In a DreyerCoaching Teacher Team meeting the other day, one teacher told us a story about when she was working with an adult student. To respect his privacy, we will call him “Wayne.” (This is the same “Wayne” mentioned in his story “Knowing English helped Wayne in Las Vegas.”)

The teacher explained that Wayne was a leader in a high-tech company in the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park, Taiwan’s so-called “Silicon Valley.” As a leader who needed some help with his English, he sought out DreyerCoaching. In his 1 on 1 business English classes, Wayne asked for help with writing emails, reports, and listening to conference calls he had recorded.

Those calls often involved people from the US and England who spoke English as a native language. The calls often included people from France and Brazil too, who spoke English as a second language and so they had pretty strong accents. In all, understanding these calls was a challenge for Wayne so he would sometimes make recordings and discuss them later sentence by sentence with his teacher in class, until he understood all that had been said. In this way, Wayne gradually but greatly improved his listening skills and ability to effectively participate in phone calls in English.

Because Wayne’s English was improving, his boss once asked him to write the official company Chinese New Year’s cards to send to vendors and clients. Wayne wanted to make sure his grammar was correct, so he showed his letter to his DreyerCoaching teacher. One line said something like, “We will be closing our doors from January 15-30.”

Of course, Wayne was trying to write English…while thinking in Chinese. We call that “Chinglish.” In Chinese, “close doors” can mean “take a break for awhile.” However, in English, it can mean a company is going out of business for good! So, you can see how that could cause a huge misunderstanding! Imagine if a company in California had just made a big order with Wayne and gave them a large sum of money. If a few days later they get an email from Wayne saying “we are closing our doors,” the Americans might fear their money is gone forever!

To make things clear, the teacher told Wayne that he needed to express his idea in another way. Here are three examples:

• In honor of the Chinese New Year, we will be closed from January 15-30.
• In observance of Chinese New Year, we will be closed from January 15-30.
• No one will be in our offices from January 15-30, but we look forward to serving you after that time.

在本周的一次教师会议上，罗森鲍姆老师讲了一个关于新竹科学园区一位商人的有趣故事。 她在帮他提高英语写作，他让她校对老板让他写的春节信。 他写道，“我们将关门大吉”，因为他想解释公司将因假期休息关闭。 然而，罗森鲍姆老师解释说，在英语中，当一家企业“关门”时，这意味着他们要倒闭了！ 很感谢地，因为那个商人有一位 DreyerCoaching 老师作为他的向导，他才避免了那个错误可能带来的尴尬。

DreyerCoaching 不仅帮助儿童。 我们也帮助成年人！ 无论您是想在工作、旅行、学习、移民、编辑出版方面获得英语帮助，还是想跟上您孩子的英语水平，我们都可以提供帮助！

English is a crazy language and “Chinglish” can be hard to avoid, but do not be afraid. You can get a personal guide to better English from DreyerCoaching. Contact us today to find out more!

Since 2010, based in the friendly USA State of Virginia, DreyerCoaching.com has been providing customized, high-quality, real-time language instruction via the internet to a global audience in their home, school, or office. Think how comfortable, confident and successful you or your child will feel, receiving personalized guidance from college-educated teachers who are native speakers and have bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees plus decades of teaching experience. Whether you are looking for help with the ABCs or the SATs, or college admissions to conversational English to business writing, we serve all ages and levels to help our students make dreams come true. Discover the Dreyer Difference. Take the first step and visit DreyerCoaching.com, send Scott an email, or schedule a free consultation to get started. 

自 2010 年以来，DreyerCoaching.com 总部位于友好的美国弗吉尼亚州，一直通过互联网向全球观众在家中、学校或办公室提供有制度的、高质量的实时语言教学。 想想您或您的孩子会感到多么自在、自信和成功，从受过大学教育的教师那里获得个别的指导，这些教师都是以英语为母语，拥有学士、硕士和博士学位，以及数十年的教学经验的教师。 无论是从 英语ABC的基础课程 或 SAT 的帮助，就读美国高中，大学入学申请，还是从会话英语到商务写作，我们都为所有年龄和水平的学生提供服务，帮助我们的学生实现梦想。 发觉 Dreyer 的不同之处。 迈出第一步，游览 DreyerCoaching.com网站，向 Scott 发送电子邮件，可开始安排一个免费咨询。