Je m'appelle Gabriel, et j'apprends le français.

Introduction

       My name is Gabriel. I was born in Taipei, and stayed there until I was two years old. Then I moved to an ancient and cultural city, Tainan. Finishing my study in Tainan Second Senior High School, I was fortunately enrolled in Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Chung Cheng University in Chiayi. I used to live with my mother and father, who passed away in the last summer of my high school. I have an older brother, who lives in the north, and he is exactly the man who made me want to major in engineering. I have always respected him, because of his wide knowledge in science.

Professional Study

News has been existing for a very long time, and there have been many types of sources of news likewise. Among so many ways by which news is conveyed, I prefer to watch new on TVs. I believe sending the latest message through TVs is the best way, because it's fast, illustrated, and abundant.

Live new can always surprise me. I still remember being shocked, four years ago, when I was watching cartoons, the screen showed that the president was shot. If the news shows in others ways, I think it will take a long while for me to know. Therefore, the speed of TV news is amazing.

Another convenience is the illustration. The reporter will tell the audience what's happening. If I saw an interesting picture on newspapers, I'd like to know the story immediately, and I don't need to spend much time reading the whole content. Radio news may meet my demand, but it's in lack of pictures.

Many people consider success to equal to money. The rich are truly abundant of physical conditions, but I don't think this means they are successful. I think one man's success is based on his relationship between people, his family, and self-esteem.

A person's relationship between him and others explains how successful he controls his emotion and has good manners. I want to take an employer of my friend's for example. His employer is extremely rich, but stingy and mean. Most of his employees don't like him. Such a person is successful in business, but nobody likes him. I have a friend who might not have much money, but is always sincere to his friends. Years later, when he needs help, I believe a lot of people will passionately give him a hand. I believe this is success.

The next important factor is the harmony of the family. If the father knows nothing but make money, ignoring the existence of the families, his families will just become farther and farther. The father maybe supports his family, but he won't gain the respect from his children. For the children, their father is more like an ATM. That's not success.

Some people think that they don't need schools, and all that they need is just books. In their opinions, all of the knowledge can be passed down by paper. I have to say I could not agree with them. Books are not everything. As an ancient Chinese proverb goes, "if you believe in everything in books, I would rather you don't have any books." Of course, books are important; however, experience should not be excluded when studying.

Books have limited space, and limited time to convey knowledge. Authors are human beings too, they can't know everything. When writing a book, authors must abandon some things, which the author considers unimportant, or which is unable to tell on paper. However, if a student believes only books, he doesn't go out and take a look at things beyond books, he will also be limited.

Books don't give all kinds of examples. When reading books, I don't think a person could easily understand everything. Sometimes he might think he knows everything in books, but when he tries to use what he learns on other real things in the real world, he might find there are too many factors not mentioned in books. Sometimes, experiences help to give a hand.

Most of students are not satisfied with their school. Not surprisingly, I am one of them. If I had the power, I would like to solve the accommodating problem in my university. The number of available beds is in severe lack. I think the school should provide more opportunities to live in student dorms.

Living in the dormitory is more secure and safer. My university is located in the countryside of southern Taiwan. It’s a little discrete around my school. After sunset, the school becomes quite discrete, and this has caused some safety problems. Stealers can easily get into a vacant room without appropriate security. However, people need ID cards to get through the door, and when they stand infront of thr door, their faces are recorded by cameras.To live in a safe place enable students to concentrate on their studies.

The other reason I think there should be more room available is based on the economic aspect. Our school is a non-profit and governmental organization, so the school could provide economic and acceptable price. Some students might be rich and want to have his own room; however, other students might not afford to live outside. I think the school has the responsibility to take good of such students. Thus, more rooms should be provided for those who don’t want to live outside and who don’t afford the rental outside.

In one’s lifetime, a person experiences many different stages, and he also has to do some changes to meet the demands in every stage. Yet what accompanies or helps everyone to pass through difficulties or dilemmas is his attitude. Growing from a naive child to a mature elder, a person constantly changes his attitude. In my opinion, I think people change their attitudes in their adolescence, their summer of life, and agedness.

In adolescence, people say goodbye to past childish deeds and somewhat start to think about their future seriously. I think people in this stage know that they are no longer children, their parents are expecting them, and after getting along with so many different kinds of other people, they become more mentally mature. People begin to have their goals. Some people think studying hard is the key to success, whereas others don’t think a diploma is the most import part of their future. Anyway, self-awareness appears.

When it comes to the summer of life, people begin to think about things from different angles. After graduating from school, people transfer their core of life to their careers and families. Out of great ambition or the will to better physical conditions, people abandon their previous simplicity and turn tactful, as well as sophisticated. This is irresistible, and is to survive this complicated society.

Recently, the trend to study abroad has been more and more obvious. What on earth has motivated those people to go overseas and be willing to study in another country? In my opinion, I think the reasons are mainly the sharpening of language skills, the pursuit of deep knowledge, and the expansion of an individual’s horizons.

A foreign country provides the best environment for foreign language learning. When studying abroad, a learner could improve both professional language usages, basic daily conversations, and furthermore, speaking skills. Take English for example. In domestic schools, English is taught as if it were merely a school study, rather than a language. Most students are trained to take tests, not to communicate in English. I consider it a very significant gain when studying abroad.

It’s easy to become a professor, but it’s not quite easy to become an A+ professor. I think the difference between an A+ professor and a common teacher is some specific characters. To win the respect from his students, a professor should be understanding in his students’ hard points, responsible for his teaching and good at interacting.

A professor should place himself in the student’s position. When giving lectures, he should adjust his teaching material according to the students’ learning situation, rather than indulge himself in his own professional world, or show off some very difficult knowledge. If the lecture is too hard or most of the students do not understand the lecture very well, the professor should slow down the steps or spend more time to explain. It is even a professor that has something unfamiliar to him. Therefore, standing in others’ shoes is very important.

A professor of responsibility has a positive effect to his students. If it is the professor himself that always gets late, asks for leave of absence, or even fails to answer the students’ questions, how does he demand those in front of the platform to give him respect as a teacher? In the long run, they become more and more inattentive and unconcerned. This lowers the study efficiency and weakens the learning will. Namely, a teacher without the sense of responsibility gives bad examples, and makes his students become just as irresponsible as he.

Nowadays, learning has become easier and more varied than before, but do all of the students know how to learn correctly? Or the progress becomes the bias instead? Most of now students don’t know how to learn effectively and efficiently. In my opinion, successful students should contain three important factors, successful attitudes, good time management, and the participation of extracurricular activities. 

Right attitudes are the key to the door of knowledge; however, successful attitudes lead students to success. Successful students have a winning attitude. They have both the determination and the self-discipline necessary for success. Successful students are always well-prepared in class, while common students only get prepared for tomorrow’s test. They show their curiosity and explore anything they don’t know. The questions conceived in their minds are more than the exercises in textbooks, and their initiative makes them more flexible, so they could come up with more ways to solve problems.

Good time management explains the sense of responsibility of a student. In college, the reason why students are unable to do things as scheduled, like attending class late or handing in homework late, is mostly sitting up all night long playing online games or fooling around with friends on weekends. This shows many of the students are in lack of the sense of responsibility. As students, finishing homework and attending class on time are both basic duties, but they totally don’t sense that the time spent on entertainment has minimized the time they could capitalize on. Therefore, good time management is quite paramount.