The end

For this last post regarding my overall experience at Éco-Quartier NDG, I must say that I did not firmly believe that my English would improve that much. After six weeks as an intern in a completely Anglo-speaking environment, I proved myself wrong.

 

 

 

My Goals

My objectives have been my reason and motivation to travel and work hard each day to Notre-Dame-de-Grâce every Wednesday. All this time, energy and effort has brought me more than I had hoped. I have learned a lot of vocabulary words, meanings and above all I have had the chance to practice my English with great people. By doing so, I have reached my initial goal of enriching and expanding my vocabulary as well as my knowledge of the English language.

First, I wanted to use new expressions and apply them to my everyday speaking habits. So far, this has happened once and I can remember it clearly. I was very proud to have used a new idiom in an appropriate context.

Additionally, I wanted to become a more self-assured speaker. In all the challenges that I have faced, this is the achievement that I am most proud to have overcome. My fear of being judged was one of my biggest problems. This prevented me from expressing my ideas clearly and made me stutter most of the time. Simple exercises like speaking on the phone or starting to make eye contact has helped me in such a way that they remind me to always apply them to any conversation that I engage into; as much in French than in English. Monitoring also helped me heaps thanks to the telephone calls, causing me to control my fluency and getting my message across better.

 

 

Strategies

At the beginning of my internship, I had the intention of ¨Speaking to myself¨ and ¨Interacting in any way possible¨ as strategies in order to become a better language learner. I recall thinking that speaking to myself would make me practice my pronunciation but it hasn’t been effective at all since I wouldn’t speak alone to myself in the middle of a work place. That would not make much sense since the goal was to work there to interact to speak to actual people… silly me. Instead, I used the ¨monitoring myself¨ and the ¨body language¨ strategies (I forgot the actual name of the last one) which were more effective than I would have ever thought. I am more laid back and concentrated on what I am saying. I am now more conscientious of how I get my message across rather than what I get across. I didn’t realize that the problem resided in the way I expressed myself rather than the organisation of the content I wanted to project. I still used the ¨Interacting in any way possible¨ although I guess that everyone and anyone that tries to express themselves in any way possible if they really want to get their point across.

 

Language

I do not want to seem redundant, however, I have in fact expanded my vocabulary and as I felt gratified by my spontaneous usage of a random expression, I am sure to use all the words that I can in order to keep them fresh in my mind without forgetting them. Expressions, idioms, words, I want to benefit of my ability to use every new term. I am now more conscious and on the lookout for new ways I could use and exploit the English language to my advantage. I am also working on the way that I speak and express my ideas.

Growth

As I have stated earlier in my blog, I did not think that I would actually learn a lot of aspects in the English language. Despite my initial thoughts on the subject, I have in fact learned more than what I expected and more particularly, I have used strategies that I never would have thought useful. I genuinely feel that I have grown as a person as well as a language learner by becoming more conscious about how I interact but also about the environment. I have learned many ecological facts and received a lot of information on what to recycle, where to drop the items you don’t know where to throw away like fridges, armchairs, glass, metal, etc.

   

I have learned that there are people that really want to make this world a better place, that there are people that are willing to help the community at any time and that they are fighting for our planet. I learned that there is still faith for the future of our Earth, that there is hope to restore what is being destroyed and damaged, that it takes ever a minority to make a huge difference. You hear it on television but having been there in the heat of the moment, it really pays off to come back home and feel that you’ve made a difference in the world, even in the slightest way. It feels amazing to do something so significant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The internship

It has been an excellent experience and I feel that I have definitely been at the right place at the right time. This has helped me in so many aspects of my life and it is something that I have no regrets about, I would do it all over again. It is truly an effective way to help a student become more confident, to make one more responsible and there is so much to learn. It gave me an entirely different aspect on life, as philosophical as that sounds. It undeniably made a difference in my life.

 

 

Gratitude

It is quite obvious that I am thankful to the Eco-Quartier team to have accepted me into their little family. It has been an incredible journey and I now know more about what I want to do later in life. I have discovered that this world needs this kind of people, that one act can influence a whole chain of events. Éco-Quartier helps not only the environment, but the community as well. It is a great place to meet some people and have a good time. It is easy to fit in and they make you feel very welcomed. I am immensely thankful to what they have brought me, to what they have made me realise and to help me become a better person. I am now more motivated than ever to use my acquired knowledge.

 

 

The placement

For me, the placement has been absolutely spot-on. I could not have hoped for a better place to be an intern. I recommend this place to everyone and anyone that is looking for a dynamic place to work at. There are various tasks that make you explore and practice the English language in a way that everyone gets the help they need in a very cool and laid back atmosphere. I have truly enjoyed the whole time I was an intern at Éco-Quartier NDG.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This has been the ideal experience for me to improve my English while providing me information about culture.