Autobiography

My journey with languages began since a very young age. My mom is Polish and
my dad is Lebanese. I was born in Poland and lived there for 4 years on and off. I later
moved to Libya where I lived for 5 years. Then, I moved to Lebanon where I stayed until
I moved to Poland for my Masters half a year ago. Therefore, as its evident, I had quite
some experience with languages and learning them.

When I born in Poland, the language that my family used around me was mainly
Polish with the exception of my father who would see me every couple of months and
talk in Arabic because he didnt know any Polish. So the first language I encountered was
Polish. My mom recalls having said MAMA in a Polish accent as my first ever word.
Later on, I moved to Libya and that was when all the chaos with acquiring languages
began. My father and mother used to communicate in Russian. However, mom was in
process of learning to speak Arabic and Dad just started learning Polish. I went to a
British nursery in a British Camp where children from multi nationalities were present,
from British to Indian to Arabs from various countries with different accents. Apparently,
as my mom told me, at the beginning of talking, I wouldnt say much. Mom was afraid
my speech delay is a serious problem. However, I probably was just confused with all
those languages which one to use first. My mom tells me that I had a big picture book
with many pictures in it and I would show her what I want using it. Looking at my book
reports from my KG1 and KG 2, it says as I recall, I cant very much express myself, but
again, who could blame a 5 year old with at least 4 different languages circulating around
her? As I recall my childhood in Libya, my classes consisted from learning centers and a
lot of showing and telling. I even have my diary as a 5 year old with sentences describing
pictures that I drew of what I did on the weekend or something I would like to write
about. Since I was born till the age of 7 I lived between two countries. When I was in
Poland for 6 months, I would attend a public nursery nearby. However, I only remember
the trips and nap times I had. I did however, learn some basic Polish as I suppose.
 Later on was the stage where I moved to Lebanon. I entered a world where Arabic
was the main language. I remember it was quite weak and lacked the basic structures and
fluency in a Native Speaker. However, dad refused to admit me to the American System
at School, and so just like any other Lebanese person, I had Arabic classes. All schools in
Lebanon are trilingual with English, Arabic and French as compulsory languages of
instruction. I was in a school where I mainly had English language, Math, and all the
Sciences in English with Arabic language, Geography, History, Civics in Arabic. I also
had French which was considered a second language. I was completely lost. School was
very difficult for me when I was in elementary and very demanding. I had to learn French
on my own since no one spoke French in my family and dad did not have time to help me
since times were rough back then. I remember later on when I moved to Middle School
and High School; I changed schools and went to a better school. French was now being
taught by native speakers. I remember they did not speak Arabic with us at all and many
times we went through this cycle where neither we nor the teacher were able to
understand each other. I can recall that there were a lot of drilling and memorizing tables,
grammar rules and vocabulary. Teachers depended more on the course-books and just
went on and on according to the table of content. I do remember, I wasnt very fond of
the French language, and so I had a lot of problems. I still have problems with the
pronunciation of many words correctly and I could very weakly design a correct sentence
even though I studied French for 10 years at school. The focus in our French classes was
more on the form, syntax and semantics, but our conversational skills were a bit ignored.
On the other hand, English language became my passion. We had excellent teachers
using American books from Glencoe/McGraw Hill Literature books from grade 7 to 12th
grade to Houghton Mifflin textbooks when we were in elementary classes. Arabic on the
other hand was difficult, but I caught it since everyone around me spoke Arabic and my
relatives only spoke it, so with time I became proficient in it as well,

As a matter of fact, I graduated from High School in the Philosophy Division, so I

had English and Arabic literature as well as Philosophy in Arabic and Psychology in
English. I had extended Geography and History in Arabic too. It turned out pretty good
for me because I studied translation for 2 years, but then I decided teaching is more
interesting and interactive so I changed majors. However, I do hold a grudge against the
ways we were taught French. Learning it was never fun. As young kids, I see the
importance of having games, chants, songs, and more hands on activities to learn a new
language. It was rarely interactive and mostly dictations, repetition of words, quizzes,
saying out loud what weve memorized and writing short essays. Maybe if French was
taught differently, then I would have known to say something with complete confidence.
However, after school, I rarely used it and that could have deteriorated my abilities to
speak it too.