My Memory

My Memory I remember six years ago when I moved to the United States, I barely knew how to speak English. I only knew a couple words like "hello, how are you?”. That was all I had a chance to learn in school before I moved to the United States. I was surprised with everyone around me, maybe because the language everyone spoke to communicate with others was one that I could not understand. We did not do anything except sleeping for about a week. When we started getting used to the weather and the time over here, my uncle took my family and me around Houston to visit my cousin and see how our community is growing bigger every day in this country. I was so happy that I finally was able to understand what they were saying when we visited a Vietnamese market. Christmas break was almost ended when I came here. My cousin did all the paperwork for me to attend middle school right after the break. I was really excited to get ready for the first day of school. Also I was nervous and worried that I was going to fail in school because I did not know English, but the school was not hard as I thought it would be. English was bad, so the school sent me an assistant; her name is Julia Ho. She helped me translate all the work in class, the homework, and all the rules that I needed to know in school so I would not get in trouble. Julia was really nice; she translated almost everything for me except when I did not have class with her. After the first day of school, I could not wait to get back to school on the next day. I loved my middle school right away; I loved all the system and equipment that the teacher used to teach in school. Everything was new for me; I met new classmates, new teachers and saw new equipments that I had not seen before. I remembered that back in Vietnam, we did not have all that equipment such as projectors, lasers, and air condition in school; instead of that expensive equipment, we used chalk to write on the board and a couple fans in the room to use when the weather was getting hot. I remembered those days that I had to walk home on a rainy day, when my parents could not pick me up after school. But that is not a problem over here when schools have buses to pick the students up in the morning and drop them off after school. Even though my English was bad, I had a lot of friends in middle school. Most of them were in my ESL class; they had moved from another country to come here and hope for a better future. We used hands to help us to communicate with others and also help them to understand us better. Sometimes my friends had a hard time to understand what I tried to say; I pulled out my dictionary and tried to find the words that I wanted to say. School year was almost ended, and my English still had not improved much since I had been in school for the whole semester. I wanted to learn more English in the summer and start a better school year, so I gave myself a schedule to reach my goal. I wanted to watch television and read newspapers when I had free time, but my English was so bad that I had to translate every word in the newspaper; I realized that would not help me to learn anything, so I used all my free time to watch television. Even though I did not understand most of the words people were saying, I still wanted to listen to the conversation over and over again until I recognized the word. Later on, I found out that if I heard a word over and over again, I would remember more than if I just sat on the chair and tried to put that word in my head. I kept doing that for the entire summer, and when the school year started, all my friends were surprised that my English had improved a lot.
The friendship between Julia and me was closest in eighth grade when we had classes together. I started using English to communicate with her, but when I could not find the word I wanted to say, I changed it back to Vietnamese. Every time I got stuck with a word, she always helped me to find that word and learn it right away. Julia helped me to improve my English skills; I helped her to improve her Vietnamese skills. We helped each other throughout middle school and graduated together.
When I moved to high school, I found out that Julia had moved to a different district, and I lost contact with her from there. I was sad and I felt as if I just brought a new notebook like the first day I went to school, but this notebook I had to write by myself. I joined a community service when I was in seventh grade, and that was how I improved my speaking skills. I talked with elder adults and helped them with their problems. At the same time, I also taught myself how to communicate with others and improve my vocabulary every weekend I visited them.
Over all, English is not hard to learn as I thought before I came to America. people just need time to read more and practice to communicate with others. Without those lessons from teachers and friends I would not be speaking and writing as I can today. I am appreciating all thing that they did for me, and I use what I learned to help other non-English speaking students who come to America and want to have a better education.