Jody Zhang is a former student of Huaiyin High School who is preparing to begin an exciting new adventure studying at Singapore University. Jody had the great honor of receiving a scholarship to pay for her education there. She credits her oral English skills with making this possibility a reality.
Jody has very graciously agreed to speak to the current students of Huai in High School regarding the importance of oral English. I encourage all students to carefully read and consider the text of Jody’s speech.
Jim Fleming
Foreign Teacher
Oral English
Huaiyin High School
2004-2005
The Importance of Oral English
First, I want to introduce myself. My name is Jody-----a student in
Huai yin High School. I was supposed to be studying in senior 3, but now I don’t have to go to school, because I’ve been admitted to two universities in Singapore. They are NTU-----Nanyang Technological University and NUS-----National University of Singapore. So I want to tell you something about how I got the chance to go there. In May, there was an announcement that said our school would have 6 students to take the written exams to get the scholarship to go to Singapore. Well, first I didn’t pay any attention to that. I just thought that we would waste our youth there. But after seeing a lot of students put up their hands, I wanted to have a try, too. So finally, I was chosen to take that exam. After the exams, I felt so bad, because it was so difficult. I even guessed some of the answers in the exam. So I worried about that for several weeks. Fortunately, I got the chance to take the interview in late June. I was so happy at that time, and of course I began to prepare for my face-to-face English interview. I still remember that I prepared a lot of questions that I thought they might ask me-----more than 150. And I recited them every day as fast as possible, because I thought as long as I was well prepared, I would be confident when I faced the interviewers. We took the interview on July the 28th. During the interview, there were four interviewers that sat in front of me. They’re a professor in NTU, a professor in NUS, a woman from the Singapore Embassy in China and another woman from MOE (Ministry of Education in Singapore). I felt very nervous at the beginning, because it was my first time to take this kind of interview. Some interesting questions were asked during the interview. For example, “Why didn’t the top students in your class take the exam?” I couldn’t understand this question at first, because the professor asked this question in a totally different way. But after four times, I finally understood it. My answer was, “Everyone has his own goal. Maybe their goal is to go to Qinghua University or Beijing University in China, but my goal is to go to the two universities in Singapore.” Another question was “Do you live with your parents?” I said yes. “Then how can you be independent to live abroad without your parents?” I answered, “Maybe it’s one of the reasons why I want to go to Singapore. I think living there alone can make me more independent.” So from this example, I found sometimes you should adjust to others, even though you don’t mean that.
Now I want to say something about learning English. You can see the importance of English from my experience, especially spoken English. If I was not good at it, maybe I wouldn’t get this precious chance. Have you ever watched the movie “Forrest Gump”? I still remember a sentence his Mum said to him, “Life is like a box of chocolate. You never know what you’re gonna get.” It really makes sense. In your life, you never know when you will get a chance to do something. If you’re not well prepared, you’ll get nothing. So you should prepare a lot in your daily life and study, especially your spoken English. In this way, you can show your confidence when the chance comes. We have two great foreign teachers here, so don’t be shy, just talk with them as much as possible. Maybe sometimes, you’ll feel you don’t have enough time to talk with them. I’ve had the same feelings before because we have to work hard to enter a good university. But you should think that practicing your oral English is also a very good way to improve your written English. As long as you can speak English fluently, you can write down what you want to say and what you’re thinking when you’re doing a composition. It’s also a good way to make your marks higher, isn’t it? And you can also speak English with your friends on the bus or when you’re walking to the canteen. Time is just like the water in the sponge, you can get it by pressing. I learned this good method from Addison who is a student in NTU now. His English is very good because he speaks a lot in his daily life.
A lot of students are very shy when they’re communicating with foreigners. I used to be shy too. I joined many English summer camps in our school. But at that time, I was always afraid of making mistakes, so I seldom spoke to my foreign teachers. So I lost many good chances to practice my oral English. Now I think I was so stupid at that time and I regret that. So don’t do the same thing as me. Just be confident and speak!
Confidence is so important when you do anything. I think it’s the reason why we should give a foreigner a strong handshake when we meet them the first time. A strong handshake can show your confidence to others. If you want to work in a foreign company, and you’re taking an interview, you have to give the manager a strong handshake, and then you’ll have a bigger probability to get that chance. This is just a small example to show how important confidence is. Even in your study, you should be confident. Don’t say “Oh, it’s too difficult, I can’t do it.” Be confident! There is a saying “If you think you can, you can.”
And last, I want to give you some advice in learning English. Do you know OUTLOOK? Watch it everyday. It’s a good program. You can watch it when you have your lunch. And you can also watch the
CCTV-News on CCTV-9, even though you may not understand it, it’s ok, because it’ll help your accent. The program about traveling is also worth watching. You can understand most of them.
This is my speech. I hope you can get something you want from it.
