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English has always been my 'favourite' language, but it's not until recently that I've started to think about what areas in the language I'm good at and what I need to practice more. In this essay I am going to try and assess my strengths and weaknesses in the English language in the aspects of listening, reading, speaking and writing. 
Listening to English has never been of that great difficulty to me since I've always enjoyed listening to it, especially in lyrics, and that is probably why I don't find it that difficult: I see it as an enjoyment! I believe my listening skills developed a lot during the ten months I spent in London working as au- pair. The family I worked for was English so I heard the language every day, both at work and in my social life. When you live in a place where everyone speaks English you don't have another choice but to try to understand what is being said, which makes you listen more carefully. What I do have difficulties with is when people are talking really fast, or in interviews on television or radio, when difficult vocabulary is being used. Then I tend to give up trying to understand what the conversation is about.
	The problem with vocabulary is something that I also notice when I read. Because I find English such a beautiful language I've developed a taste for reading literature written in English and most of the time I don't have any problems with understanding the plot, whereas I sometimes find that I concentrate more on finding words I don't understand than on the story. Reading different sorts of texts is something we didn't get to practice much in school, so the problem with difficult words can also occur when I'm reading an English magazine or newspaper where, I think, there can be a lot of special vocabulary used in articles on specific subjects. 
	I believe that of these four my strongest skill is speaking. Working as au- pair gave me the opportunity to practice frequently because I had to talk to the children and their parents every day, and of course in other situations such as in the pub, and when talking to friends. I also took a course in English as a Foreign Language, where speaking was emphasised. My pronunciation improved, and because of all the practice I became more fluent in my speaking. Still, I can be a bit nervous when I speak, and especially when it's not done spontaneously and I really don't want to make any mistakes, for example when I'm giving a talk in school. When I speak I sometimes hear myself say the wrong word or inflect a verb incorrectly during the conversation and I think that has to do with me both being a bit nervous and also with not having that good knowledge of grammar. 
This also affects my writing. Grammar has always been something I've more or less ignored and I tend to write, and say, what I think sounds correct. This, I have noticed, doesn't work that well. I don't consider myself being a good writer and I've never been that fond of writing in neither Swedish nor English, which has probably got to do with the fact that I'm not very imaginative when it comes down to writing. Basic informal letters, and the like, I can manage, but as soon as it gets a bit more complicated like writing a story or an article I have difficulties in expressing myself the correct way. A great deal of course is to blame on my poor grammar skills.
	Without have lived and worked in London I don't think my English would have developed that much. Learning more words in order to get a wider vocabulary is something I think is important and this course will hopefully help me to do so. Unfortunately you don't get grammar skills for free, and grammar is what gives me the most problems when speaking, reading and writing, so that is what I will have to concentrate on this term.
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