Vovaging Towards Excellence 4

 Extract No. 04

Page No. 81 [Lines, “As I climbed up ………  companies” ]

Watch this video and have some Fun

https://youtu.be/7Mkaz1CggaY

Read the first activity, read the extract and do all the activities that follow.

A1. Complete :           (02)

Complete the diagram by writing down the tendency of vernacular medium students while speaking English language.

  (This is a practice Activity for students)

            

As I climbed the stairs of my hostel room, my plan was ready in my mind. Normally most of us who are educated in vernacular languages such as Marathi, think in Marathi, before speaking in English, translate it in English and then somehow try to speak out these translated English sentences in an extremely awkward fashion.

I had decided that I would do nothing of this sort. I wanted to achieve excellence. This urge to excel in anything that you try to do has been with me since the childhood. Whether I would succeed in this or not, I always set my aims high. In this case too, I wanted to speak excellent, elegant and fluent English. 

The first thing I did was to start reading English newspapers and English novels. I studied etymology and phonetics and studied the roots of the words and how to pronounce them. I used to stand in front of the mirror and practice speaking, realising my mistakes and correcting them myself all the time and improvising and improving day by day. 

It took about 9-10 months by which time I started feeling quite confident about speaking in English at length with anybody. My fear had vanished and I started feeling at home in my hostel. In my future career, out of 32 years in Information Technology field, I was the Chief Executive or Managing Director or head of Software Company with thousands of software engineers worldwide. During that period I had to give several presentations or negotiate many contracts with the CEOs, Directors or VPs in the US, UK or Australia. I was absolutely at ease at that time. It is only due to the efforts at IIT that I could sign contracts worth millions of dollars worldwide and also run large global software companies.

A2. Describe :            (02)

Describe the efforts made by the writer to improve his English.

1. He started reading English newspapers and Novels.

2. He studied etymology and phonetics.

3. He studied the roots of the words and how to pronounce them.

4. He used to stand in front of the mirror and practice speaking, realising his mistakes and correct them all the time and improving and improvising day by day.

A3. Infer/ Interpret.            (02)                     

I had decided that I would do nothing of this sort. The above statement implies that……………….

A4. Personal Response :.      (02)

“If there is a will, there is a way,’’ Do you think this proverb justifies the above extract.

A5. Language study :.               (02)

1) As I climbed the stairs of my hostel room, my plan was ready in my mind.

(Use As soon as/ No Sooner…than construction and rewrite)

As soon as I climbed the stairs of my hostel room, my plan was ready in my mind

No sooner did I climb the stairs of my hostel room than my plan was ready in my mind.

2) I used to stand in front of the mirror.  (Rewrite the sentence using,” would”)

I would stand in front of the mirror.

3) My fear had vanished.

( Identify the tense used in the above sentence)

Past perfect Tense

4) I could sign contracts worth millions.

(Use be able to and Rewrite it.)

I was able to sign contracts worth millions.

A6. Vocabulary :             (02)

Find out words from the extract which mean the following.

a) Desire =     urge

b) Study of the origin of words = etymology

c) Arrange or workout = negotiate

d) Global = worldwide

Activities prepared by

TUSHAR J BAGWE.

K J SOMAIYA COLLEGE OF SCIENCE AND COMMERCE VIDYAVIHAR EAST MUMBAI 77

Mobile: 9820928141

E Mail ID tushar@somaiya.edu