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Living, as I do, on the 14th floor of an appartment block I am sometimes trapped in an elevator for at least a minute with one of my neighbours. Usually a polite greeting is enough to keep the atmosphere comfortable, but from time to time my fellow passenger is someone with an interest in English.

The other day I was accompanied on my long and slow descent to ground level by a lady of advancing years with an apparent enthusiasm for languages. She said she spoke Portuguese and Spanish, but that her English was not improving. Anyway, the reason I bring this up, is that the dear lady asked me the fatal question : “My English just doesn’t get any better - what should I do?”.

That ‘What should I do?’ sent me into the usual headspin, grappling desperately in my mind for a suitably pithy but helpful response. I ended up smiling and saying in a trance-like voice ‘Yes, I wonder what you should do’! You see, when it comes to the crunch you can only do what you want to do and I don’t see how any amount of advice from anyone else is going to change anything. So let me say now, what I should have said then :

PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE !!!

AND THEN PRACTICE SOME MORE.

OH YES, AND DON’T FORGET TO

STUDY THE GRAMMAR

AND LEARN SOME VOCAB!

If you don’t know what you need to do to improve your English, then I’m afraid there is not much I can say that is going to help you. If I have to give a serious answer then let me say ‘you need some good study materials, a decent dictionary, some free time, and if possible some friendly natives with whom to shoot the breeze’. It’s down to you and the effort you are prepared to make, and, importantly, your conceptualization of the necessity of English for you and your life.

That last bit sounded a bit technical, so let me break it down for you. If you are Japanese and living in Japan the probability is that you DON’T NEED English!! However, in order to get good at English you need to convince yourself that it is in fact necessary. We usually manage to remember important things in our daily lives, because we perceive them to be important or necessary. So, the same goes for your English (or anything else you are studying) - you need to convince yourself - and believe more fervently than the most radical religious fundamentalist - that good English is essential for you and that your future survival depends on it. The rest depends on the sincerity of your effort and how much free time you have to study or practice.

So, there it is - now you know what to do. No excuses will be accepted!!!