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Problems facing different nationalitiesSpeakers of other languages have various difficulties learning English that differ based on their native language. The more different the native language is from English, the more likely there will be various difficulties. Speakers of korean, a non-European language completely different from English, have their own unique set of challenges when learning English as a second language. As the two languages have no similar origins, korean speakers will likely have a harder time acquiring vocabulary than a German or French student ? languages in which there are many cognates. The korean language uses its own alphabet, Hangul, so beginning students would have to familiarize themselves with the Roman alphabet. However, they are heavily exposed to it in their daily lives, so learning shouldn?t be too much of a difficulty for them. The English language has a few sounds that are not found in korean, such as th sounds used in the words then or this, v sounds and f sounds. Also, differences in the way syllable structure works in korean may lead korean speakers of English to add a vowel sound at the end of words that end in consonants. koreans will likely also have difficulties with English grammar, as the grammatical structures are quite different. The korean language follows the Subject-Object-Verb word order. It is usually not hard for them to learn the English SVO pattern, but it is hard to get them to break away from this pattern and learn the exceptions. Many times they produce written text that all start with the subject. One large difference is that korean grammatical structures have no direct correspondence with those in English. Because of this, korean speakers might use a noun instead of an adjective, or an adjective instead of a noun: Example: My daughter did not go to school today because she is illness. (Instead of she is sick, or she has an illness). Another language that is quite different from English is Russian, and many Russians find English a very difficult language to learn. One of the main differences is grammar. In English, meaning is changed through the movement and addition of words (i.e. auxiliary verbs). The Russian language, however, changes meaning with inflections and additions to the beginning or end of words. Russians also have to adapt to the Roman alphabet, as Russians use the Cyrillic alphabet. The idea of articles is completely foreign to Russian speakers, and English has a very complex set of articles. This may be a challenge area. There are areas of English pronunciation that Russians may have a problem with. Russian only has 5 vowel sounds, whereas English has 12, plus 8 diphthongs. They may especially have difficulties with her/cur, and also with sat/set and sit/seat. French and English, two Indo-European languages with Latin roots, have similar grammatical structures and vocabulary. When the Normans invaded Britain in the 11th century, this greatly influenced the development of the English language. Despite many similarities, there are some key areas that French speakers have difficulty with, such as pronunciation. As the French language does not pronounce the letter ?H?, many times speakers will mispronounce words by omitted the H, such as ?ave, ?eard, instead of have and heard. The tip of the tongue is not used in French, so speakers will have trouble forming ?th sounds such as in then, clothes, and think. The auxiliary word ?do? does not exist in French, and thus speakers sometimes have trouble correctly forming questions in English, instead using a sentence as a question -- He is rich? or inverting subject and verb: How often see you her? When Spanish speakers learn English, they usually find the biggest challenge in correct pronunciation. Spanish has only 5 pure vowels and 5 dipthongs. English has 12 pure vowels and 8 dipthongs. Spanish speakers therefore may have problems producing and even perceiving the English vowel sounds. Sounds that they may have failure differentiating include ship/sheep and fool/full. Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-native_pronunciations_of_English http://esl.fis.edu/grammar/langdiff/