i know we have a lot of people on subeta who are not native english speakers, so as a native english speaker, i'm curious: what do you think is the hardest part about learning english?

When I was younger the most difficult part for me was the grammar. Especially the part where I wanted to use the grammar of my native language on English. It wouldn't be wrong- but it would sound off.

At this point I'm mostly afraid of making obvious mistakes- even though I have a degree in English now (but that's why I'm afraid of it, it would make my degree look bad lol).

Oh and I hate pronunciation. If I don't practice often enough my pronunciation deteriorates and my accent slips in. Accents are impossible to get rid of in the first place.

The grammar rules make absolutely no sense. i before e except after c? there are actually more words spelled with ei than ie in the english language. Verb conjugations are insane as well. And don't even get me started on pronunciation. Like... Though, through, bough..? but then pony and bologna rhyme (in american english)?

Nothing. I've been faced with French grammar and .. I've seen hell lmao.

Probably grammar. I found 'L' words hard to say, not so much anymore, but when I was first learning English it was like WTF?! Also English is quite a flat language and non-tonal unless you're angry or happy etc, which was something I found difficult at first annnnddd probably phrases like "He wants that" or "She likes this" adding the 's' took a while for me to get use to so i'd say "She like this". XD I'm kind of ok with English now though.

Idioms can be hard to learn because you just have to know and remember them. There's no logic to them and no way to deduce what's correct. Like Wuppie, I have a degree in English (as a foreign language, obviously), I use it every day all day at work and outside work quite a bit too, and I still need to check idioms from different sources :P

Oh, and commas! I've been told I use too much commas in English. Probably because my native Finnish punctuation rules seep through ^^

But for the most part, English is easy. For example German is a lot harder, at least for me, because there are lots and lots of things like the English idioms, stuff you simply must learn by heart. With my memory, that can be a right pain.

I'm really bad at pronunciation. I'd say I write fluently, but... if you heard me speak, you'd think I suck at English. XD It's a matter of practice, I suppose. And writing is easier because you have more time to think about the words you're using.

I also remember having trouble with it's and its, but right now I can't figure out why?

Lmao I agree about the commas. I LOVE COMMAS. As a Finnish person, I'm horrified about the lack of them in English. I just add them everywhere. :D

English is my native language and even I struggle with grammar and spelling. I have a learning disability, so I was in special ed during a lot of those grammar lessons.

I maybe going to grad school and studying Russian History and Culture. If I do, I'm going to have to learn Russian and that really intimidates me

The hardest part for me was (and still is, though not as much) vowel pronunciation. French is my native language and we have accents on our vowels to identify how they're supposed to be enunciated. English is a bit of a guessing game when it comes to that, and some words are pronounced differently depending on where you are too.

The most difficult thing was accepting that things are wrote one way and pronounced another. My mother tongue has a much more difficult grammar so I had less difficulties with that compared to the pronunciation rules. I will never understand the reasoning behind having the words written in a certain way but pronounced differently. It makes it necessary to memorize a word twice. What the heck, man...

Definitely agree with those who say pronunciation! Though, tough, through, trough... They all look so similar yet are pronounced so differently! And why are there two ways to pronounce 'either'? That's also why I'm super afraid of speaking English, I always think that my accent sounds stupid or I pronounce something wrong.

Here's a little story from 7 years ago when a man who visited us offered me something to eat:

Me: No thank you, I try to eat vegan (pronounced like in 'vegetarian', so basically 've-jen') English-speaking man: Umm.. what? Me: Vegan. Man: Vegetarian? Me: No, vegan!

• awkward silence - Me, trying to explain: No milks, no eggs Man: Oooh, you mean vegan! (pronounced correctly)

That was so embarassing for 14 year old me! 😦 But honestly, why is the 'g' in vegan not pronounced the same way as in vegetables or vegetarian? That doesn't make any sense to me.

And an 's' after 'th' is impossible to pronounce for me (which sucks as a former Hearthstone player :D). Luckily there aren't too many words that end on 'ths/thes' but my most hated english word was always 'clothes'... cloffthhss... eh, no, I can't.

because i learned english almost exclusively by writing and reading, pronunciation is still something i sometimes struggle with. ; D ; some of the words i mispronounce most often include spinach (i always thought it was like spine-ach), months, pyramid, tortoise... i also usually have to turn on english subs for movies where the characters have thick accents ('apocalypse now' comes to mind) because i can't understand anything. american accents especially give me trouble. orz

but, funny enough, i actually consider english my first language. i write much better in english than in italian although i speak italian better. i just happen to value writing more than speaking haha.

pronouncing words with th just kill me, like heath. I say it in a very weird way. also, hard words like pronounciation or whatever.

I'm a native English speaker but from the ages of when I began babbling up to age 10 I had to go to Speech Classes in school because I couldn't speak English. I wasn't speaking another language but I didn't know how to pronounce words. They called it a speech impediment. I still have it where I mispronounce words and sounds because my brain tries to repeat the word and it gets confused. Here is an example of my speech impediment.

Air conditioner, you know the thing that keeps you cool in the summer, as a child, I called it an ish-condisher (e-sh cond-ish-er).

I call Jack Sparrow (Jack Spa-arrow). There are other words I still can't say but that's okay.

I'm a native english speaker, but my parents are not. My parents are originally from Taiwan and even though they've been living in the US for 20-30 years now they still mispronounce words and get their english grammar wrong all the time. I actually remember as a kid correcting my mother's english homework. She took ESL classes via a tutor through the public library and I would help her with word pronunciation and grammar pronunciation.

I still help my parents write letters and things of that nature whenever they need more fluid, grammatically correct english because they're both the type that will write simplistic english where they'll forget articles whenever they have to write anything in english since they're used to Chinese grammer and speaking Chinese most of the time to others. They only speak english/mandarin to me and my brother, but everyone else( the bulk of their friends are Chinese speaking) they speak mandarin or Taiwanese to.

Anywho, I'm babbling, but even now, and my mother speaks relatively fluent english considering it's her second language, but she mixes r/l sounds. She'll pronounce things like halls harrs if she's not paying attention and her accent becomes particularly strong. I've also noticed with a lot of my foreign cousins that their english will be almost impeccable written( spoken tends to be 50/50 most of the time with some of my cousins having amazing spoken and written english and some of my cousins having better written english, but bad spoken english) but that they'll usually forget articles when writing to me in english.

Both of my parents have that issue as well when writing.