Why is my English so poor? Hsin-hao Su December 2, 2008

Hello!!! 各位同學你們好。 。好們你學同位各 How are you, everyone?

Hello!!! 各位同學你們好。 。好們你學同位各 How are you, everyone?

Direct Translation: Word by Word An apple a day keeps the doctor away. 一顆蘋果一天保持一個醫生遠 。

Meaningful Translation An apple a day keeps the doctor away. 一天一顆蘋果能使你遠離醫生。 An apple a day keeps the doctor away. 一顆蘋果一天保持一個醫生遠 。

Direct Translation: Word by Word 一天一顆蘋果能使你遠離醫生。 A day an apple can let you away the doctor. 一天一顆蘋果能使你遠離醫生。 An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Common Mistakes He/She +s or not +s much or many Miss articles : A/An/The Verbs : Past tense

He/She 100 years ago, there is no “she” in Chinese. He/She  他 Now, Chinese uses 他 / 她 for He/She. But, the pronunciations of 他 and 她 in Chinese are exactly the same. Therefore, we often call our mom/wife, he.

+s or not +s In English, a noun +s means many of them. For example, cars = two or more cars. In Chinese, we don’t change the noun itself. For example, car = 車子 ; cars = 車子們. But, two cars = 兩輛車子

much or many In Chinese, we don’t distinguish a countable noun and a uncountable noun. Basically, in Chinese, there is only “a lot of”. For example, many cars = 很多車子 A lot of information = 很多資訊 Much love = 很多愛

Miss articles : A/An/The You saw examples before that articles in Chinese looks like 一 X where X depends on the following noun. For example, 一輛車子 = a car 一顆蘋果 = an apple 一本書 = a book

Miss articles : A/An/The Since we use adjectives instead of articles, we used to miss a or an in writing English. Or, we just use “a” or “the” instead. Even we don’t mean “the”. For example, we use to write: Give me a apple. Or, give me the apple. 給我一顆蘋果。

Verbs : Past tense The nightmare for a Chinese native speaker in writing English is the tense. In Chinese, we use only adverbs to tell time. We don’t change the verb itself. Therefore, in writing English, we forget to convert the verb into past tense all the time.

Verbs : Past tense For example, –I went to eat lunch. = 我剛去吃午餐 –I go to eat lunch. = 我去吃午餐 –I will go to eat lunch = 我將要去吃午餐 –I am going to eat lunch. = 我正要去吃午餐 –I have gone to eat lunch. = 我已經去吃過午餐

Verbs : Past tense For example, –I went to library yesterday. = 我昨天去圖書館 –I go to library today. = 我今天去圖書館 –I will go to library tomorrow. = 我明天去圖書館