United Kingdom and United States, these two are different countries which speak the same language in general, English. They both are also included in the western domain. But does everyone know? Even though these countries are quite similar in particular things, there are also numerous differences which can be seen. The obvious difference between these two could be in the accent that they use when they speak. Those who have learned English will actually be familiar hearing the term “British and American”. Well, British is an accent used by the UK society while American is usually an accent of the US society. It may seem quite easy to differentiate those accents by hearing it. But for people who study English as a foreign language especially, knowing the distinction within these two accents in detail is a need. It may be hard to master both languages, but at least it is a need to know some major distinctions between them. There are three major differences of British and American accents such as: the word, the stress and the pronunciation.

Begin with the differences of word. There are several different terms of saying something although actually that term refers to the same things in these two accents. For instance, to address a football game by eleven players, British calls it as ‘football’ yet, American calls it ‘soccer’. Another examples are; the term of fried potato. British uses the term “chips” while American calls it as ‘French fries’, British says ‘sport shoes’ which refers to ‘sneaker’ in American accent, British usually labels a long-styled pants as ‘Trouser’ yet, American just calls it ‘Pants’.

Move on to the stress which occurs between those accents. There are several examples of how British and American settle of the stress position in words. Let say the word ‘garage’ as an example, American accent will probably be stressing the utterance in ‘r-a-g-e’. In contrast, British will put the stress on syllables ‘g-a-r’. Another example is on the word ‘advertisement’, The stress will comes out from the alphabet a-d in American accent while the syllables ‘t-i-s-e’ are the stress points in British.

The last major difference is the pronunciation. This matter is usually the most important concern to understand British and American accents. The examples are plentiful indeed. One of them is the sound of alphabet ‘R’ which is usually uttered stronger in American accent rather than British. Try to hear the sounds ‘chair’, ‘hear’, ‘water’, ‘clear’, and ‘pure’ and the differences of those accents will be heard. One more example, pronouncing alphabet ‘a’ in a certain word, such as: bath, laugh, ask, class, chance.

In conclusion, British and American accents have more than a few of distinctions. Three common things which are so contrastive are the word selection, where they put a stress, and how they pronounce it. After observing and studying those differences, it is clear that both of the accents contain their own uniqueness that differentiates them with each other. 

      There are numerous way to learn and train your English faster. Most people who want to master this language will take a course or hire a private English teacher to teach them. Beside, writing is also considered as one of fastest way to learn English. Regarding to writing, you can write an article to broaden our sense and ability of English, post it in a blog to make it more interesting as well as to show your project to anyone who may needs it.

Personally, I have one creative way to improve my English and it is regarding to writing. Well… my first strategy is by getting use to talk always in English with my best friend. One of my best friend named Roudhatul Jannah is a girl who possessed an excellent skills of speaking English.

Her accent is just about almost the same with native speaker -Lol… I’m so happy <3. It may sounds exaggerated but I’m being sincere and honest. Her language ability specially in speaking is even better than several lecturers in my university. Every time I go out with her, she always forces me to talk in English. That’s why I think my speaking skills getting more advanced every time I get use to speak with her. Omg where are we now? Let’s go back to our first topic:p

My creative way to increase my English is this….

Yup, I use to write a diary every day, in English. It sounds usual isn’t it? What makes it special is that I draw lots of thing to make my diary cuter and more interesting to re-read again. People call this kind of thing as “doodle planner/doodle diary”. It is simply refers as journal that filled by your everyday activities, schedules, unusual experiences, and everything about yourself. Then you can decorate it with your photos or cool picture from internet, put a cute stickers, draw something with your crayons and watercolors, or using colorful sticky notes and washitapes. So this is my first doodle diary…

        Believe it or not, writing and drawing at the same time make me feel that writing is not a boring thing to do. It is almost the fact that common people who learn English will probably feel that writing is the hardest thing to do, including me and you, but that hard situation can be resolved gradually if you have a will to get rid of that pessimistic thought and try to learn more. Begin with writing a really simple and basic things—personal experience, study plan, etc—, then splash a little bit of art to your diary, you will found it interesting and begin to like it, trust me J

Writing doodle diary also really good to keep your memories stay alive in a form of hand writing. Including me, you must have experienced numerous experience in whole life, and you may forgot about those little things which happened; but by write it down and read it in the future may be can make you smile, laugh, cry, and feel nostalgic. Write a diary may sounds just like a regular writing, but actually for beginner it can positively affect your writing ability, too. Moreover, the combination of pictures and other decorations on it will boost your willingness over writing habit. As a result you will write and write again. Your doodle diary will be served as a reminder of mistakes you've made, lists of what you like and dislike, accomplishments you're proud of, and so many great moments that you want to remember.

            Here is a sneak-peak of my doodle diary….

   

 I've already started mine, when will yours? ^^

Now days, there are various ways to learning English. Most people will commonly taking certain English course to improve their English. Nevertheless, there are also numerous people that prefer to use another media like internet. Using the internet connection, People could open various websites that are useful for increasing their English comprehension.Website for learning English usually provides video, audio, and reading materials so that people can experience learning with various forms. By the invention of English website, learning is no longer with just sitting in class and listening teacher explanation. There are abundant total of good English websites offered when you search it on Google. I want to give a brief review of one website that is appealing for upgrading the English skill recently. The website is www.englishcentral.com.

www.englishcentral.com. is a full-English site which presents so many interesting videos and provide it with subtitle and question to test viewers’ understanding at the end of the play. This website claims that it is the leading provider of online English conversation solutions. The material here are the arrangement of web’s best English video, a proprietary Intellispeech assessment technology and an adaptive vocabulary learning system and live tutor.

             How does the website work?

www.englishcentral.com is so easy to use. The options presented are simple and understandable even for the beginner website user. In the picture below, there are several options in the left side of the site that related to topic of the videos, while there are several skills provided at the bottom of topic options.

Viewers may choose the topic that they interest most, and the learning video will appear based on the topic chosen. The skills as well, there are 5 basic skills offered in here, communication, grammar, pronunciation, test preparation, and vocabulary building.

The level of learner comprehension is also available here; see the three options displayed above the list of video. By clicking the level of learner—beginner, intermediate, advanced, viewers can watch the video that is most suitable for their intelligence level. Beginner is usually for people who learn English for not a long time, intermediate is specifically for the one who already taking several courses of English and know a bit of basic English rule, while an advance option is for people who are almost mastered this language and now how to use the language properly in real life context.

At the upper right side of the website, there is a search option, account option, and the language option. Below is the view of account information. Using this feature, viewers can create their own account and join other people in this English community. they can see their entire progress, rank among all the viewer in this website, and the vocabulary that they have already acquired so far.

. All the new vocabulary that is presented in the learning video is listed in ‘my words’ option, it is precisely below the search option. When this option is clicked, the list of words from the video watched before is automatically shown.

When the viewers already choose the topic, the level, and the skill by clicking them, the list of videos will appear. The next step is to choose the video. The picture below on the previous page is one of the video that appear when the viewers choose a grammar skill. There will be several units which are related to the grammar selected. Right above the video, there are three option of the learning progress—watch, learn, and speak. In ‘watch’ option, viewers will simply watch the video with the English subtitle at the bottom.

When the viewers click the ‘learn’ option, the website will test viewers skill by requesting them to fill in the blank; fill the missing word. The purpose of this test is to gain a new vocabulary related to the content and to test the writing ability. Meanwhile, viewers can test how well their pronunciation by clicking the ‘speak’ option. In this section, the website will ask the viewers to follow what the speaker in the video said in order to find out the proper way to pronounce those words.

Meanwhile, at the bottom of the page there is several items related to the website, there is even the face book page on the right bottom of this site. If the viewers have a face book, they can like the englishcentral.com page and join other friends in face book that also use this website.

             What are the pros?

There are quite a few advantages of using this website as an online language tutor. First, it provides a distinctive topics (e.g. academic english, bussiness english, etc) that the viewers can choose based on what they are interested the most. The lever of learner is also quite advantageous thing due to the fact that viewers IQ level of the language may be different from one another. By three levels provided in this website, viewers can decide which one the most comforts and fits their IQ level well.

This website also offers a set of specific skill that the viewers may choose. If they want to master the grammar, just simply select the ‘grammar’ skill, when they want to improve their communication skill, they can choose that skill and the video will manually directed based on specific skill needed.

Numerous studies have demonstrated that vocabulary acquisition is a crucial component to language acquisition and fluency. www.englishcentral.com  has developed a unique vocabulary learning tool that has over 20,000 headwords. They stated that the power of their system rests in the use of "in-content" learning that allows users to see multiple examples (and collocations) of words from authentic video clips

The core of the website system is with using video as a media to enhance people English ability. What is special about this website is the use of contextual teaching, it is a real world emphasis on teaching. In other words, relating what is being taught into the context of the real situation. So viewers can acquiring the new vocabulary and skill as well as knowing how to use it properly in the real life context. By watch the video and fill in the blank, viewers know the use of certain words right in the content. This site also very useful to increase the ability of pronouncing the words because of the ‘speak’ feature in here. There is also the rank space that can grade as well as track the viewers process of learning which is very helpful to measure how far the viewers can follow the tutor.

There is also no advertisement which are usually appear in common websites. With no add, this website looks so exclusively sophisticated, it looks high-class as well.

www.englishcentral.com also show the process of mastering the language by giving a short but meaningful explanation in one picture. It will make the viewers more interested to learn here. Another benefit of this picture is to increase their motivation to boost their English ability in here.

This website even confirm that they have been adopted in huge amount of universities from all over the world. As the picture illustrated above, several famous universities abroad already join this website. This website popularity will make the viewers gradually trust it to improve their English. The view of 400 universities as well as the companies that work together with www.englishcentral.com made this website sounds really fascinating and trustworthy.

             What are the cons?

It is such a pity that this website only presented in a few language. There is even no Indonesian language available here. It is a little bit hard for the viewers that haven’t master English really well. The website also require a registration of email/ face book to learn further. Imagine if the viewers do not have email or face book account, they cannot open the course and video, as the result, this website will be inefficient.

Another con in here is that the score/rank after practicing the material will be terrible if the viewers pronounce the words not exactly like the speaker. In fact, people speak the same word a little differently because of the diversity of the accent. So it is quite hard to achieve a high score if the viewers cannot utter the word and set the intonation precisely like the speaker in the video.

Overall, I’m very satisfied using this website and I found it really helpful for those who want to upgrade their English ability, especially in speaking and vocabulary building.

 When it comes to Disney princess movie, I bet everyone could imagine a view of the whole movies they have created. It must be very amusing, popular, and it usually remarkable for some reason. A Disney princess movie are full of magic, sweet fairy tale, beautiful quality of animated characters and colors, etc. Almost all of Disney princess movie provide such an epic and memorable plot which made us as a viewer will remember and give a best mark for every movie they have created. For a frozen movie as well, this movie contains a magnificent plot. There is a plot twisted made me interest to watch this, the plot twisted contained here will make a viewer could not expect what will happen next. Personally I also included a person who love this movie so much and I think this such a remarkable movie that Disney ever made.

Compared with others Disney princess movie, the most contrast different is about the partner who will accompany the main character. We all know that Ariel has a prince in a ‘little mermaid’, Snow White married a handsome prince after she were rescued by him from death with a true love kiss, so do Aurora, she live happily ever after with her prince. There are lots of another princess story which the princess usually  end up with. They are with their own partner at the end.

 A princess story that we know all this time was a story of a weak ordinary beauty girl who wait for her hero/prince to save her life. Different with a story-line offered in frozen. This movie moreover concern about the real love between siblings, making anyone watch this certainly will feel how sweet and warm a relationship between sisters can be. This movie can be a good explanation and good example which show to people that love is not always a relationship between couple as many people think  in this era. Love could means different in so many aspect, it can be the affection of family, friend, brother and sister somehow. The theme of this story is more special comparing another princess movie which often use love between couple as a theme, such as Cinderella, sleeping beauty, beauty and the beast, little mermaid, etc.

The plot as well, was very unique and unexpected. Who could imagine that prince Hans –A prince charming that looks so fall in love with Anna at some first scenes, sacrifice himself to protect Arendelle royal kingdom at first—was a bad people behind all of the plot story; he is a true villain. This was such a creative plot twisted. If we take a look on the other princess movie, all the villain looks can be spotted clearly, supported by their own appearance and their  evil plan/intention to disturb the main character’s live. In little mermaid, they have Ursula, in a sleeping beauty they have malleficent, in tangled movie they have mother Gothel —An old witch who possessed a power of everlasting beauty—  and the other Disney princess movie. But the movie frozen success of making a person who we think as a main hero, unexpectedly becomes a villain. I even think the villain in this story is Duke Wesselton at first, that was true in some point. However, who know there is another villain exist, this epic story line tells different.

Another protagonist character, Olaf —A funny snowman which made by Elsa when she was playing with her sister in their childhood— also success of gaining a popularity among the children around the world. Olaf cuteness and his naive personality made anyone watch this movie would love Olaf so much. Even he was just a supported character and did not appear in every scenes of the movie, his funny character success make him as a remarkable character. And another good point of Olaf, behind all the cuteness and foolish motion that he made, he also took a special part in a several ending parts of the movie. He made a conclusion that the true love will melted a frozen heart was not a true love between Christoff  and Anna, but the sacrifice of true love between Queen Elsa and Anna. He also comes and give to Anna such a good advice when Anna locked in the room by Hans. Here was a quotes of Olaf that I remember:

“Some people are worth melting for”

What a sweet quotes that has a very deeply meaning of affection, this one is my favorite scene of Olaf, I love Olaf so much and I also like a warmhug  xD

There is a similarity between Frozen movie and another disney princess movie. The feminism is clearly inferred in this movie, means that the princess is no longer a weak girl who need a man’s help, every princess has a power which could made them as a remarkable person. This aspect I think is quite similar with the previous movie which Disney made, Brave. The theme offered in ‘Brave’ movie also not a love-line between couple, but it is about the affection between mother and daughter. Another similarity also spotted when we compared between Frozen and Tangled –a story about long-haired girl who cursed by magical hair because of a holy flower. The similarity is in the character. Rapunzel is quite resembles Anna, even their careless and fearless character is quite same, Flynn is quite similar with Christoff, and Sven remain us about Maximus, a smart and funny horse which exist in Tangled movie.

Even this movie was such a hit that Disney ever made (of course in my opinion), there are also several point that I like to tell and critic about this story. First one is about the source of magic ability that Elsa possessed of. This movie didn’t describe why did elsa has magical power while her sister has not. Comparing with the movie ‘Tangled’, the source of magical hair that Rapunzel possessed was explained well at the beginning of the story. So that this is will left a question mark among the viewer, where and when did Elsa acquire such an ability to play with ice, even her parents didn’t have that ability. So why she has those things? Did her magical power were exist since her birth? I think this matter should be explained in this movie actually. At least, give a view scene about the source of Elsa’s power.

Another minus which spotted in this movie is a hard decision of considering which one is the main character of this movie actually, Anna or Elsa? When we already watch a movie till the end, the main character of this movie should be Anna. But unfortunately she displace her character comparing with Elsa. Elsa Should not be the main character of this movie, but her power, her frosty style, the elegance of her appearance and as a cool-hearted princess certainly made her become more popular than the main character, Anna. I bet there are lots of people who admire queen Elsa much more than an ordinary girl Anna. Anna appearance here is just too casual, even her clothes is not looks like a princess usual dress.

Comparing with the previous princess movies, the main character is easily recognize. Aurora is the main character in ‘Sleeping Beauty’, Belle is the main character in ‘Beauty and the Beast’, Rapunzel in the main character in the movie ‘tangled’ etc. In Frozen movie we have two princess, so which one is better? Which one is the real heroine? So as viewer I think Disney is a bit failed to make Anna as the main character can be seen and popular as much as Elsa’s level of popularity.

The relationship between sisterhood is also not explained too much in this movie. In the beginning, Elsa and Anna look really close each other. But after the accident which injured Anna, their sweet sister relationship became almost invincible. The explanation of how was their live after separated because the accident is needed to make a viewer sense more love of sibling’s atmosphere. The explanation of how both of them growth until their adult is not enough to be explained in just a short song “do you want to built a snowman”.

In addition, as usual as many Disney princess’s story line, there is a kiss scene in this movie, it is the same thing with lots of Disney princess movie beforehand. As a viewer, I wonder is this really a movie for a kids? Kisses, love, romantic scene is not supposed to be seen in children’s movie actually. Of course this is based on my perspective and belief. Children should not be exposed in some adult scene too early. But regrettably, almost all of Disney princess movie has such of this romantic things. Let’s say may be Disney made this movie not only for children but also for everyone in all age, but this is a cartoon, an animated and fairy tales movie which children loves so much.I’m pretty sure that the viewer of all Disney princess movie is a child under age in majority. With all the romantic scene between boys and girls, watching this kind of thing is somehow negative for children.

Overall, I think this movie is a good movie to watch, there is a good moral lesson and a brand new perspective which maybe change a people common point of view of Disney movie. All the soundtrack songs presented here were really nice too, the melody is easy to be remembered, and the lyrics are rock! I give 8 from 10 rate for this movie.