487. Other powers of people (2)


I have copied a post of my former blog and pasted it onto a Word document, and then I’m trying to set it on this very blog, as a new entry. There could be some format setting problems. I have changed minor things from the text published then, October 9, 2007. / Photo: nigerian-student factmonster com


More about effort in learning English


"Mistakes are easy; mistakes are inevitable. But there is no mistake so great as the mistake of not going on."

This was written in 1876 by Jex Blake, and I assure you it hasn't lost its value in our time. In Spain, my country, experts say that children today have more than ever before, but many times lack in receiving affection and also lack in discipline and effort: everything is at hand just in a blinking of the eyes.

Notwithstanding, as I proposed in previous posts, effort is crucial. That is, the firm resolution to do it, to learn English. That person, with that quality, wins the battle always. What is worth to gain implies effort. Best students enroll themselves in a program of a school or an academy, precisely to be demanded by a teacher. In my doctorate research I also used other terms that try to round up the concept of effort---think of them, because they constitute a help to the learning process of a language: willingness, energy, self-control, desires to communicate in the target language, self-involvement, initiative, responsibility, self-planning (Oxford 1990), studying, creativity, constancy, to intervene and participate in the class, autonomy, capability of intuition (Stevick 1989), discerning, perseverance, the more you dedicate to this process the better.

In other words Thomas A. Edison said:


"The three great essentials to achieving anything worthwhile are; first, hard work, second, stick-to-it-iveness, and third, commonsense."


OXFORD, Rebecca (1990) Language Learning Strategies. What Every Teacher Should Know. Boston: Heinle & Heinle Publishers.


STEVICK, Earl W. (1989) Success with Foreign Languages. Hertfordshire: Prentice Hall International.

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