Speak now or forever hold your peace..!

Speaking is a part of education that I have never been attracted to. The idea of speaking in front of total strangers in a classroom has always terrified me. Throughout my 12 years of education in Kuwait, I never gave a speech or a presentation without mumbling and being nervous. I decided to change my attitude towards speaking before I came to the U.S. I knew that in American universities presentation and speeches are a big part of the learning process and thus, I took a one year program in CSUF called the American Language program for international students. Throughout that year I developed myself in English and got a solid base of the language. I found an American roommate to live with. He was of great help to me. He helped me improve my accent, gain some new vocabulary, and made me meet his friends and practice speaking in English with them. I became a fluent and a confident speaker. After that I realized that my fear of speaking was not because of the lack of confidence in my self, but it was because of not knowing the English language good enough to speak it. I then started to watch more American movies, listen to American songs, read English literature, and start conversations with native speakers such as my neighbors and classmates. I also started speaking in English with my Kuwaiti friends here in California for the sake of practice. I was criticized and laughed on at the beginning; being an Arabic speaker speaking in English around other Arabic speakers. But after that my friends started to get the reason why I did that and became more helpful and encouraging. Speaking has become something that I look forward to. As a result I took the HCOM 101 class, which is all about presentations and public speaking. I am encountering with native speakers more and more with every day I spend in the United States. Also, my pronunciation became better and better with practice. Back when I was in Kuwait I used to speak English and I thought that I pronounced the words correctly but after I came to the states I figured out that I miss pronounced half the words I knew. The best moment of my ALP year in CSUF was when my public speaking teacher told me that she heard a southern accent when I was presenting. At this moment of my life I am very proud with what I have accomplished. After being a hesitant speaker in both Arabic and English, I became a better speaker in Arabic and a fluent speaker in English, give or take some grammatical mistakes and some pronunciations. I am seeking to improve more and more until I reach a point where I don’t count English as a second language. I am planning to take more public speaking classes and presentation classes too. Finally, I would like to point out that the biggest role in improving my speaking abilities goes to my dedicating teachers, which I will be forever grateful for the efforts.