayed in those insulation mats. There’s a layer of thick plastic between the insulation mats and the floor boards and unless the water made it’s way through that plastic somehow, I should be able to exchange the insulation only. One can always hope.

I “think” I’ve fixed the leak on the toilet too. It’s leaking where the water goes from the tank into the toilet, so at least it’s fairly clean water. But it creates a lake around the toilet quickly and duct tape will only fix it for so long. The landlord ignores it, like they do with everything else in here, and I don’t really care about it for the sake of their floors. But in the long run it gets stinky and knowing our landlord they might just try to charge us for the damage if and when we move out of here.

And I’m cautiously optimistic about the new house we went to look at the other day. It’s nice and perfect in size for the both of us. Two bedrooms, a small, but new kitchen, brand new bathroom on the second floor and a guest toilet on the first floor. We’ll see how it goes. There was no carpets in one of the bedrooms or in the stairs to the second floor since the former tenant ripped those out and took them when she moved out. She took a lot of things that didn’t belong to her I believe, so the landlord there is willing to pay half if we want new carpets.
This is still hanging in the air and we’re trying to get some cash for the bond and the first rent right now. That should be fixed on Wednesday next week, and if not…well, in that case we don’t stand much of a chance to get it either. It might even be gone by Wednesday for all I know. Robin had a chat with that landlord, but since we can’t really ask him to hold it for us, it’s still possible that he will find someone else in the meantime that wants it.
So we’ll see what happens. That’s why I’m “cautiously optimistic”. And also because so many other possible chances to move away from here has gone down the drain in the past.

Well, I’ve got some dishes to do and a kitchen to clean. And then I’m invading the bathroom before I’m ready to rip up the floor :p The insulation boards in the bathroom will need to be exchanged as well and we got plenty of boards like that in the shed. It’s just a matter of getting that plastic liner off the floor without destroying it :p

Have a nice Sunday :D