Nome: Richard Davis
Idade: 29 anos
Escolaridade: superior incompleto - Letras
Tempo de aprendizagem da língua: 6 anos
My learning history is interesting. I think that almost always I studied alone problaby most of what I know today (much little) is relating to with I learned by myself. Indeed, I have one dream that one day I could express myself in English. I have been studied English since I was a teenager and until today I’m learning a lot. My contact with English was in the books used by school. I was one of the best students of English, but I didn’t have money to make an English course.
In 1998 I passed in the vestibular contest and began to study the REAL ENGLISH in UFMG. In fact, At University I discovered a great way to learn: reading, listening, speaking and writing. Thus, I started to study English into CENEX. I could perceive that CENEX´s method is more structural than functional, particularly when considering the first levels -Inglês Instrumental. It seems more communicative from the intermediate level on, but it is still more teacher-centered. However, it helped me to improve my accuracy.
My personal method is listen music and tries to get the lyrics, watch movies into the cinemas and read magazines or others (when I have time). This is very good for me to enlarge listening skills, what I believe it is the most difficult for us.
In conclusion, at University I can learn in Cultural Competence, Functional, Sociolinguistic and also Interactional Competence. In fact, the English Literatures is giving me support to develop my skills. Furthermore, I’m having so many opportunities to develop my communicative competence and, I’m determined not stop studying English until I make my dream come
true.