The first semester of Mrs. Grant’s tenth-grade Latin class was devoted to vocabulary memorization and sentence completion, leaving me with memories of chiming, “Matella est mater. Flavius est pater.”

Although I had never studied a foreign language before, I remember thinking, “Even if Latin is a dead language, there must be a more lively way of learning and teaching it.” I have since traveled extensively, lived in other countries, and learned other languages. As my current passion for teaching developed, I often thought of Mrs. Grant’s Latin class as the antithesis of what I aimed for my classroom to be like.

At age twenty-four, I was building a career as a restaurateur and earning a lucrative living when I rediscovered my passion for learning and for teaching through evening courses in French and seminars in teaching English as a second language. In particular, I realized my profound interest in teaching English to speakers of other languages, and so I made the difficult but ultimately invaluable decision to study in the Second Language Teaching program at theUniversityofOttawa.

In this program, my interest evolved from a focus on teaching young adults to teaching adults at the post-secondary level. Opportunities to apply my knowledge in the classroom, in combination with my experiences learning two languages in foreign contexts, have served as integral guides to the development of my own approach to teaching second languages.

In the classroom, it is particularly important for me to understand the second language learner’s point of view and use humor and real-life situations to get a point across. Yet a teacher's work goes beyond these techniques. In order to further understand the political, economical, social, and cultural issues underlying educational policies and procedures, I wish to join the Master of Education program atColumbiaUniversity. This foundation will serve as the critical bridge needed to further my career as an educator.

Through my undergraduate studies in second language teaching, I developed my interest in pursuing research on the question of how sociocultural factors impact awareness in second language design, implementation, and assessment in a multicultural community versus those in a culturally homogeneous community. In my experience, moreover, sociocultural factors affect schooling in a variety of areas, including culture, gender identities, power roles, class markers and social markers. Research in this area as part of my studies atColumbiawill therefore help fill a pressing, practical educational need.

Finally, while conducting this research, I hope to expand my analytical, statistical and examinationskills, and later to bring to my teaching an increased awareness of issues currently affecting educational pedagogy. The Master of Education program will therefore provide me with theeducational foundation to fully realize my professional and personal goals.

文章點(diǎn)評：

大綱：文章開篇點(diǎn)出第二語言教學(xué)的精髓。隨后闡述了自己對這個(gè)專業(yè)興趣產(chǎn)生的原因，并從個(gè)人興趣轉(zhuǎn)移談到了第二語言教學(xué)的教學(xué)方法，并且從不斷的實(shí)踐中對教法有了不斷的深入。對于自己技能的提高過程給了一定的說明。最后在實(shí)踐中發(fā)現(xiàn)了第二語言教學(xué)的精髓所在就是“社會與文化的因素如何影響第二語言在那些類似同等的文化團(tuán)體中的計(jì)劃”。

主題：作者通過自身的經(jīng)歷發(fā)現(xiàn)了對第二語言教育的興趣。把自己的將來的理想定位在第二語言教學(xué)上，引出自己學(xué)習(xí)的必要性。

取材：整篇文章以作者的經(jīng)歷為題材，通過自身的經(jīng)歷來渲染整篇的文章。讓讀者能了解到，他對該專業(yè)的興趣并且為這一興趣作了哪些工作，而且逐漸專業(yè)經(jīng)歷的積累又讓他明白了該專業(yè)精髓所在，而此時(shí)又明確了未來專業(yè)學(xué)習(xí)的方向。

借鑒：作者沒有象其他作者只是詳細(xì)的描寫一些過程，是深度對教學(xué)方法進(jìn)行了說明，而第二語言教學(xué)正式看重申請人在教學(xué)方法的鉆研和興趣。

這篇文章主要的成功之處在于能從專業(yè)自身的特點(diǎn)出發(fā)，結(jié)合自己的興趣明確未來專業(yè)學(xué)習(xí)方向