Learning languages helps me help other people
Darren took part in our uTalk Challenge in January this year, choosing Polish, and he’s continued in February with Czech. Here’s his language learning story…
My name is Darren, I’m from Bath, England, and my language journey really began about 10 years ago.
I had studied French and German at school but I didn’t really enjoy them. I didn’t realise how useful languages could be until a friend asked me to help her learn some Latin for her nursing exam. She gave me the list of things she needed to learn with a look of sheer terror on her face and I told her ways to easily remember each word. You could see the panic in her eyes fade as she realised she could remember everything after just a couple of hours.
Soon after, I started working with a lot of Polish girls. It was quite difficult because only one or two of them could speak English, so I decided to try to learn enough Polish to be able to say “Good morning”, “You need to do this…”, “Would you like a coffee?” and other essential phrases. My first few attempts at communication were hilarious! My pronunciation was terrible and led to smiles and giggles, but they were all really impressed that I even tried and my blushes soon turned to grins of pride. I started doing the same when other new people arrived and was soon spouting phrases in Polish, Hungarian, Latvian, Romanian, and Greek. The look of happy surprise as a nervous new employee is greeted in his or her own tongue is itself worth the effort of learning.
I try to study a different language every day of the week for about two hours. Now I have friends from all over the world and teach English as a Second Language so I am lucky enough to be able to practise different languages every day. I’ve lost count of the number of times I have been able to help someone in the street when they have asked someone in broken English if they know where some place is, or in a shop when they don’t understand what is being said to them by a cashier. One time I was even asked to help translate for a friend who had been attacked and needed to talk to the police. Languages are now very important in my life and are my biggest passion.
One last thing: my original attempts at speaking Polish eventually led to me marrying the girl of my dreams. Just another reason to start your own language adventure!
How did you get your surname?
Do you know how you got your surname?
It is regarded as a tradition for women to take their husband’s surnames when they get married in Britain. It’s also the tradition for men to always be Mr but women will be Miss until they’re married and become Mrs. So if Miss Young married Mr Smith, she would become Mrs Smith. A survey in 1994 showed that 94% of British women decided to take their husband’s surname when married. This ‘tradition’ is no longer as common today, with many women choosing to keep their own surname, or creating a double-barrelled surname.
In Poland many women choose to take their husband’s surname when they get married. However, they have masculine and feminine endings to their surnames. My surname – Koszykowska – like many Polish names ends in ‘ski’ for males or ‘ska’ for females; my dad follows this rule, as does one of my uncles, but the other uncle keeps its simple by using ‘ski’ for his family. It’s thought that originally Polish surnames ending in ‘ski’ or ‘cki’ came from the places where people lived; so if you lived in Wola you would become Wolski.
The Koszykowski (and Koszykowska!) family
In Iceland the family name reflects the immediate father’s name or in some cases the mother’s. This is a more complex way of creating a surname compared to the British tradition. If Jón Einarsson had a son called André, André’s surname wouldn’t be Einarsson; instead it would be Jónsson. This is a combination of his father’s first name ‘Jóns’ (the s indicates that he is literally Jón’s son) and the Icelandic word ‘son’. If Jón had a daughter her surname would be Jónsdóttir, dóttir being the Icelandic word for daughter. In some cases they may use the father’s middle name, or their grandfather’s name.
In Spain it’s the norm for children to take the surname of the father and their mother’s maiden name to form one surname. For example if Alejandro López marries Daniela Rodriguez, their child Paula will take the father’s surname López as their second name and their mother’s Rodriguez as their third; Paula López Rodriguez. Then it gets slightly more confusing: if Paula marries she won’t change her surname; instead she will add it to her name. For example, she marries Álvaro Arroyo; her name will become ‘Paula López Rodrigues de Arroyo’. This continues when Paula has children, her mother’s surname will be dropped from their surnames to become ‘López Arroyo’.
Is there an interesting story behind your surname? Let us know!
Alex
Junior Language Challenge – 2016 here we come…
The Junior Language Challenge 2015 may be over, but we’re already thinking about next year’s competition. In 2016, we’d love to double the number of children taking part from 1,100 to 2,200, and raise even more money for our brilliant charity, onebillion.
Every year, we’re blown away by the enthusiasm and commitment shown by children, parents and teachers. 2015 was no exception, as you can see from our brand new video, made at this year’s final.
Please help us make next year’s competition our biggest and best yet, by sharing the video with friends and colleagues across the UK. Thank you!
For more details about the Junior Language Challenge, visit eurotalk.com/jlc or email jlc@eurotalk.com.
Junior Language Challenge: Aalaya’s story
Last week, we heard from Jackie Gliniecka, a teacher at The Hawthorns School in Surrey, about her experience of the Junior Language Challenge over the last ten years.
But how does it feel to take part in the competition? Today we’re sharing runner-up Aalaya Sanjeeva’s story, which begins three years ago…
Aalaya
I started JLC when I was in Year 3. In the first year, when I got through to my first JLC finals, I did not make it to the final 12 after the heats. However, just getting into the finals was a fantastic experience and I just had to do it again the following year. In the second year, I worked really hard and made to the final 12 but not the top 3. This year, my friend Nithya and I worked our way through to the finals and we both did really well to get into the top 18. It felt so great and seriously nerve wracking while we were playing, when I came second I could not believe it (I still can’t believe it).
I would recommend entering JLC as the whole experience is a lot of FUN and besides, learning languages is an important skill, it helps you communicate better when you go to foreign countries and also since you know where the money is going and what it is helping with (onebillion), it inspires you and makes you work even harder for it! Over the years, I have seen the videos of a school classroom built in Malawi and happy children learning to read and learn maths in their native language and progressing quite well. It makes you happy to see their smiles when they get the stars on the iPad.
I also remember Martha Payne, a girl not much older than us, who handed out the prizes during JLC 2013 – her story, ‘Martha, Meals and Malawi‘ was amazing and really inspiring and touching!
I had great fun learning all the 9 languages over the last 3 years 🙂 Thank you, team JLC for the wonderful opportunity!
Aalaya receiving her medal and certificate from Martha Payne at the JLC Final 2013
Aalaya’s parents, Sanjeeva and Priya
We have had an amazing experience learning so many languages over the last 3 years, it has instilled in Aalaya a love of languages that will stay with her for life and the steadfastness of effort that was required was also something wonderful to see in all the kids who have done multiple rounds. Plus she has had tons of fun, going to the semi-finals and finals – looking forward to the special journey to London Olympia with her teachers Mrs Gliniecka & Mrs Guest and schoolmate Nithya, the exposure to the huge language show opening up the wonderful world of linguistics and last but not least, those marvellous goody bags – all part of a wonderful package for a young child 🙂
Your team (Liz, Franco and others) and Richard Howeson are amazing and inspirational people – the happiness and camaraderie and the genuine passion in what you do is so evident every year! Richard, especially, with his vision for onebillion, has been so instrumental to all this and much more. The progress we saw unfolding with EuroTalk and onebillion was heart-warming, it gives a lot of hope for the future. We hope and pray that onebillion will achieve the goal for which it was founded and will try supporting it by encouraging more children to join the competition every year!
Some learning stays for life! Aalaya has been very inspired by the wonderful initiatives she has witnessed and this in turn with similar other experiences will help her grow as a responsible person.
THANK YOU again and keep up the good work!
Two ever grateful parents! 🙂
Aalaya at this year’s JLC final, where she came second
If you’d like to know more about the Junior Language Challenge, or you’re thinking of entering next year, please do feel free to contact us at jlc@eurotalk.com or visit eurotalk.com/jlc, where you can sign up to join the mailing list and be first to know all the details of the 2016 competition.
10 Years with the JLC – a Teacher’s story!
Here at EuroTalk we love hearing feedback from participants of the Junior Language Challenge! So when runner-up Aalaya Sanjeeva’s teacher Jackie Gliniecka from The Hawthorns School sent us this wonderful message about how she’s found being involved in the competition over the years, we had to share it with you 🙂
10 years ago, in 2005, we received a flyer from EuroTalk telling us about this competition, and we encouraged the children to enter it. It was an exciting adventure and we have repeated the experience every year since.
I remember so clearly, when we reached the semi-finals and I met Dick Howeson for the first time. His passion for languages and education, together with his compassion and drive to change the world, completely bowled me over; when talking about the competition to anyone and everyone who stands still for long enough to listen, I feel compelled to try and include a description of Dick. The best I can manage, to convey his wonderful energy, enthusiasm and gentle treatment of these young children combined with the fantastic difference that he encourages them all to make in the world, is a sort of cross between a kindly mad professor and a true saint! And what a fantastic team he has built up around him, too; Liz, who is always there to answer all queries in an incredibly efficient and kindly way so as to not scare the teachers and parents; Franco, who has the unenviable task of running the semi-finals and the finals with a rod of iron, yet maintaining a kindly, gentle, friendly demeanour so as not to scare the children; and countless others who make taking part in this competition a real joy.
Over the years, so many of my pupils have benefitted in so many ways from this wonderful competition; not only do they get the chance to try lots of different languages, thereby deepening their general knowledge of language and developing language learning strategies, but also it opens windows onto the world, helping to turn them into good global citizens, sowing the seeds that will encourage them, like Dick, to make a difference in the world. It is all done in such a gentle, fun way, encouraging independent learning, allowing the children to push themselves as far as they want to and at the same time helping the amazing work of the charities that the JLC support.
Aalaya has entered this competition 3 years in a row and has made the final each time. She was ecstatically happy to have come second this year and the whole school is so proud of her. This competition requires so much more than just the ability to acquire huge amounts of language in a very short space of time; you need a brilliant memory, a very cool head, nerves of steel, the ability to stay calm and focused and the faith to persevere under extreme pressure. What a brilliant set of skills to develop, and, although Aalaya has all these skills in bucketfuls, it has been so rewarding for me to see her develop and hone them enable her to achieve such a high standard in your competition.
The great thing is, though, as Dick always tells them, just to have entered makes them winners because of the good they are doing for others and the fun they have along the way!
Jackie (left) with Aalaya and her parents, alongside JLC champion Tudor Mendel-Idowu and fellow runners-up Cassandra Emmanuel and Isobel Eason
Look out for next week’s blog post to find out what second place finalist Aalaya and her mum Priya think about the Junior Language Challenge!
If you were part of the Junior Language Challenge in 2015 – or any previous year – and you’d like to share your story, please email us at jlc@eurotalk.com; we love hearing from our JLCers 🙂
